My guild puts together kits for members to finish off for donation. This month I took a baby quilt to practice some free motion quilting on.
When I got it home I found 2 pieces of fabric and a polyester batting. The top was a yellow and white check and the backing was plain white cotton. Pretty boring I thought. So what to do with this?
I decided that I wanted to try something new. I recently purchased something called "quilting templates" from June Tailor. These are small shapes that are made of fabric with a sticky back to them. Not sure if they work well or not, but that was my challenge today, to see how well they work.
The concept is simple, you place the sticker onto the quilt, and the stitch around it. This allows you to make simple shapes without marking! Sounded good and they say they can be used 50 times each. This I had to see for myself.
The kit I tried out was animals. I chose the paw print and the cat shapes to work with. First I divided the quilt top into equal sections (like blocks)by folding and pressing lines. First in half one way then in half the other way. I kept doing this until I got 16 equal sections. I then drew with chalk over these fold lines so I could see them better. Once I had my sections done I traced the paw prints on every other block. I traced these as there were 5 pieces that would have made me nuts to stick and then re-stick each block. The shape was simple enough to trace and stitch.
But then it was time for the cat! I stuck it on one block and stitched around it. Not to bad for the first attempt. But then it was time to peel and reuse it on the next block. Came off pretty good, and also stuck again. I can tell the adhesive is not as strong now that I have done 3, I do not see this lasting to 50 times!
So an idea came to me while do thing process. A cheaper and maybe better method. (Sorry June Tailor)But why can't I just trace the shape onto freezer paper, press it to the block? I could stack several pieces of freezer paper, staple them and trace on the top one. Then cut them all out at once. I could make several of the same shape that way. Or I could do one, and reuse it if I don't mind getting up to press it each time.
So now my quilt top will have paw prints and cats on the 16 sections I created. Once I get all the shapes quilted, I will then do a meandor or stipple around the shapes to fill in the background. This way the quilt will have some design elements even if it is just a solid piece of fabric.
I know you want to see photos, but I haven't taken any yet. Sorry, you will just have to use your imagination, and hope that my descriptions are good enough for now.
Sewing Sundays, are about sewing not photographing. Maybe I can start with Sewing Sunday, and then move to photo editing Mondays and posting Tuesdays.........but that sounds like work, this is supposed to be for
fun!
Added photos out of guilt for those who need the visuals of what I was doing. As you can see in the first photo, I have a few cats and all the paw prints done now. The trouble with this kind of idea is there were a lot of stop and starts with the stitching, especially with the paw prints. I found that frustrating as there were more thread bobbles or knots than I would have liked.
The second photo shows a close up (or as close as I care to share) of the designs. you can see the folds and light chalk marks that defined my areas for quilting. Once I get all the cats done, I will just meandor around these shapes and not actually quilt a grid. That way if the cats or paws aren't centered (and they aren't) it won't be as noticeable.
I welcome your comments or thoughts on this quilt as always. If I remember to take a photo with the sticker on for the cats I will post that on my next up date, which should be next Sunday. (hopefully)
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