I'm the busiest person I know with a part time job and a heavy schedule of classes and workshops to teach. I play in a traditional Australian bush band and love to keep in touch with the grandkids, family and friends. I also battle to find time to go to the gym and to stop and smell the roses at least once in while. Finding time to indulge in my fabric passion is difficult and requires a lot of time management. I usually head straight into my workroom very shortly after arriving home each day. This half hour or so helps me to unwind from the days events. In doing this I establish that I am in creative mode, so after I’ve stopped to watch the news, cook dinner, chat with my husband, make phone calls or whatever else needs to be done, I find it easy to go back to my room and continue where I left off.
Learn about colour. Buy a colour wheel and experiment. Be adventurous and don’t always choose fabrics that are safe (too closely matched). As a rule I think that the more fabrics you use the more you can use. Don’t always opt for a range of fabrics that “GO” together (known as a story), step outside your comfort zone a bit - try taking a 10 percent risk. Join a class with a teacher who can help you through this process.
Try ATC's (artists trading cards) these 2 1/2inch x 3 1/2 inch miniature works of art are quite easy to make. Research the subject on the internet and even use the net to find people to trade with. The tradition is that they must be traded, not sold, however they can be given with no expectation of receiving one in return, this is referred to as a random act of kindness (a RAK). I've made heaps of these little treasures and give them as a random act of kindness to just about everyone I know, including all of my students. If I receive one as a trade this will be a wonderful bonus. The important things to remember are to make sure they are 2 1/2inches x 3 1/2inches (very important), they should consist of 3 layers i.e. fabric on either side of some sort of stiffening and have your contact details (brief or full depending on how you feel) on the back. Have fun.
Don’t get stuck in a rut - experiment, experiment, experiment. Read books and magazines, join classes and workshops. Keep a book for ideas, colour schemes, interesting pictures etc. these can be quite inspiring. Give yourself permission to play.
It's easy to print photos onto fabric through your own inkjet printer. Look for the great paper backed fabric sheets. I've also used bubble jet set to prepare my own fabric for printing on and I've been impressed with the results. Extravorganza is also worth a try.
I don’t wash fabrics for contemporary projects, however for traditional projects I don't even put fabric into my work room until it has been washed. I know that whether or not to wash fabrics is a hotly debated subject, but I'm just not prepared to take the risk of having a fabric run, or shrink. Most fabrics only shrink a very little but I once bought a fabric that shrunk from a width of 43 inches down to 37inches! and it wasn't an inexpensive fabric.
The 1/4inch foot you use on your sewing machine may not be enabling you to sew a perfect scant 1/4inch seam. It's so important to make sure the seam really is a SCANT 1/4inch for traditional quilt making. To check your seams, cut 2, 2inch strips of fabric very accurately, then sew them together along the long edge. Press them carefully and measure the newly created unit. It should measure exactly 3 1/2inches across. If not adjust your seam allowance until you've got it right.
Rotary cutting - If you are new to rotary cutting, then I suggest you buy 1/2m of cheap fabric or calico and cut it up into various shapes and sizes before starting on expensive fabric. You need to become confident and accurate with your cutter. Remember to always retract the blade between cuts. I’ve seen a couple of nasty accidents.
Use the finest pins you can find. I prefer Clover patchwork pins.
Tilt your sewing machine towards you with the aid of a slant board or a couple of door wedges. This enables you to clearly see what you are sewing while keeping good posture. I have neck and back problems and this has really has made a big difference to my ability to sew for longer periods of time without pain.
My best advice to beginner quilt makers, is that there are really only 3 things to get right - accurate cutting, sewing an accurate scant 1/4inch seam and careful pressing. If you master these then most of the other steps along the way will fall into place easily.
Pressing your seams - Press, don't do what I call "creative ironing" which is likely to stretch or distort your work. Set the seam first by pressing the unit before opening out, then gently finger press the seam over and press again with the iron. Always use an up and down motion rather than dragging the iron across the unit or block or vigorously rubbing the iron across your work. I always use a dry iron unless I particularly need steam for the technique I'm working on.
Spray starch will help to stabilise your work, particularly useful if you are working with bias edges, very open weave fabric or strips cut from across the width (weft) of the fabric, but be sure to wash it out afterwards, I've heard that moths love it.
Do you know about the warp and weft of fabric. The warp is the straight of grain - down the length of the fabric parallel to the selvage edge. The weft runs across from selvage to selvage. Someone once told me the easy way to remember it is - the weft runs from weft (sorry, left) to right !
Don't ever be tempted to machine sew over a pin. It will not only dull your machine needle, it can be quite dangerous. I had to take a friend of mine to hospital to have the tip of a sewing machine needle removed from her eye. She sewed over a pin and the tip of the sewing machine needle broke off and flew into her eye. It fortunately did not pierce the eye but became lodged between the eye ball and bottom eye lid. A freak accident I'll admit but a very anxious time for everyone concerned.
While on the subject of machine needles. I accidentally sewed over my index finger 1 week before Christmas 2004, which is definitely not to be recommended. The pedal on my machine was malfunctioning and didn't always stop the machine from sewing when I removed my foot. I knew this was a problem, but because I was in a rush to finish a quilt for my grand daughter for Christmas, I decided that I could deal with the problem and get it fixed in the new year... WRONG decision. The pain was very intense. The time taken in doctors surgeries, x-ray departments etc was rather lengthy (2 full days). The loss of sleep over 3 nights due to the throbbing pain was hard to handle. The day in hospital and the surgery to have the tip of the needle which had broken off inside my finger was very expensive (my out of pocket expenses were over $1000). My finger nail which had to be partly removed to get the needle out took weeks to regrow and the recovery time slowed up not only my patchwork quilting efforts but made Christmas and just about everything else more difficult. Tegan finally got her quilt in late January. Remember safety comes first.
Research Fibonacci Number Sequencing and the Golden Rectangle ratio. It’s great for achieving aesthetically pleasing proportion in your designs. Have you ever looked at a quilt and quite liked it, perhaps you couldn’t fault the colours and the workmanship was superb… yet there was something missing, perhaps you just couldn’t put your finger on the problem. I know I’ve been in this position with some of my own quilts and with quilts on display at shows or in magazines. I now know that the problem in many cases is that the proportions are wrong, perhaps just the length to width ratio, or sashings/borders that are not in harmony with the overall proportions of the quilt. Search the net or join one of my classes to find out how the simple 1.618 rule and the number sequence 1.2.3.5.8.13... etc. can make a difference. I've been using this newly acquired information in my quilt designs for several years and love the results.
Buy yourself the best, sharpest unpicker you can find. All quilters have to unpick at times, and it's frustrating to have to struggle with clumsy blunt equipment. We all deserve the best.
For marking quilting lines I generally only use a soft pencil or a white chalk marker (the new ones similar to a mechanical pencil are fantastic). I stay away from blue markers, fading markers etc as I'm unsure about what the chemicals involved will do to the fabric over time.
Always cut long strips such as sashings, borders, bindings etc from along the length of the fabric rather than from across the width. There is no stretch in the fabric from the true straight of grain.
The back of a quilt is still part of the quilt, so don't always just opt for the easy way out and automatically back your quilt with a single piece of fabric. Consider piecing the back from left over fabrics to make it more interesting. Or make it truly reversible by quilting two quilt tops together.
A quilt isn't a quilt until it's quilted. Scant quilting on the main body of the quilt and neglecting the borders completely just isn't good enough. A simple cross hatch or gentle curve is quite easy to achieve and makes a huge difference. If quilting seems too difficult on a large quilt, consider learning how to quilt as you go.
It’s important to quilt evenly across the quilt to avoid distortion.
Don't ever be tempted to cut a border strip that is longer than the quilt, then sew it on and cut the left over bit off. It's a recipe for a distorted quilt. The measurement through the centre of your quilt is the true measurement of your quilt. When adding borders, always cut the borders to the centre measurement. Quilts often flare a little on the edges, so if you were to measure along the edge and cut the borders to this size you could easily end up with a quilt that has wavy distorted edges.
To make quilts lie flatter when hung on the wall. I always use a flat piece of wood rather than a round piece of dowel. Or in some cases I use a piece of old curtain rail that has been cut to size, these are reasonably flat and don't sag under the weight of medium to large quilts. In some cases I also attach a sleeve to the bottom edge of the quilt and put a flat piece of wood inside to weight it down a little.
I've been using YLI Silk thread for appliqué. I also use Clover No 10 sharps. If you've tried hand sewing and not really liked it, I urge you to give silk and Clover No 10 sharps a try. I've managed to convert several of my students to actually liking hand sewing by using this combination.
Quilting gloves make all quilting jobs easier. I've tried disposable rubber gloves, finger stalls and the rubbery material sometimes used for removing stubborn lids from jars but didn't really like any of these options. Cotton quilting gloves with the little rubbery spots really do grip the fabric and are comfortable to wear. They reduce tension in your hands arms shoulders and neck and put you firmly in control.
Free machine quilting isn’t all that difficult. Give it a try and put in some regular practice. If you were to learn to play a piano you wouldn’t just jump in and start playing a tune on day one. You would learn some scales and start practicing regularly. It’s the same with free machine quilting - drop the feed dogs and relax, try playing some music, wear your quilting gloves, tilt your machine forward a little and enjoy. It’s worth taking the time to master this technique.
It's very important for both raw edges to be aligned when sewing a seam. If one has slipped a little it really is worth unpicking the seam
Be organised, keep a small container topped up with hand sewing jobs and make sure you have spare needles, scissors etc in the box. You'll find it easy to take it with you and fit a little hand sewing into even the smallest bits of spare time.
A couple of years ago I had around 20 works in progress. This made me feel very guilty about starting a new project (something I really enjoy), so I made a deal with myself and decided I would finish two projects before I would allow myself to start a new one. It took a while to reduce the backlog using this two steps forward one step back approach. I also culled the pile and discarded the projects that I had seriously lost interest in.