Vacation for Me, 20% Savings on Wide Quilt Backing Fabrics for You!

The Studio will be CLOSED

Thurs. May 23 through Weds. May 29

To compensate for the inconvenience,

all wide quilt backs have been marked down 20%

As always, local customers may order through the website and include a comment that they wish to pick up in-store. I’ll subtract the shipping costs when I finalize the sale, and email you when your order is ready to be picked up. Mail-order customers, please be aware that no shipments will go out during the above dates, but I’ll send them as soon as possible after May 29.

Edge-to-Edge or Custom Quilting – Part 4 – Questions, Anyone?

So I was going to post photos of some of the quilts I’ve done, and tell you why I chose the design I did. I find I learn a lot just by looking at photos of quilts, or quilts at shows. I analyze what I like and what I don’t like about a particular type of quilting, and try to remember that when I’m choosing quilting designs. And if I can explain to you why I chose what I did, maybe that will help you too.

BUT, it is taking me SOOO much time to find photos, clean them up, resize them, then write a description, etc. So instead, I thought what if I answered some of your questions on anything I’ve discussed up to now, or on quilts you may be working on? If someone has a top that they are puzzled on how to quilt, email me a photo, and I will try to give you suggestions.

In the meantime, you can view some of my recent customer quilts on my Flickr account, and I’d be happy to answer any questions you may have about why I chose the patterns I did.

We Have a Winner!

Thank you to everyone who entered my blog contest by answering the question “Why Do You Quilt?”. It was really fun hearing all the different answers. There were several recurring themes….being creative; giving gifts from the heart; challenging yourself yet having fun & relaxing; being therapeutic or relieving stress; nourishing the soul, an ego booster and the friends and community found within the quilting world. Wow – I wonder how many other hobbies can offer us all of those things?? Aren’t we lucky!

Speaking of lucky, I used a random number generator and came up with our winner………Julie Thomsen!! Julie gets her choice of any of my cotton wide backings (not flannel or batiks, sorry). I’ve sent you an email, Julie, please reply with your choice of fabric and your mailing address and I’ll get your prize out to you.

And don’t forget, if you didn’t win this time, there is a 2nd way you can win. (See rules here next to the #2 symbol.) Purchase any of my wide backs during March and you will be entered into the second drawing. At the end of the month I will choose one ticket and refund the amount of that backing to the customer. Click here to shop my wide selection of quilt backings.

If you are on Facebook and have not ‘Liked’ my AndiCrafts Quilting Studio page yet, be sure and do so. You don’t want to miss out on the quilt photos, funny links, and Facebook only specials.

Edge-to-Edge or Custom Quilting? Part 3

So now we know what is meant by Edge-to-Edge (or Overall) Quilting and Custom Quilting, but how do we decide which one is right for a quilt? I usually consider 3 things :

#1 How will the quilt will be used? Is it for a child or college student – meant to be loved, dragged around, washed often? (Choose E2E).

Edge-to-Edge Daisy pattern on baby girl’s quilt

Or is it to be brought out only on special occasions, or maybe hung on a wall – an heirloom to be passed down through the generations? (Choose custom or heirloom).

#2 Will the design of the top allow fancy quilting to show? For example, an appliqued quilt top will almost always be enhanced with a custom quilting job, as will a Lone Star or other pattern with large areas of plainer fabric.

The plain background of the Lone Star quilt lets custom quilting designs stand out.

Whereas scrap quilts with lots of small pieces, or quilts with busy fabrics, often will not show any kind of fancy quilting designs so an overall pattern is more suitable.

A strippy quilt with no defined blocks is the perfect place for an edge-to-edge design.

#3 What is the customer’s budget? (Or if you are quilting your own, how much time do you want to put into the quilting?)

After asking yourself these questions, you should have a better idea of whether E2E or Custom is the right choice.

Let’s say you decide on E2e. Now, what pattern to choose? The other considerations are the age and sex of the recipient – I wouldn’t put hearts or flowers on a 19-year-old boy’s quilt, nor would I put basketballs on a 6-year-old girl’s quilt (unless she really happens to be into basketball!). I often choose based on the recipient’s interests, or some motif in the fabric. Sometimes the quilt will tell me how it wants to be quilted. Now that may sound weird – but with some quilts, as soon as they come in the door, an idea will pop in my head of how to quilt it.

Softball T-Shirts made into a quilt just screamed for an overall softball quilting pattern, featuring bats, balls and gloves.

Whereas others may take me a LOOOOONG time to decide. That is called the “Stand and Stare” factor. Because I do exactly that – I stand there, staring at the quilt for many days, trying to decide what’s right. This usually happens with custom or heirloom quilts, which is another reason why they cost more. I often have to go searching for or spend time designing just the right pattern to fit a particular space.

I plan on showing you some more examples, but it may take me a while to find them. I’m VERY good about taking photos of every quilt before it leaves my Studio. I USED to be very good about filing those photos into the customer’s folder as I took them. I’m NO LONGER good at the filing thing. I now have 12,500 – YES TWELVE-THOUSAND-FIVE-HUNDRED photos on my laptop!!!! Okay, not all of them are of customer quilts. I’m guestimating 1000 photos are of my quilts and quilts I’ve taken at quilt shows, and 500 are personal photos of my house, and yard, and dogs, and family, etc. That leaves ONLY 11,000 photos that I need to organize!!! I should be able to get that done in a couple of hours, don’t you think????? So as soon as I get that done, maybe I can post some examples of what I chose to quilt on a top and why…….

In the meantime, don’t forget to visit the website to see the large selection of wide quilt backs I now carry. Purchase one (or more) during March to be entered to win that back for free! And if you feel the information I’m presenting here would be valuable to other quilters, please feel free to share my blog with your friends, on your online groups, Facebook, Pinterest……wherever.

As for me, it’s back to sorting photos……

A Recent Customer Quilt

I’m working on Part 3 of my article on types of quilting and when to choose which one. But in the mean time, how about some eye-candy?

If you’re on Facebook, you may have seen this already. But I really had fun on this one, so I wanted to share. It’s called Glacier Star, which is a paper-pieced pattern by Judy Niemeyer. My customer did a great job piecing this. I think I would have given up before I got it finished (good thing she likes to piece and I like to quilt!). She wanted custom quilting, not too dense, thread to match, but other than that it was up to me.

Glacier Star, a Judy Niemeyer pattern

I wanted to play up the circular area in the center of the quilt so I quilted a circle with flame designs around the center star. I know she doesn’t like dense background fills, so I wasn’t sure what to do in the rest of the cream area around the flying geese. Then I decided that 1/4 inch outlining would be just the thing.

I like to have continuity in a quilt, so I repeated the ‘flame’ stitching from the center in the around the black spikes of the large star, and repeated the 1/4 inch outlining in the outer New York Beauty blocks.

Feathers would have been the obvious choice in the black areas, but I wanted to do something unexpected – so I chose an orange peel fill.

She was very happy with how it turned out, and I had a lot of fun quilting this one. Hope you enjoy the photos.

Edge-to-Edge or Custom Quilting? Part 2

So now that we know about overall/edge-to-edge quilting, (you can read my first post on that here) what exactly is custom quilting? Custom is any type of design that does NOT completely cover the quilt top with one pattern. There are actually different levels of custom quilting. I sometimes break them down into semi-custom, simple custom, full custom, and heirloom. (Other quilters may have different terminology.)

An example of semi-custom quilting. An overall design in the body of the quilt, with separate border treatments. (Click photo to enlarge)

The distinctions between levels is not clear cut. The simplest form (semi-custom) is an overall design in the body of the quilt, with a separate design in the border. But just as there is a wide variety of quilt tops, there are also many variations of custom quilting. Each time an additional treatment is added to a quilt, it adds time, complexity and cost. (A ‘treatment’ is each differing design, border, sashing, stippling around applique, etc.)

So if a quilt is made of 60 blocks, but they are all the same, I might only need to decide on one block design, one sashing design, and one border design. Another quilt may have only 30 blocks but they are all different. Now much more time needs to be spent on how to quilt each of the blocks. Therefore the first quilt might be simple custom (only 3 treatments), while the second quilt would be full custom.

Simple Custom – the same design in each block, with a different design in the sashing. (Click photo to enlarge)

A word about stitch-in-the-ditch (SID). Many customers come to me and say “Do something simple like SID”. When you are quilting on your regular sit down sewing machine, SID is fairly easy, as you have feed dogs to guide the quilt sandwich and pull it evenly through the machine. However, on a longarm machine it is quite different. Not only do we not have feed dogs, but we are ‘driving’ the machine around on the fabric, rather than pushing the fabric through the machine. It is very difficult to move the machine perfectly along the (hopefully ) straight line of the ‘ditch’. Most longarmers actually use an acrylic ruler to help guide the machine in that straight line (or along the twisty windy path around an applique design), and slow down considerably. So SID and other types of straight-line quilting are technically more difficult and slower than other types of LA quilting. For this reason, some longarmers do not offer it, or if they do they must charge a premium price for it. I actually like doing ruler work, and if you’ve seen the custom quilting I do, I often combine straight lines with other treatments. I love the way it looks, but it is time consuming, so it does cost more than other types of treatments.

Ruler work in the black sashing and outer border. These treatments take extra time to space evenly, mark, and sew with templates. (Click photo to enlarge)

Heirloom quilting is the top-of-the-line show quilt stuff. I could quilt two identical tops with feathers, but one could be full custom and the other could be heirloom. What’s the difference? On a full custom quilt my feathers would be more freeform random feathers that are not necessarily symmetrical or identical. Background fills would be medium to small sized. There would be some SID to separate perhaps the body of the quilt from the borders, but no extensive SID or ruler work.

Informal feathers – these are not marked and may be more randomly spaced. (Click photo to enlarge)

Quilt B (heirloom), would have more formal feathers, usually using marked designs to keep them looking alike. Background fills would be smaller, there would be more SID, and many of the designs would require measuring and math to be sure they are spaced evenly.

Formal feather border (Click photo to enlarge)

Center of applique quilt with heirloom quilting. (Click photo to enlarge)

I also try to come up with unique designs to fit the top – for instance once I had a quilt with a fleur-de-lis design in the fabric, and I repeated that design in open areas of the quilt. Which means I often custom design a motif just for that quilt.

Center of Wilderness quilt with custom designed pine cone motifs. (Click photo to enlarge)

Now that you know about some different types of quilting, there are a few questions you need to ask yourself in order to determine which type is right for your quilt. I’ll cover those questions in my next blog post. To be sure you don’t miss it, subscribe to my blog for future updates (on the upper left of this webpage, or below if you’re on a mobile device). You can also “Like” my page on Facebook. And feel free to share my site with your friends!

Part 3 of this article has been posted here

Win a FREE Queen-Sized Wide Quilt Back!

Would you like to win a free quilt back? I now carry almost 40 different wide fabrics on my Website and in my Studio.

I’m so excited to have such an extensive selection, that I thought I needed to celebrate. And what better way to celebrate than to have a giveaway!

There are actually TWO ways you can win!

Leave a comment below, telling me WHY you quilt? Quilting began as a way to keep warm by making practical bed covers from scraps of leftover or previously used fabric. But most of us no longer NEED to keep warm in this way. It would be much faster, not to mention less expensive, to purchase a ready made blanket or comforter. So WHY do you participate in this ‘crazy’ hobby of taking perfectly good, brand new fabric, cutting it up into tiny pieces, and then sewing it back together again?? What is it about quilting that calls to you?

Leave your comment by Sat. March 16, and I’ll draw one name at random. That person will win 2-3/4 yards (99″ x 108″) of THEIR CHOICE of any of my COTTON quilt backs (sorry, Batiks and Flannels are excluded from the giveaway). While you’re here, don’t forget to subscribe to my blog on the left side of this page (or below if you’re reading on a mobile device). That way you won’t miss any of my upcoming posts on choosing quilting designs for your quilt tops (see the first article here).

Purchase a wide quilt back from my Online Store or in the Studio any time during March. Each time you purchase a 2 yard or larger cut of one fabric, your name and the value of that particular backing will go into a drawing. (If you buy 6 backs, you get 6 chances!) At the end of the month, I’ll draw out one name, and I will reimburse you for the price you paid for the back!! So if you bought a 3 yard piece at $16.99/yd., I’ll write you a check for $50.97 (plus sales tax and/or shipping if applicable)! How cool is that???

Be sure and visit the Website to see all of the wide backs I’ve recently added. And check out the Clearance section for some great buys on notions, patterns and Paintstiks and accessories!

And since it will be lots of fun to read why people quilt, please share this with your quilting friends, on your Facebook page, or Tweet about it, etc. Thanks, and Good luck!!

Edge-to-Edge or Custom Quilting? Part 1

When deciding to work with a longarm quilter, or quilt your own top on a standup frame system, one of the first decisions you need to make is whether to have your quilt custom quilted or finished with edge-to-edge quilting. How do you decide? And what exactly are the differences?

Edge-to-edge quilting, also known as overall quilting, ignores the pieced design of the quilt top. A random, usually repeating pattern is stitched on all portions of the quilt. Sometimes this is done from the back of the machine, tracing a paper pattern called a pantograph (panto for short), with a laser light or stylus. An overall design can also be worked from the front of the machine as a freehand design – in effect the quilter is ‘doodling’ on the quilt top, making up the design as she goes.

An edge-to-edge pantograph quilting design

If you are a beginning longarm quilter, there are many things to learn – how to load the quilt on the frame and keep it square as you are quilting. How to choose threads and balance the tension between the top and bobbin threads. How to move the machine smoothly and evenly to get a consistent stitch length and lines that don’t wobble. If you are then trying to think about what design to stitch and how to not get boxed into a corner at the same time, sometimes it can get frustrating and overwhelming.

Using a pantograph pattern can support you like training wheels on a bicycle do. The wheels keep you from falling over while you are learning to pedal, steer, and keep your balance. A pantograph pattern gives you a map to follow, so you can focus your attention on keeping your movements smooth and even, instead of thinking of where to go next, and how to control the spacing so the design is even. Once you have quilted an entire quilt with a panto, I think you will find you have much more confidence in your ability to control your machine. Compare your first rows with the rows near the end – I bet your stitch length will be more even, and your long sweeping lines of stitching will have fewer wobbles.

A pantograph pattern on the back of the longarm machine.

Practicing a panto pattern also helps you learn to freehand. As you are following the pattern, notice how you need to slow down your movements on the long straighter sections (to keep the stitches from getting too large), and speed up as you are doing smaller, tighter motifs. When changing directions, you need to move in and out of points quickly or there will be a buildup of thread, resulting in a knot or the thread breaking. Pantos are a great way to learn the basics of longarm quilting, and while you are learning, you are finishing some of your quilt tops as well!

Although it’s been 12 years since I got my first longarm, I still remember the awe I felt at what this marvelous machine could accomplish, and my pride at finishing my first ‘real’ quilt top (I practiced on lots of muslin first), even though I just used a very simple panto on it!

The first quilt ever done on my longarm.
Quilted with the panto “Cotton Candy” by Norma Sharp.

In another post I’ll talk about Custom Quilting. If you don’t want to miss out, be sure and subscribe to my blog on the left side of this page (or down below if you’re on a mobile device) to be notified when I publish it!

Happy Quilting!

Part 2 of this article has been posted here

What Does Steak Have to do with Quilting????

Have you ever been to a restaurant that served many, many, MANY types of food – Italian…. Steak…. Mexican…. Chicken…. Chinese…. American…. etc? Usually when trying to prepare many diverse things, none of them are done particularly well. Then you visit the restaurant that serves ONE thing – let’s say steak. Big steak …… or little steak ……. is the only choice. You KNOW you are going to get a great steak at that place.

I’ve been feeling like that first restaurant lately. Longarm quilter……pattern designer…..quilting teacher……retail store owner…..website manager…..bookkeeper…..blogger…..retreat organizer…… I don’t feel like I’ve been doing any of those as well as I could if I weren’t spread so thin.

So I’ve spent a lot of time lately thinking about which parts of the business I’m best at,  which ones I enjoy the most, and which parts fit in best with my personality quirks  (I’m not good at long term planning, and I have the attention span of a gnat – both things that are not conducive to running a fabric store!). I find that I need to create – not plan things out six months in advance…….not haggle with vendors over mistakes on orders…….not guess which fabrics to order that people will want to buy, only to find out my crystal ball was broken that day…..not spend a lot of time on marketing and merchandising and trying to convince people to buy things they probably don’t really need anyway. (I mean……really……how many of us are actually in danger of running out of fabric?!?!?!?!? LOL)

After much consideration, I have decided to narrow the focus of my business. I’m going to concentrate primarily on the longarm quilting, and possibly some time spent designing patterns. I really love the creativity of these parts of my business. I’ve had pattern ideas in my head for a long time, but just not enough uninterrupted time to get them worked out (there’s a lot of math involved in writing patterns!). I’ve also toyed with the idea of designing digitized quilting patterns for the computerized longarm systems. And I’ve still kept in the back of my mind the requests to teach longarm quilting classes. (Gee, that doesn’t seem like I’m really letting some things go, does it???)

Anyway, in order to free me up for these pursuits,

I’M HAVING A CLEARANCE SALE!!

New Sale Prices in Effect beginning Aug. 11, 2012 – all regular width fabrics $6.99/yd or less! Everything else has been reduced by 30% (sale prices not valid on batting or wide backs)

(CLICK HERE TO SHOP NOW)

I’m going to clearance out all of the retail quilting supplies, other than batting and wide quilt backs, which I will continue to carry. So all of my 44″ wide fabrics, pre-cut fabrics, notions, books, kits, etc. will be first come-first served, while supplies last.

I also need to take some time off this summer to recharge my batteries. I will be open Tues, Weds. and Thurs. from 10 am to 5 pm for July & August, other days will be by chance or appointment. The best thing to do if you are coming from out of town is to email or call to see if I will be open. And if you are not already on my mailing list, sign up here and/or Like Me on Facebook to be kept up-to-date on my hours. (I’ll probably be taking a full week off late Aug. or early Sept.)

I’m sorry for the inconvenience this may cause, but hopefully the great buys on sale items will make it up to you a little bit. And keep in mind, while in the future the Studio may no longer have the most extensive ‘menu’ around, you’ll know that what we do offer will be the tenderest, juiciest, most flavorful ‘steak’ ever!

(CLICK HERE TO SHOP NOW)

More About the X-Blocks Rulers

After my last post about X-Blocks rulers, (while you’re there, leave a comment to enter my giveaway!) I’ve had some questions about the different sizes and types which I’ll try to answer  here.

The Large X-Blocks ruler comes in two sizes: 6-1/2″ and 7-1/2″. The only difference is you will start with different size strips or squares, and the finished projects come out different sizes. For instance, if you were to make the Triple Play quilt using the 6-1/2″ ruler, the quilt would finish at 40″ x 40″. Using the 7-1/2″ ruler it would be 45″ x 45″. You would only need one of these rulers to make any of the quilts in the first book, as well as most of the individual patterns.

The Mini X-Blocks rulers can be used on their own to make smaller versions of most of the projects – the Triple Play quilt would end up about 24″ x 24″. The blocks they make finish at one-fourth the size of the large ruler, so you could combine Mini 6-1/2″ blocks with Large 6-1/2″ blocks in the same project (or Mini 7-1/2″ with Large 7-1/2″).

The BellyButton rulers are sized to fit the center of the nine-patch made for the Large X-Blocks ruler. Let’s see if this photo helps:

Obviously I’m using blocks from two different projects here – normally they would match and make a pretty design.

There are just a few patterns that require the use of the BellyButton (like the Thornton pattern to the left, click here to see my kit), but it gives a whole different look to the quilt. The BellyButtons can also be used on their own, just like the Minis, to create smaller versions of the projects.

So the bottom line is: you only need one ruler, plus the book or a pattern, to get started using the X-Blocks technique. The size depends on whether you like to make small or mini projects – then choose one of the Mini’s or BellyButtons. If you prefer lap or bed-sized quilts, start with one of the Large X-Blocks rulers.

If you like working with jelly rolls or  2-1/2″ strips, choose the 7-1/2″ size. There are a few patterns (Blueprints & Patch-ouli) that can ONLY be made using the 7-1/2″ large ruler (if using 2-1/2″ strips) or 7-1/2″ Mini ruler (if using honey buns or 1-1/2″ strips.)

Most of the patterns (individual or in the books) give cutting charts and instructions for making any of the projects using any size of the ruler. Don’t forget, you can find all of the X-Blocks rulers, books and patterns that I carry in one place right here.

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