I took my first crack at hand quilting and think I'm happy with the front but here's my question for all of you talented quilters. Is this what the back should look like?
First let me say I had no idea how to hand quilt. So I went with what would work for my design. I used embroidery floss for the quilting, when you see the design on the front you'll understand why. I used 3 strands of floss doubled up & tried to do a knot-less method so the back would be neat. It worked most of the time but the brown and green stitching looks a little messy on the back. What are you really supposed to use for hand quilting? I know I've bought hand quilting thread by mistake before and my machine doesn't like it! Do you do just a single strand?
The finished quiltie is 11' by 8". I've found binding the edges to be a challenge. Despite Susan's help and a very detailed Flickr tutorial I still can get perfectly mitered corners. So I decided to do a thin border then add the batting and sew a back on before quilting it. I think it worked. For my quiltie, I knew I wanted to go with my favorite red bird. I like to draw and paint these little red birds on things(Nature Girl can draw these birds too.) Anyway, I cut out the bird and sewed pieces to get the bird, branch and background together. Then I quilted on leaves, clouds, the branch and around the bird's body. I added a button eye and a wing that sticks out. Overall I think I'm happy with it but I feel like the leaves should be all green. I probably should have tried appliquéing on leaves(something else I've not tried to do with a quilt yet.) I'm tempted to dry brush it with green paint but after all of the work I hate to ruin it, so I will probably just leave it and mail it out like this. I'm still waiting for my partner's address before I can send it out. Now it's back to work on my Miniature Booty Swap quilt. That quilt is almost done and will be mailed out by the end of the week I hope.
4 comments:
its kind of hard to see the stitches. but they should be clean and neat. you can use embroidery floss to quilt, but usually its hand quilting thread. its thicker than regular thread and you dont run the risk of your thread breaking as easily. it looks totally adorable!! i cant believe you were worried. and as for the back, if it looks a little icky, i say thats ok because the front looks so great!!! if its up on the wall no one will see it anyway!! everyone will love to see this.
What an adorable quilt!! So cute, so creative -- I love the way you did the bird. I'm not a hand quilter, so I can give you absolutely no advice there. But I agree with Susan -- the front is so wonderful, who cares what the back looks like! No one will see it anyhow. Really, such a cute quilt.
I love the little bird and the leaves look really nice without being appliqued on. I use hand quilting threads, but I never done something that needs to stand out like those leaves, and they are great.So I can't really help either.
love the birdie :-)
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