A Break from Quilting

So here is an update on how my quilting project is going.  I decided to go with a design involving squares and spiral squares.  I don't know if this was a good decision or not.  It's not a difficult design, but since this is actually my first real quilt, maybe I should've went with just straight lines.

I don't fully regret it though, because it has taught me a few things about quilting, particularly free-motion quilting.  It's one thing to read about it and watch other people doing it on uTube videos, but you can't really learn how to do it until you experience it yourself.  And free-motion quilting is one of those things that definitely takes experience and lots of practice.

Anyhoo, one tip that I read on the internet is to fill up a bunch of bobbins before you start.  This may sound like a no-brainer, (duh!) but I'm glad I saw that tip cuz I don't know how long it would've taken me to figure that one out on my own (did I mention I'm new at this?).  So I searched for all the empty bobbins that I had on hand, and in the end managed to gather 11 empty bobbins and filled them all up.

This turned out to be extremely handy cuz I absolutely HATE rethreading my machine more than I have to.  It's not so much the threading part, it's the part that involves threading the needle.  That can be quite frustrating at times.  Thankfully, with this handy-dandy tip, all I had to do was change the bobbin instead of refilling the same one over and over.

Here is something else I learned:

The back panel of the quilt is a mustard yellow color with small brown leaves/flowers, so I thought this multi-colored thread would match it perfectly and add some personality.  This was not a good idea for me, the beginner quilter, because all the darker shades of the thread show up really well, and I made a lot of mistakes in my stitching, which of course are all conspicuous now, practically advertising all my goof-ups.  Plus, the thread got nested in a few places.  Needless to say, this quilting job is not going to turn out perfect.  Thankfully, my daughter, who is going to be the recipient of this quilt, understands this, and is only appreciating the fact that I'm making her a quilt at all.

Since I was doing squares and spiral squares, this was going to require a lot of starting and stopping of my stitches, so I had to learn what to do with the hanging threads.  Most of my quilting resources (books, internet, and videos) say to knot and bury the beginning threads, but then wondered why I should bother if you're instructed to just snip off the end threads.  It didn't make any sense to me to go through the trouble to bury some and then just snip the others, so for awhile I just snipped.  But the whole time I was doing this, I felt like I was taking a shortcut, and "cheapening" the quilt and worried that this method was going to cause the quilt to unravel a lot quicker.  There had to be a "right way" to do this.  More research on the internet led me to a video that showed me how to bring up the bobbin thread so I could bury it together with the top thread.

And yet another video showed me how to bury the threads without having to thread a needle every time, just by using a looped thread.  (too hard to explain on here)  The looped-thread method made this job fast and easy, and "fun", so I didn't mind having to do this every time I started or stopped a stitch.  By the time I became a whiz at that, the squares and spiral squares were all done, and I could now switch to my walking foot because all I had left now was the straight diagonal lines.  I love free-motion quilting, but after doing that for awhile, quilting straight lines with a walker foot really seemed like a breeze!  The problem that I was having with free-motion quilting was trying to maneuver the bulk of the quilt in my short-arm machine.  Not easy; thus the crooked stitches.  I think that maybe I should ask Santa Claus (aka "my hubby") for a long-arm machine for my next Christmas present.

Some setbacks that I had involved my top thread breaking all the time (tension needed readjusting),  bobbin thread running out at the most inconvenient times - but is there really a convenient time for the bobbin thread to run out?  And the cats wanting to enjoy the quilt before I had it done:

Anyhoo, we were planning on going up north to visit my daughter over the weekend, so I was trying to get it all done before we left.  And I did get all of it done except I still have to go around the edge of the border yet.  I'm glad I didn't force myself to get that part done cuz if I rush myself, I only get frustrated and make more mistakes.  Sometimes I have to force myself to put it down and walk away. And that's what I did.

My daughter Stephanie lives on Eielson AFB, a 6-hour drive from here.  Here is a picture of Mt. McKinley that I took on the way up there:

Chuck was marveling that we could still see the shrub grasses sticking out of the snow.  At this time of the year, especially further north, there is normally enough snow that all the shrub grass should be completely buried.  This is definitely not the year for snow.  Fairbanks had some snow on the ground, but not much.  It was definitely colder there, though.  This morning when we left her house, it was only 11 degrees.  When we got home today, it was raining and 47 degrees.  Of course everything is brown - no snow on the ground at all.

Here is a picture of Stephanie and PW with Steph's dog Charlie:

Cute dog but very hyper.  I don't know how Steph does it with Isaac being gone for two months.  He would be too much for me all by myself.  I think I will like him more after he outgrows some of his puppiness.

It was a fun visit, but also good to be back home.  My quilt is still folded up and sitting right where I left it, waiting to be finished.  So I am looking forward to working on it some more.