How to become a great machine quilter

Hi, 

This post was also posted to the GraceMachineFrame Yahoo group.  I am posting it here because it covers some good information about becoming a better machine quilter.

Hi Arvilla.

I am glad that you finished your quilt.  I cannot say enough about practicing and the difference it will make in how quickly you get to the skill level you hoped for when you purchased your quilting frame.  There was some expectation that you had set at some point and thought that you could do you own quilting and save money.  I hope you will take some time to think back and see in your mind’s eye what you imagined your quilting would look like.  Using visualization can be very helpful in helping you progress with your machine quilting skills.  You can practice doing feathers and other more complicated quilting techniques. 

Do you remember, “Wax on, wax off,” from the, “Karate Kid”.  Mr. Miyagi had Daniel waxing his car, sanding his deck, and painting his fence.  Daniel focused on the repetitious tasks and didn’t understand the underlying principles of what he was being taught.  Once he discovered what he had been taught he could move onto more complex training.  He had to be taught those basic movements so they would be second nature when he needed them.  There are a lot of quilting techniques that Kathy uses that she doesn’t have to think about, she just does them.  After you have done over 3,500 quilts you learn a lot. 

I know this is a long way to say that you really need to practice on a quilt that it doesn’t matter what it looks like.  In “Machine Quilting Magic”, the eBook that Kathy and I wrote we recommend that the first quilt you do on your frame is a couple of pieces of muslin and some thin batting like Hobbs 80/20.  You quilt through your quilt with a bright colored thread.  When you finish you unpin your quilt top leader, roll the quilt back up on the quilt back rail, then quilt it again like it was a blank quilt ready to be quilted.  You can do this several times with different colors of thread.  You spend more time quilting and less time pinning and unpinning.  Don’t waste time stippling, that won’t help you become an awesome quilter.  Check out the Gallery on KathyQuilts.com.  That shows a lot of different designs you can practice.  Just keep quilting and soon things will start to fall into place.  Here is a link:

http://www.kathyquilts.com/KathyQuilts.com-Quilt-Gallery.html

Thanks,

Lynn

KathyQuilts.com