Tag: Tarts Come to Tea

I know the photo I posted the other day didn’t show all of the tiny quilting lines.

In this series of photos you can better see my obsession. The first photo, left, shows the back of the upper left hand corner.

There are some parts that are not as heavily quilted as others. I was using the quilting on the front to express my vision. In this piece, the quilting is part of the design.

I struggle with the quilting being part of the design. I love piecing and never want the quilting to overshadow my piecing. In strictly geometric quilts, like Frolic! and Flying Around, this is usually not an issue when Colleen quilts for me. Her quilting fits really well into the design of the piecing. It’s different with a quilt like the Tarts Come to Tea.

In the second photo, an extension of the area covered in the first photo, you can see more of the differences in the density of the quilting.

The body of the triangular carafe is a lot less densely quilted than the the background, for example. I really struggled with how to quilt the larger tea pots, as discussed in September when I finally broke that barrier. I am not sure I did the right designs in the those larger teapots. My skills were not up to more curvilinear  or loops and swirls designs, which might have worked better in the round green kettle and the  tarty silver teapot.

The quilting on the Tarty Silver Teapot shows up very well on the back. I did quilt in some gentle curves, though if I had had Colleen quilt it, I might have had her try to mimic the scrollwork or leaves and vines you see on some antique teapots.

In some respects the idea that the quilting is an integral part of the design shows up in my choice of thread color. Also, as it my usual philosophy, when the quilting lines were not part of the design, I want them to disappear.

I used the same thread on the back and front when I started the quilting. I think I really should have used thread colors that matched the fabric colors on the back. I think it would have looked better, but it doesn’t really matter now. I don’t think anyone will really care and I don’t know that I will put this quilt in a show, but I like to do my best work and this doesn’t feel like my best work.

I am pretty pleased with how the quilting on the cake turned out. The cake is in the upper center of the quilt. I really like the way it turned out on the front. I kind of think using the stripe for the center of the cake was genius (if I do say so myself!). I like how the layers of the cake (horizontal) have been highlighted in the quilting. The quilting on the top of the cake is another plus. I love the way it looks like the pieces have been cut, or scored so they are ready to cut.

Now on to a binding and a sleeve. More coming.

OMG. Quilting is endless. Over the last weekend I thought I was making progress. Today I am convinced I will never finish quilting this quilt. Sigh.

I finally tackled the large teapots. I am still following the edges and hoping I don’t ruin the quilt. I feel the space it too big to leave it completely unquilted, especially with the close quilting of the backgrounds. The teapots looked baggy. So, I held my nose and dived in. I am choosing threads that match the fabric, so hopefully the quilting won’t show too much.

I think the tea kettle looks pretty good. I am not so sure about the teapot in the tea service. I think I will rip some of the quilt in the Tea Service teapot out.

If I never quilt anything again, it will be too soon.

After finishing The Lobster project, I had to decide what to work on next. The Tarts have been on the side burner (not the back burner!) for a few weeks, so I spent a whole afternoon machine quilting parts of it. I finished a checkerboard and I quilted one whole large corner block. I felt so exhilarated. I really felt like I had crossed some kind of barrier to finishing. I feel like I am nearing the end.

Don’t get me wrong! I do NOT feel exhilarated by machine quilting itself. I feel exhilarated because I am making progress. I am nearing a point where I can put the binding on and call it done….finally.

I am really running up against my limitations as a machine quilter with this project. I want to do some free motion quilting, but I am not good enough. Any but the most gentle curves are too difficult and not satisfying using my pseudo walking foot method. I would need a lot of practice for the kind of FMQ I want and I am unwilling to do the work.

I crossed another barrier by quilting the lime green round tea pot.

Up until this point I had only quilted backgrounds, not wanting to ruin the teapots and tea kettles. I might be over that fear after quilting this one.

You can see some gentle curves in this quilting. That is about the extent of what I can do with the machine quilting method I am using.

And there is some bad news.

I burned the quilt. Well, really the quilt got burned. I don’t know exactly how, but I think the quilt was shoved up against the light I have behind my machine for too long. The burn is worse on the back, but does go through to the front. It might look ok in the grand scheme of things, but I’ll have to consider what to do.

Despite the burn, I like the style of this quilt and am thinking of recreating the quilt, “He Tried to Make it up to Her”. I have been thinking about all the different kinds of fusible I have. After contemplating the feelings around the Tarts, it occurred to me I could remake ‘He Tried’ and then have Colleen quilt it. something to think about.

As you can see from other posts I am not continuously quilting on the Tarts, but it is a project I try to work on every day.

I was pretty excited about how the frame went after my first post, so I worked quite a bit on it. The bloom, however, is off the rose, as mentioned in my last post. Still, I am soldiering on.

My latest efforts are some smallish blocks on the center bottom, a latte glass and some silverware. I thought I could do some straight-line curves around the latte glass. I wasn’t happy with it and I ripped it out and went back to straight-line quilting the background.

I like dense quilting and I like my quilts flat so straight lines are working best for me.

I am done with the novelty of quilting. The bloom is off the rose.

Still I am quilting. It took me all day to quilt one corner background of the Tarts. The quilting looks good, but it was tedious and took a long time. No, I am not doing free motion quilting; I am doing straight-line quilting, which is the type of quilting I can sew successfully and, thus, be happy with.

Am I tempted to rip out the quilting and take it to Colleen?

Yes.

I am going to hang in there. I have made so much progress after years of no progress that it would be stupid to rip it out. Still, I am tempted. Quilting is terrible.

Yes, after YEARS of having this project on my to do list, I have pulled it out of the project box and started to finish the quilting. First, I am obsessed at the moment with crossing things off my to do list. Frankly, I am sick of looking at the same items month after month. Second, I need the project box for something else.

Now that you are back in your chair a second time after being gobsmacked on to the floor, you read that right. I am machine quilting a real quilt. It isn’t a king sized quilt or anything, but it is also not fabric for a bag or a tablerunner. It is real quilting on a quilt.

I started working on it last Friday. I started with the frame of one of the blocks. I thought some straight line quilting would get be back in the groove.

The good thing about that red frame is that the quilting would not show if I used red thread.

You are probably remembering the Cha Cha Cha table runner. Yes, I quilted that myself, as well as some fabric for bags this year, so it’s not like it has been 20 years since I actually quilted anything. It has been about 10 years since I worked on this project. Recently, I have decided that UFOs are a bad thing for me and I want to eradicate them, as much as possible from my workroom.

I had the box of thread I used for the other, already quilted Tarts blocks, so I picked out the red (Maderia rayon I used to use for embroidery) and got busy.

I was pretty pleased with how the process worked. I was a little nervous about doing the frame before the center, but it ended up all working out.

I was particularly pleased that the quilting made the frame flat. It seemed really puffy when I started (first photo, above). I know that I need to work from the center out and I am doing that, mostly. I started with the frame, because I didn’t want the quilting to show while I worked out stitch length, etc.

I think the stitching looks ok. It is not Colleen’s stitching, but it is not terrible either.

Onward. Maybe I’ll finally finish this quilt, but one thing at a time.

Yesterday, I taught a class on machine applique. In the course of the discussion, I brought out Down the Drain to show different examples of satin stitching. I also showed The Tarts Come to Tea.

This brought up the idea of quilting, which I tried to gloss over, but my intelligent students wanted to know why they had never seen the Tarts and I had to admit that I hadn’t completed the quilting.

I felt silly admitting that the quilt was partially quilted and languishing in a project box. Will I get back to it? Maybe. They didn’t think it was weird or out of date looking, so it might be time to get back to the quilting. I quilted Down the Drain and survived the process, so perhaps it is time to get back to it?

I rearranged my workroom yesterday and quilted on the Tarts. The quilt was calling from where it was neatly hung in the closet and begging to be worked on. Since I had no good excuse NOT to work on it, I pulled it out and quilted some blocks. I did lots of straight line quilting, because the tension on my machine needs to be adjusted. I also didn’t feel like taking the time practice.

I set a goal of doing the yellow section that I had to pick out last Fall. I surpassed that modest goal by quilting that small section, the section next to it, a cup and a piece of pie. I am pleased.