The first stage of quilting on Sunflower Scrap VI is done. Here the fabric is still moist from the spritz I gave it to eliminate the blue marking pen guidelines. The moisture makes the fabric appear to be slightly darker than it actually is.
I will let the quilt dry on my design wall. If any of the blue marking lines reappear — they may just do that in areas where I marked a bit heavily or changed the design — I’ll just spritz and let dry until they stop appearing.
Stitching the large, sweeping vine and leaf designs was quite a challenge. I had to stop, shift fabric and restart quite often to move the design across the top. Doing that and keeping the lines smooth was not always successful so I did my share of taking the quilting out. Let’s face it, there is simply no wiggle room when using a navy-blue thread on light-blue fabric. So, in spite of the light amount of design that appears here, the stitching took 2 days to complete.
The next step will be to block the piece. The eleven sunflowers are stitched twice to make them more bold that the leaves and vines. That extra stitching has created a bit of puckering. Though it isn’t dramatic, I don’t want to run into any pucker problems when I begin the next phase of quilting. Blocking at this stage will ensure that I can focus on the quilting design and not how to ease in bulges.
I’m happy with where I am on this project. I limber up the peach-colored thread next! Stay tuned.
Elegant as usual.
Thank you Gurli. I’m looking forward to the next stage of quilting.
Franki, very nicely done. You always choose the right fabrics and colors. Your choice of quilting designs is so nice. What brand of blue marking pens do you use?
Thank you Debbie. I use the Collins fine line water erasable marking pen. It really does produce a very fine line and comes out easily.
I’ll stay tuned. It’s fun to watch a piece in progress!
Looking fabulous!
Thanks Maryann!