Tip from Ricky Tims about Marking Quilts for Machine Quilting
Do you mark your quilts for machine quilting or do you just have that in your mind? Ricky: Yes and no. I never always do anything and I never, never do anything, which is an oxymoron in itself. I do what is required or necessary for each individual project. I love to do improvisational quilting, even if it's feathers. I've done several quilts where I will do little feather plumes randomly over a border, just letting them do their own thing. This border doesn't look like that border and this plume will run into that plume. It doesn't matter because I can draw them. I tell people, if you can draw them, you can learn to quilt them. If you're trying to quilt them without learning to draw them, you don't know where you're driving. You have to know where you're going to drive. By practicing on paper, I'm able to know what I'm doing. Then I start doing it on a quilt. Penny: It goes back to that hand-eye coordination. Ricky: Absolutely. This is a hard one to describe, but it is on my "Grand Finale Machine Quilting" DVD on my website. When I need to have a perfect mirror image on an L-shaped border and really want that to be symmetrical, I use a polyester tear-away stabilizer. My brand is called Ricky Tims Stable Stuff. It comes on a roll and also comes in 8.5 x 11 sheets. The reason I have it in sheets now is because I used to take a different product and cut it into 8.5 x 11 sheets. I've eliminated that cutting part. I will usually draw my design on freezer paper templates for large sections. Then I will copy that design as many times as I need it onto this tear-away stabilizer. Then I put that on the back of my quilt top. That's important. It's not on the quilt top. Most people mark their quilt top right on the surface of the quilt top. I put this on the back of the quilt top. Then I use water soluble thread, top and bobbin. I free-motion stitch on top of that copied design. That design is very faint. I don't need a big, black design. I just need to be able to see it, so I usually set my copy machine on a faint, light setting. Then I just stitch on it. It allows me to practice my quilting design before I'm really quilting it. The bobbin is marking my quilt top. That bobbin water soluble thread can be seen on any fabric, including navy, black, prints or whatever you want to do. I practiced my design and didn't trace it. I tell people, "You don't need to learn how to trace. Tracing is not a skill you need to improve." Most people are looking to improve their quilting skill. Mark your quilt by quilting it. Then you've already practiced the whole quilt. It didn't take you any longer to do it that way than it would have to trace it all. Now when you put your sandwich together, you follow those water-soluble thread lines. Then you dunk the quilt in water when it's done. Those threads go away, and it's quilted. That's how I mark it now. If I have to mark, I use this Ricky Tims Stable Stuff product. Penny: That's brilliant. Ricky: It doesn't dissolve. The product is made out of polyester. The substance that makes it feel like paper is what dissolves. When the quilt gets wet and the water soluble thread goes away, this Stable Stuff product turns into a spider web of dusty polyester filling inside the quilt. You'll never know it's there, because it's way thinner than your batting. You haven't even added trapunto or extra batting. It's just inside your quilt and totally soft. Listen to Ricky's secret for marking your quilt for machine quilting:
Happy Quilting!
Penny Halgren
TheQuiltingCoach
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