I just purchased needles, thread, and a quilt by hand book and hope to start doing some handquilting too. I wish you luck with yours and hope to see more about handquilting on the message board. Welcome to the board.

What book did you buy?

The first thing that comes to mind is the coloring of your quilt. I would not use darks, keep your colors to light to medium color range. I personally use a washable marker by Dritz. It does show up nicely on light to medium colors. If you don't necessarily need to do a pieced block, then there are many quilting stencils/patterns out there that are beautiful just done on a piece of material where you don't have seams to deal with. You could even do a whole cloth quilt and just use whatever designs you choose to.

I have a friend that has limited eye sight and she finds hand quilting and needle turn applique is easier for her to do then machine piecing. If you're interested in applique, PM me and I'll send you some sites that I frequent.

She's using a size 10 between, which is a good size for someone starting out with hand quilting.

Learn to Do Hand Quilting In Just One Day
by Nancy Brenan Daniel

[quote=gramquilter2]Learn to Do Hand Quilting In Just One Day
by Nancy Brenan Daniel

Let us know how it goes and if you like the book. I have been wanting to learn hand quilting for many years.

I have just started hand quilting.

The first little quilt is done including the binding.As you can see my stitches are not tiny. A friend who is a quilt appraiser said it is not so much the length of the stitch but uniformity of the stitches.

I used an embroidery needle for this quilt.It is smaller than the needles I use for doll making. I have started another practice quilt using a quilt needle. They are so small I am not sure how it is going to work but I am trying it.
judy j
http://hardincountykeepsakes.blogspot.com/
http://classicclothdolls.blogspot.com/

judith ann -- I think you did a VERY nicely with your first hand quilting job!! :thumbup:

Stitching "in the ditch" is quilting right along the seam. Since I hand quilt, I make sure all my seams are pressed to one side, so I can stitch next to the seam on the side where the extra fabric is not. (Stitching through the seam allowance is too thick for nice hand-made stitches.) Your stitches almost disappear when stitching in the ditch. I usually SITD when I want to bring out the patchwork design, around a quilt block, or along the seam where a border joins the quilt to make it puff up nicely. It's also good to do when you're learning to hand quilt and you don't want your stitches to show up as much.

If you wish to quilt 1/4 inch from the seams go to your friendly auto paint shop and ask for 1/4 inch masking tape. It is a lot cheaper than the quilt shop stuff and works just as well. It can even be reused several times if you are doing many seams the same length, or you can patch it if needed.

Hi, I usually hand quilt. I usually cut geometric shapes (circles, squares etc depends on quilt pattern) out of paper for my templates and pin them to the quilt. I also use embroidery thread to quilt because I like the contrast. But the white paper templates are easy to put on and see, and so is the bright embroidery thread. I am a self taught quilter so I don't go by any rules when I quilt, just do what I like.