Do you wash your quilts after doing SITD? My SITD was not very good, and a friend told me to wash it. That made all the difference in the world.

The lady that owns a quilt shop here says that she has discovered over the years that most people are toppers rather than quilters. lol So it seems that more people like the quilting part less than the piecing part.

I don't enjoy the quilting part at all. I'll make your tops if you will do my quilting!!!

I would like to get a frame someday. I did do some baby quilts all by hand, assembling the top and quilting. That I really enjoyed.

I am a total toss up on this. I so enjoy piecing and seeing how all those little bits of fabric come together into a beautiful quilt top. But to me, quilting makes the quilt!. I enjoy having a quilt all sandwiched together for me to do hand work while I sit with DH and watch TV. And like Ninnie, I love to see how it progresses and really comes to life as I progress. I use a lap hoop. I don't mind binding at all. I do hate the sandwiching/basting part though! And I dearly love my cats but hate picking all the cat hair off of my projects before each session. It seems a quilt in progress is the preferred sleeping spot of all cats. I can have a complete one on the couch but they much prefer the WIP. :roll: Also it takes me a really long time to handquilt a quilt. Guess I am really slow but on average it takes me a couple of years of sporadic off again on again quilting. I will usually work on it a couple of hours a night but not every night of the week. And often I will put it aside when life gets to hectic and not work on it for several weeks. So that may be why it takes me a couple of years to hand quilt a bedsize quilt. I have done smaller ones on my Bernina and want to expand try that fun and done method or another quilt as you go thing.
I would give my eyeteeth to have a long arm set up but that is a good 5 to 6 years of saving down the road.

That is why when you finish a top you hand it over to a long-arm quilter to finish it for you...you love the piecing part, she loves the quilting part...match made in heaven :D

So glad to know I'm not alone :lol: While piecing, I'm happy, the closer I get to being finished, the slower I sew, like that makes the inevitable slow down.

I am so glad someone finally admitted that. I am in the process of quilting one of mine and HATE it! I could piece 24/7 but dread the quilting part. I am still new to this so maybe I will develop a system that works for me, but I am not going to hold my breath! LOL

I do tend to knot my very large quilts. I know that hand quilting those would take too long! The fabric may go bad before I got it all quilted. lol

I wish I had the quilting love as well...but I get so frusterated that even if I have a million pins there's always a pucker or two...I did get the lqs to longarm one for me and i love it however am not in love with the cost...and wait time!! I love to do the tops...my machine has the free motion piece to it as well and I have not learned to use it yet...so maybe that would help...but for now blah!!!

I think if I had something other than the round lap frame I would probably tend to quilt the larger quilts.

I just finished a baby quilt. I did stitch in the ditch with a decorative stitch in all of the seams. Then I put it on my embroidery machine, and did a quilt design on the blocks. It is the circled feather design. It went really quickly and looks great.

I have bursitis and handquilting causes me a lot of pain. I have several tops to be finished and just might incorporate more embroidery.

OMG I'm so happy so many of you find the quilting as tedious as I do. I think that is why when they offer classes for 1st time quilters, they don't teach anything about the actual quilting.
At my LQS when I took my 1st class, I was quite surprised when the class ended and all I had was the quilt top. The shop is located in a rather upscale community. Everyone told me they pay someone to do the machine quilting. When I found out how costly that was, I sat down and thought myself how to machine quilt (with the help of Alex Anderson's show on HGTV). I really miss that show!
I really only get to quilt on the weekends. So it takes a while to finish a quilt top. By the time I'm done I'm bored and ready to start the next one. Needless to say I have several quilt tops and only a few finished quilts.

I like making the top forget the quilting. I have a stack of tops and will someday drop them off to a long armer and she can take care of the rest to includethe binding. I need a whole lot of $$$ to get them to her so I am saving up and meanwhile making more tops. (lol :lol: :lol: :lol: )
Not interested in learning to do the quilting at this time. :wink:

I'm with you there!
I must have 2 dozen tops, all ready to be finished. I bought a Handi-Quilter maybe 9 or 10 years ago, thought I'd do my own quilting..... I found I hated loading the quilt, loading the bobin, adjusting.... aaarrrrggghhh! I owned a 'John Flynn' system when I first started quilting in 96'. I managed to piece and quilt 12 tops in 6 months on that thing... maybe I'm burnt out.
I sold the Handi-Quilter at a garage sale 3 years ago. I found that I actually enjoy hand quilting, although it's quite a bit slower. I keep thinking I'm going to send my quilts out to be finished, but don't.

I hated the quilting part until I took a class and learned FMQ. I had 3 tops just waiting to be sandwiched and quilted and was dreading it. But after that class, I was so excited to have 3 ready made projects to FMQ on. And I love it! I love figuring out what to quilt, how to mark it and it is fun to see the end product that is so much prettier (imo) than a stitch in the ditch or tied quilt. It adds so much character and personality. I can't wait to make my next quilt top so I can quilt it!

OK I want to be excited. What is FMQ?

FMQ-Free Motion Quilting

FMQ, thank you for explaining. Sometimes I feel like I'm asking questions I should know the answers to, but hopefully some one else wanted to know but didn't ask.

There are so many abbreviations to so many things it is hard to keep them all straight!

I never thought of doing both machine & hand quilting. makes sense. I enjoy having hand sewing when relaxing with the TV. I have never hand quilted, will be interesting

Ok I admit, I'm not very good at machine quilting and gave up hand sewing a long time ago! I recently used my embroidery machine to stitch a quilting pattern on a small table top quilt. I liked it so much that I will use the same technique to "quilt" a Halloween top that has been sitting around for a year.

Beautiful!!! Very pretty way to finish a quilt. I like it lots. My "dream" machine is many years down the road....this kind of posts will definitely keep the dream alive. :D Thanks for sharing.

Patti

I did quilted curtains this way. My sewing room is in the basement. And I had 2 windows to cover. So using an old bolt of fabric and some scraps I made curtains. I had just gotten my emb machine and I had many redwork designs I wanted to try so that's how I quilted my curtains. I will try to get a pic to post. It was fun and quick!

MOLLIESUE.........

I also enjoy the hand work of the binding

.........and I also thank that they shoud rename Lifetime and Hallmark ...
the "hand quiting" channels.......

mj

I'm the same. I love making tops but hate the quilting part, don't mind
the binding part. I'm a hand quilter and I like doing that. I'm still
trying to learn machine quilting. I bought a Janome embroider machine
and use that instead of quilting by machine, its fast and so pretty. I
especially like it on table runners.

You should team up with someone who likes the quilting part. You would be great together.

This has been an excellent thread to keep reading!! I personally have enjoyed each and every response to this. We are all in the same boat and it makes me smile to realize we aren't alone in this thought:). It's a sad shame that too many quilting systems are what I call beyond any practicality in pricing to purchase and drag home...otherwise each and every one of us would have one and we would be whine over not having enough to quilt or something;)LOL I do wish that maybe we can start another thread for all of us that have learned the 'how to' or 'not to' on our own sewing machines to quilt...to help others and learn ourselves too from others. I am one who will not send mine off...I'd rather leave them in a pile then to pay the prices (not that they are worth it-so don't go there w/me longarmers!)I am just one who watches money...and, enjoys the making and to have each and every one quilted by someone else...would end my ability to keep making them:)So, I am one that quilts her own too...when I do, I pin baste 3 at a time to do in a row...:)One very helpful hint from a gal is not to cut off your excess off the outside of your quilt/batting until after you sew on your binding...it keeps everything from moving on you. Makes sense and I am going to try it next:)Thanks for sharing and being honest!! Skeat

I do that too:)My prob is arthur in my younger self:)If I work hard and hand quilt...the next day I so pay for it...but, love doing it. Right now my prob is time to hand quilt too....I do my hand work at night:) Binding, piecing, basting edges for applique...and, oh, applique!LOL

I love the process of choosing fabric, pattern, piecing, and seeing it all come together.

I have not machine quilted anything yet other than SITD, but that leaves alot to be desired. My machine quilting comes out with too many 90 degrees, 45, degrees, you get the picture. So I will keep working on that part.

I am not good at machine stitching the finished binding so I have been hand stitching. Quite hard when arthur is visiting but I like the results.

As far as quilting, I find it absolutely beautiful and creative and so not my style. Unlike my DG who did nothing but hand quilting. Can't afford a LAQ so that leaves a few UFO's.

I still have much to learn and unfortunately the ones here who receive my doll quilts are finding that out. :roll: :-o Great learning process, though.

We need a thread on where arthur is visiting and on how to encourage him to move on :lol:

I've heard of 'Auntie Flo' :D, before, but have never heard of 'Arthur'...LOL...that's a good one. Wouldn't you know that last spring I injured the middle finger on my right hand (my quilting finger :cry: ) and it seems that 'arthur' is still visiting--he does need to move on.

I love making the tops but hate basting the 3 layers together. I also like finishing up the binding while I watch T.V., I find it relaxing to do.

When I hand quilt, I use a device that looks like a spoon (held in the left hand under the quilt. I bought it about 5 years ago and have never seen one since. My fingers are no longer torn up from hand quilting...now if I could only find something to help with sore thumb joints...ah, the thrill of aging!

I used to do all hand quilting, but I bought a Janome 1600 and a Gracie Quilt Frame a few years ago and I can do simple machine quilting fairly quickly. I look longingly at the fancy-schmancy quilting machines (computerized Gammill, etc.) I will make do with what I have...I do a little machine quilting for my friends. I work cheap for them (we are teachers, so we aren't rolling in the dough, but thankful to be working).

Maria,

I am with you. Making the tops is the tedious part for me. I could spend all day hand quilting. I have done one queen size wholecloth and lots of smaller ones. I have another queensize wholecloth kit that I can do. I just might get it out this winter. I also love the preprinted panels. With the addition of a border or two they are ready to be quilted.

I love fabric and have an enormous stash. Making the top is the stumbling block.

I love making the top, doing the quilting and putting on the binding. The part I don't like is putting the 3 layers together. That is the hardest part for me, to just get them smooth. probably because I don't have a really convenient place to do this. Small baby quilts or lap sized ones aren't a problem, but larger ones sure are. I really like sitting there and hand sewing the binding to the back side. This is very relaxing for me.