Stitch in the Ditch
#11
Super Member
Join Date: Dec 2012
Posts: 1,857
It is your quilt, quilt it is you want. No rules saying you must STID. Personally, I do not care much for STID. If I want to accentuate a piece, I prefer to do an echo stitch. My go to quilting is a simple diagonal, quick and easy on a home machine but secure enough to firmly hold the quilt together.
#12
Super Member
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Massachusetts
Posts: 1,097
The 'ditch' is created when you press to the side, leaving one side of the seam higher than the other. You then stitch very close to the higher side. Stitching down the middle of an open seam, you'd be stitching on top of stitches only, not on fabric. You therefore wouldn't be stabilizing that fabric, and could potentially weaken those seams by breaking the original stitches.
#13
Power Poster
Join Date: May 2009
Location: NY
Posts: 10,590
The 'ditch' is created when you press to the side, leaving one side of the seam higher than the other. You then stitch very close to the higher side. Stitching down the middle of an open seam, you'd be stitching on top of stitches only, not on fabric. You therefore wouldn't be stabilizing that fabric, and could potentially weaken those seams by breaking the original stitches.
As far as a lone star is concerned, when I made mine I echoed 1/4" from every seam, I did not ditch. The echoing reinforced the fabric and the seams as well as accentuating the LS piecing design. I then did "fancy" quilting in the background fabric. That particular quilt was hand quilted not machine quilted. I have seen many machine quilted LS that are not ditched but done with motifs and designs that accentuated the star. Either continuous curves in every single small diamond that makes up the points of the star or an all over pattern that fills the large diamonds that form the star points, ignoring the piecing within those large diamonds. I have even seen lonestars with an all over quilting design. It all depends on what you are comfortable doing, what you are capable of doing and what look you are going for. Google images of Lone Star quilting designs to get a feel for what others have done and pinpoint exactly what look you are going for with yours.
BTW lone stars are notorious for "volcanoing" up in the center. Quilting will often tame it down so that is another thing to take into consideration.
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AngelinaMaria
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12-06-2012 12:02 PM