Picking up where you left off

Bunting Quilt on the 6 foot New English Quilter frame

One of the great features about our New English Quilter frames is the ability to pick up right where you left off. I was working on this quilt over a year ago. I needed to make room for a Demo so I took it off the 6 foot frame and put it to one side. I used it as a teaching tool to show how important it is to add side-sashing strips on the quilt top so that there is a place to get the tension working right before launching into the proper quilt.

on the left is the side-sashing strip where I sort my tension

But last week I decided to finish the Bunting quilt. So I loaded it back on the frame. Our frame tensions each layer of the quilt separately so there will be no rucks or wrinkles on the top or backing. I can pick up just where I left off whether it's 5 minutes or 5 months.

notice the undulating shape of the scalloped mussel shell background filler

 This red, white and blue Bunting Quilt began as a machine quilting sampler project. The top was easy to assemble with the bunting flags raw edge appliquéd by machine to a solid piece of fabric. the idea was to machine quilt something different in each flag giving the opportunity to try out a variety of patterns.

Each flag was outlined in scallops, then I used a scalloped mussel shell filler.

machine quilted with Kimono Silk from Superior Threads

I used Kimono Silk thread for machine quilting the various line designs and Bottom Line pre-wounds in the bobbins, all from Superior Threads.

an echoed ripple stipple line design

 This echoed ripple stipple design worked well with the blue crabs.

machine quilted with a JUKI TL98P Lockstitch machine

It was very satisfying to finally complete something that has been a WIP (work in progress) for a long time.