First, I took a picture of the bottles that are used for the lambs! We have to make formula several times a day and fill up 5 bottles and head off to the field. Because we have a young family there is always alot of help getting the feeding done. The only problem is being here to do it. If we have activities like most families we have to plan quick trips home between these activities to feed the little lambkins. We were in and out alot yesterday!!! The things we can accomplish when we set our minds to it!!!!I took a picture of the second step in my machine quilting lesson!! I wanted to quilt flowers on the border and I practiced with pen and paper first, then I practiced on some fabric and wadding. As you can see I then progressed to the quilt with my hands shaking, the thought of having to unpick a messy job was foremost in my mind LOL!!!!!
Not bad if I do say so myself, I think I'm getting the hang of this. I have come to the conclusion that if you want to be proficient at machine quilting you have to work at it every week. I usually let my quilt tops pile up and go months between machine quilting because I have never learned to do it properly or better yet given myself the chance to learn how to do it properly.
I spent some time on the internet looking for instructions and videos on machine quilting and this is how I have been teaching myself. I have half a pad of paper full of continuous line drawings. I thankfully had saved all the remnants of wadding that had been trimmed off previous quilts and used those to practice on.
The last photo is the back side of the quilt. I am glad that I have taken the time to do all this practicing and research, I can confidently say that I have conquered my fear of machine quilting. I can piece quilts with great precision and I have some seriously good sharp points but I was always let down with the final step.All the best and keep quilting!!!!
7 comments:
Your machine quilting looks great!!
Love the bottle feeding bottles :o) "would madame like a little French wine with her formula?"
Wow, that's fantastic. That's EXACTLY what I was looking for.
I am a beginner and need to make the next step to machine quilting. You are a star, posting this information. Thank you so much.
Your machine quilting looks very nice indeed.
I am linking your blog, if I may, to come again.
The lambs looks so cute and can do with a bit of sunshine (yr post 08/02/09)
Gina-UK
http://gina-catswhiskers.blogspot.com/
Your flowers look great! I haven't been brave enough to venture out to special shapes yet -- just curves and stars so far!
Way to go, you have discovered that you need to practice practice practice to get more comfortable with machine-quilting. I do appreciate how hard it is to fit it in with running the household, the kids and the lambs...Anyway you are off to a good start. Keep up the good work!
Machine quilting is not easy at all...I use the Mctavish method.. All of it takes lots of practice indeed! Loved the pic of the bottles.
Micki
I've recently braved machine quilting - for me it's a million microtacks, loads of pins and going v-e-r-y slowly that works :-)
I'm so happy I found your blog. It's great to read about someone who is working on learning to machine quilt. I have worked hard to overcome my fear of it, and still have a long way to go. Thanks for all the great information.
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