Adventures in Machine Quilting

By Daintry Chitaroni

I am a hand quilter. However, more and more quilts are being machine quilted due to time constraints, lack of technical ability or space for hand quilting, or just because that is what new quilters are learning. Many quilt shows have fine examples of machine-quilted quilts especially in the art quilt categories. As a teacher and quilt judge I needed to know how it was done. I finally caved in and decided that it was time to learn this technique, treating it as just one more step in my continuing education.

I decided to approach machine quilting the same way that I learn any new technique- research first, do later. I scoured my books and magazines for articles, how-to’s and patterns. However I don’t like practice pieces that are going to be discarded afterwards and have no practical use when finished. Instead I used a simple Picket Fence block made from scraps of my stash that was suitable to work in the Quilt-as-you-go method. I made up twenty 14” blocks, found 20 squares of fabric for the back and leftover batting pieces from the sides of previous quilts. Feeling pretty proud of myself for using up so much junk from my stash, I proceeded to machine quilt….

I planned the quilting scientifically- I would start with simple ditch quilting on the first block to check the tensions, and to get a feel for quilting straight lines. I would then move on to grids, stipples, meandering, echoes, stencil patterns, traced paper designs, free-motion drawings and trapunto. I would try different weights of thread on top and bottom, seams on the backing fabric, various speeds and needles and figured that by the twentieth block I would have the technique down patt. The best laid plans….

I set my machine as indicated in all of the reading material- feed dogs down, the proper quilting foot, a new quilting needle, and cotton thread. After three blocks I could still not get the proper tension and my quilting was coming to a dead stop whenever I tried to move toward the back or to the left. This of course resulted in toe-grabbing stitches and knots on the bottom, not to mention all of the loopies. I went back to the books to find the solution. I tried different threads, turning my work instead of trying to back up, a different needle, to no avail. My stitches on top were acceptable- I could do relatively straight lines, fairly good stipples, and could follow a drawn pattern. But the back remained a mystery. Finally I discussed the problem with a machine-quilting friend. She advised me to leave the feed dogs up and cover them with several layers of masking tape. This actually worked and my stitching became better on the back, and no more stalling in certain directions. Three or four blocks later, it started acting up again. How frustrating a technique when you are at the mercy of your sewing machine. Hours and hours of work can be ruined by a slip of the wrist, loosing grip on the fabric, or a needle that wears and starts cutting the thread every five minutes. I was glad that I was working on small blocks and not a full size quilt that I would need to roll and work around to get at different sections.

At this point I had done fifteen of the twenty blocks. Most were loopy on the back, or the top thread was showing through the back, but I had a feel for the quilting motions, and I figured out that camouflage was the best bet- use thread the same color top and bottom that hid both on the front and back, and not to expect a perfect quilt. This was a difficult concept for me to grasp. I was very tempted to cover the backs with another piece of fabric when I put the quilt together, but decided that for future reference I wanted to see the mistakes and pitfalls, and would leave it as is. It will probably fall apart the first time that I wash it, but I guess that I can always add more quilting lines. It has been quite an adventure, and I am now even more committed to remaining a hand-quilter.