Should've Gone To Bed: When 20 Minutes of Careless Stitching Yields an Hour and a Half of Ripping

Greetings, Friends!  Today's tale of woe has a happy ending and is chock full of Monday Morning Quarterbacking and useful tips for Future Rebecca.  Let's start with the Happy Ending, shall we?  I finished stitching this row of alternate blocks in my Deco quilt today, so I'm nearly 2/3 finished (with the stitch in the ditch and major digital designs in this 102" x 102" bed quilt that I am custom quilting).  Tomorrow I'll pop off the computer robotics belts from my machine, snap on my ruler base, and work on the stitch in the ditch quilting around the pale purply-pink squares and the green squares in the adjacent blocks.  Doesn't that Teal So Fine thread look pretty against the dark Kona Indigo background fabric?  That is the kind of quilting that says "Notice ME!  And pay no attention to the wobbly imperfections of the stitching in the ditching!"

This Is the Row of Decorative Computerized Quilting I Completed Today

Here's what I was looking at late last Thursday afternoon, when I was tired and wanted to stop quilting for the day but pushed myself to finish out the row:

I Quilted the Wrong Design!  😱

When I planned out the quilting, I decided to alternate between two similar Karlee Porter designs on these blue squares, Glam Block Flame and Glam Block Sunflower.  I thought that would add an interesting layer of detail on close inspection and also help to alleviate the boredom of stitching the exact same design over and over again on such a large project.  Below, you can see how I intended to stitch these designs in alternating pairs.  On Thursday night I was very careful with sizing, positioning, and trimming that last half block design to fit my quilt, but I didn't realize that I had started with the wrong design until after it was completely stitched out in who knows how many hundreds of tiny stitches.  Aaargh!!! 

Intended Pattern of Alternating Designs

My husband told me to leave it alone because "no one will ever know," and I'm sure half of you agree with him, but if I left that alone it would destroy my joy and satisfaction in working on the project.  Mine is the only opinion about my quilts that matters, and in my opinion, it's not worth doing it at all if I'm not going to give it my best.  So I ripped out a couple inches of stitching before shutting down my machine, committing myself to taking that wrong design out and restitching the correct one.

Yes, It's Possible to Remove Dense Quilting Without Damaging the Quilt

Now for the helpful tips and tricks: I stitched this design with a short stitch length of 12 SPI due to the level of detail in the quilting design.  Those tiny stitches are a bear to remove, and the only seam ripper that works for me is the one that comes packaged with the basic tool kit for any one of my Bernina sewing machines.  The Bernina seam ripper has a skinnier point than any of the other ones I've purchased in quilt shops or notions aisles at the big box stores, and I am able to slide that tip under even the tiniest well-tensioned quilting stitches to lift them from the surface of the quilt and slice the threads individually.  I lowered my quilting frame (one of the many times the hydraulic lift comes in handy) so I could sit on a stool while I ripped out stitches for an hour and a half, which was better than standing, but my lower back is still very unhappy with me about it several days later.  Ah, what is art without SUFFERING?!!  

Okay, so I know you are all worried about those needle holes, aren't you?!  They were made by a size 100/16 Universal needle and the Kona Solid fabrics in my quilt top were heavily starched throughout the process of piecing the quilt top, which makes those needle holes terribly prominent after removing the quilting stitches.  Here's the trick: I dipped a stiff stencil brush into clean water and used that to wet the entire blue side triangle patch, working the brush in a circular fashion to help the needle holes close up as the wet yarns of the fabric weave swelled and relaxed.

Water and a Stencil Brush Magically Disappear the Needle Holes

I blotted the excess moisture with clean paper towels and allowed the quilt to air dry for a bit.  Then I positioned, resized and trimmed the correct quilting design and quilted that over the place where I quilted the wrong design the day before.  Ta-da!

All Fixed!

The seam allowance is still damp in that photo; that's why it's a little darker there.  No one will ever know there was a mistake in this part of the quilt.  That is, no one except the Quilters of the Internet who are reading about it here...

Moral of the story?  I always regret the mistakes I leave in a project, but I never regret taking the time to fix them.  And even when doing computerized quilting -- maybe especially when doing computerized quilting -- pushing yourself to keep going when you're tired is likely to result in setbacks and do-overs rather than help you get your project finished sooner.  Just like you're more likely to get into a car accident if you keep driving when you know you're too tired and ought to stop for the night.

Meanwhile, I have read through the Month Two block instructions for my Stonefields project and have begun some of the prep work.  The first blocks in the batch get tiny 3/8" finished EPP (English Paper Piecing) hexie rosettes appliquéd into the center of Square In a Square blocks.  I printed up my Square  in a Square foundation paper piecing patterns from my EQ8 software and I have the itty bitty 3/8" hexie papers for these blocks in a template kit that I bought with my Stonefields pattern.  I have done very little EPP in the past but I've been refreshing on the technique and gathering the supplies I'll need.  I feel like I've been very disciplined about working on the Deco quilting, and I deserve some Stonefields blocks this week as a treat.

However, most of tomorrow will be wasted because I have to drive an hour away to a surgeon who is going to cut an annoying cyst thingy that looks like a stye out of my right eyelid FINALLY as it has been there for a year, sometimes flares up all red and angry and itches and feels like a foreign object is stuck in there, and it has not responded to the usual treatments of warm washcloth compresses or antibiotic drops.  Super annoying and I hope I don't look like a cyclops afterwards, but I suppose What Will Be, Will Be.  There will be icing on the way home and some kind of ointment.  And then we will see whether I can sew with one eye...

Shelly Long and Tom Hanks in The Money Pit (1986)

Those are my sewing plans for the rest of the week!  In other news, the builder/remodeler finally got back to us with the numbers for Phase One, the things we need done before we can move all of our things (including all of my sewing equipment and paraphernalia) back to North Carolina from Florida.  The good news is that I could schedule movers for the week before Thanksgiving!!!!  The bad news is that my husband is apoplectic about the cost and might fire the builder before they even get started, leaving me stranded in the Everglades with my dog and my sewing machines indefinitely.  

I like it better when the '80s movie that epitomizes my marriage is The Princess Bride rather  than The Money Pit.  Let's hope it doesn't devolve into The War of the Roses before we're through!

MONDAY

Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts  

Monday Musings at Songbird Designs  

TUESDAY

To-Do Tuesday at Quilt Schmilt  

WEDNESDAY

Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter

THURSDAY

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation  

FRIDAY

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Off the Wall Friday at Nina Marie Sayre

Beauty Pageant at From Bolt to Beauty

 TGIFF Thank Goodness It’s Finished Friday, rotates, schedule found here: TGIF Friday

SUNDAY

Frédérique at Quilting Patchwork Appliqué

Slow Stitching Sunday at Kathy's Quilts

Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework