Black Baby Quilt, Because Infant Brain Development and Selfish Quiltmaker

Fabrics and Threads for Amish Baby 54-40 Or Fight Quilt

So I'm going with the black baby quilt, because that's what I feel like making, and I don't have sufficient discipline or selflessness to spend hours and hours making a quilt in fabrics that I do not personally find exciting.  I guess I'm just a selfish quilter.  "Know thyself," right?  I bought fabric for both of the designs I came up with, but I'm going to make the 54-40 Or Fight quilt first because the Storm At Sea wasn't giving me ruler-friendly numbers for all of the patches in the size I wanted to make.  The mantra for this Amish Baby quilt is going to be "Keep It Simple, Sweetie."  The 54-40 Or Fight blocks will finish at 12" and with sashing and borders the quilt should end up at 53" x 53," just right for tucking into a stroller or car seat, and later, for dragging around the house.  

My 54-40 Or Fight Amish Baby Quilt Design

I got some interesting feedback in the comments about black for baby quilts, but my husband pointed out that my high contrast designs with black, white, and bold primary colors reminded him of those "visually stimulating" infant mobiles and toys that are supposed to be better suited to an infant's underdeveloped visual capabilities than traditional pastels:

"Baby View," an "educational" Android app for infants

 I did a quick internet search to see whether this black and white baby thing was still a current recommendation (since my husband is remembering this stuff from when Lars and Anders were babies) and apparently this high contrast stuff for babies is still all over the place and now they even have mesmerizing "educational" apps for iPad, Android etc. such as Baby View, shown above, featuring this graphic, black/white/bold aesthetic.  I have to share this quote from parenting guru Dr. Sears' web site:

"The best way you as a parent can stimulate baby’s vision is using black and white stripes or light and dark contrasting colors. So what about those nice soft pastels that used to be so popular in baby toys and nurseries? While these may look pretty to you, they do nothing visually for your baby. Research has proven that black and white contrasts register powerfully on baby’s retina and send the strongest visual signals to baby’s brain. Stronger signals mean more brain growth and faster visual development. Surround a baby with soft pastel colors, and you might as well be blindfolding him. Surround your baby with black and white or light and dark pictures, and watch your baby’s eyes light up."

I put quotation marks around "educational," by the way, because I don't really buy into the idea that you can make your baby smarter by bombarding them with black and white graphic patterns.  In 10 or 15 years, I fully expect the experts to come out with new research that totally contradicts all the advice parents are getting today.  These things must go in cycles so we can continue to blame the previous generation's bad parenting for the current generation's bad habits.  Whatever -- I feel like making my black baby quilt design, so I'm going to co-opt Dr. Sears' infant brain pseudoscience in order to justify my personal aesthetic choices.  Thanks, Bernie!

Let the Piecing Begin!

So, as you can see, I've prewashed/preshrunk my fabrics, cut all of my patches, and I've started to piece the 4-patch units.  Having set aside the paper pieced pineapple log cabin project, this is my first opportunity to piece with the new # 97D Patchwork foot on my Bernina 750QE.  This is a brand new patchwork foot designed especially for 9 mm sewing machines, and I'm in love with it! 

New # 97D Patchwork Foot from Bernina

Traditional 1/4" patchwork presser feet are not wide enough to completely cover the feed dogs on a sewing machine that sews up to 9 mm stitch width, which makes it more difficult to stitch perfectly straight and accurate quarter inch seams on these machines.  That's one reason why so many quilters prefer to piece on 5.5 mm or straight stitch only machines.  The new #97D foot is wider on the left side to improve fabric feeding, and comes with a seam guide that screws firmly into the bed of the machine as shown in my photo at left.  There is a little notch in the presser foot that makes it very easy to quickly install the seam guide in exactly the right position.  The "D" indicates that this foot has a cutout in the back to accommodate the Dual Feed on Bernina 7 Series and 8 Series machines (owners of machines without dual feed should purchase the regular #97 foot without the cutout at the back of the foot).  I am amazed by the difference in my piecing with the new #97D foot versus the older style #37D patchwork foot that came with my 750QE. 

Straight, Consistent Chain Piecing with New Patchwork Foot #97D

See how nice and straight those seams are coming out of the back of my sewing machine?  Usually I struggle with keeping the seam allowance accurate at the beginning and end of a seam, when the fabric wants to shift sideways.  I feel like I have a lot more control with the new presser foot, so much so that my seam ripper has remained in the drawer.  Who doesn't love that?  What's more, my pieced units are finishing accurate to size with the new foot:

Completed 4 Patch Unit Finishes Exactly 4 1/2"

I highly recommend this foot for anyone who is struggling with patchwork accuracy on a 9 mm Bernina machine.  One of the things I most enjoy about my Bernina sewing machine is the high quality of the Bernina specialty feet which make it so much easier to achieve professional results.  Now, if only Bernina would come out with a special foot for doing FMQ ruler work on my machine...

Ah, well -- the kids are home from their first day back at school after the winter vacation.  I'd best head downstairs to see how they are getting on with their homework.

I'm linking up with Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times.  Happy Stitching!

Chubby Welt Cord: Another Reason to Love the Dual Feed on the Bernina 750 QE

Half Inch Welt on Window Seat Cushion

In true Gemini fashion, I've been vacillating wildly between hand sewn invisible applique, my vintage Singer Featherweights, and my shiny new Bernina 750 QE over the past few months.  When I decided to purchase my new  'Nina  machine over a year ago, no one at the store did a very good job of explaining the integrated dual feed feature to me and it didn't factor into my purchasing decision at all.  However, I've found that the little Dual Feed footsie that scoots along behind my presser foot really DOES improve all kinds of sewing, from piecing quilt tops to matching prints on drapery panels.  I recently discovered another situation where the dual feed is a huge help: covering welt cord.

Lars's Window Seat Cushion

Most of the time, if I'm making a project that requires fabric-covered cording, I'll use a 5/32" or smaller diameter cord so I can whip it up on my serger with the raw edges perfectly even and overcast, all in one operation.  However, for this bench cushion for Lars's bedroom window seat, I preferred the look of chubby 1/2" diameter welt covered in orange chenille upholstery fabric.  Now, when covering cord on a regular sewing machine, the biggest problem to watch out for is uneven feeding of the two fabric layers, which can create a twisting, spiraling effect to your cord and make it pucker unattractively on your finished project.  Normally this effect is more pronounced and more difficult to avoid with the larger diameter cord, so I gritted my teeth and prepared for the worst.

I used my #4D (the D denotes that it's a foot with a special cutout at the back to accommodate the Dual Feed mechanism) Zipper foot with dual feed engaged, and I was delighted with how well my machine handled this task.  Since I will be using this cording on an upholstered cornice as well as on the boxed cushion for the window seat, I had to make 12 yards of cording.  With Dual Feed engaged on my 750, I was able to sew this cord accurately with no twisting or shifting of the fabric layers, and at FULL SPEED, 1000 stitches per minute, with my pedal to the floor.  It was almost as fast as covering skinny cording on the serger (except for having to go back and overcast the edges in a separate step with Foot #2A). 


Overcasting Raw Edges with a Zigzag Stitch Using Foot #2A

Here's a Bernina video that better explains how and why to use the Dual Feed feature, demonstrated on a 780 sewing machine:

Now that Lars's window seat cushion is done, I need to upholster his cornice (a job I loathe) and make a few throw pillows for him to snuggle into with a good book.  Then I can get back to my quilting!

Happy Thursday, everyone!

And the Quilt Goes On... Tips for Embroidery Repair and Perfect Patchwork Seams

Quilt Top is Complete!

I finished up the Dresden plate quilt top for my niece's birthday yesterday -- Yay!  Of course her birthday is TOMORROW and I still have to layer, baste, quilt, and bind this before I can ship it out, but at least the end is in sight.  I figure that as long as Sarah gets her gift before her brother James gets his (their birthdays are 6 days apart), I'll be okay.

Embroidering the Monogram Label with the Jumbo Hoop

I embroidered the monogram block on Thursday with my new Jumbo hoop.  This monogram/quilt label is approximately 7 1/2" wide by 8" tall, so it would have been impossible to embroider this on my old 200E/730E.  (If I had an 830 E machine, I could have made this design even bigger, up to 10" wide, but as you can see on my sewing machine's screen, the 7 Series machines cannot embroider in the leftmost 2" of the Jumbo Hoop because there isn't enough space in the harp area for the hoop).  Can I just tell you how much I LOVE this hoop?  It has an entirely different closing mechanism than the smaller hoops; it clicks into closed position and distributes the tension more evenly across the entire hoop rather than just at the location of the screw, if that makes sense.  After my recent research on machine embroidery best practices, I opted to fuse a layer of Polymesh to the cotton quilt fabric, and then floated a layer of midweight Clean and Tear stabilizer under the hoop.  My design stitched beautifully with NO puckering or distortion. 

Thread Loops (Circled) Due to Dull or Damaged Needle

The first color to stitch in this design was the blue scrollwork, and I noticed some little thread loops as this was stitching out.  My books say that thread loops are caused by a dull or defective needle.  This made sense, as I had the same embroidery needle in my machine that I had used for all of the blanket stitch applique to attach my plates to their background squares.  I switched to a brand new 80/12 Titanium plated Organ embroidery needle, and the remainder of the design stitched out perfectly with no more loopies. 

[Updated April 2013: Thread loops can also be caused by using a ballpoint needle rather than a sharp point needle on woven fabrics, or by using a needle that is too SMALL to allow thread to pass smoothly through the hole in the fabric while forming that satin stitch.  Next time I do a design like this on quilting cotton fabric, I'm going to use a size 90/14 Organ Embroidery SHARP needle, a 90/14 Topstitching Needle, or a 90/14 Microtex needle.  Using a thread net on slippery embroidery thread spools helps to eliminate the loops as well.]

However, what to do about those loops that were in the scrollwork?  I did NOT want to start over again, because it took about an hour and a half to sew out the design.  If I just trimmed the loops off with a scissor, the rest of the embroidery design would be compromised.  So, after unhooping my fabric, I used a snag repair tool to pull the loops to the back side.  It worked like magic. 

After removing the tearaway stabilizer and trimming the polymesh to within about 1/2" of the embroidery design, I pressed my embroidered fabric and then cut it into a 13 1/2" square for my center block.  I did not cut out the block prior to embroidery because the block was smaller than the size of the hoop.  I sewed the blocks together with the sashing and posts yesterday afternoon, and finally added 3" borders to the quilt (I'm planning to use 2" wide satin binding on the edges, so only 1" of my border will show on the finished quilt.  I have one more quick tip to share: You may already know this, but I had sewn on Berninas for years and it was still news to me when Kaye England told us in class how to get a perfect 1/4" patchwork seam on a Bernina machine. 

For a Perfect 1/4" Seam, Look at the Line on the Stitch Plate, NOT the Presser Foot

First of all, you should have a straight stitch plate on your sewing machine, especially if you have a 9 mm machine like my 750 QE.  Kaye recommends regular 80/12 Universal needles for patchwork pieceing and 50 weight Aurifil Mako cotton thread, so that's what I'm using here.  I have my #37 D Patchwork foot on my machine (the D indicates Dual Feed, so I have that little Dual Feed footsie engaged -- I really feel like it helps feed the fabric evenly, especially with the little 1/4" seam where the right feed dog is not in contact with the fabric).  Now, I've always used a #37 foot for piecing, and I've always used a straight stitch plate.  But I used to watch the presser foot when I was sewing, trying to keep the fabric edge even with the edge of the foot.  Kaye pointed out that there is a little groove line on my stitch plate for a 1/4" seam, and that you can get a perfect 1/4" seam by lining up your fabric edge with that little line on your stitch plate.  As long as your fabric is right next to that line, but not covering it, you'll get a perfect 1/4" seam every time.  I can't believe no one ever told me that before!

Borders Attached, Ready for Quilting

Now that the quilt top is assembled, I've decided to trim away the backing fabric behind each plate.  As usual, I did some internet research before coming to this conclusion, and found that removing the bulk of the backing fabric is strongly recommended for hand quilters, and optional for machine quilters.  My concern is that the extra layer of fabric behind each Dresden plate is making the quilt top feel too firm and stiff to me.  I want the finished quilt to be very fluid and snuggly, so I think trimming the backing fabric is the way to go. 

After that, it's time for my least favorite part of the quilting process -- layering and basting.  Since the Minky fabric I chose for my backing has stretch in one direction, it's especially important to do a good job of stabilizing it prior to quilting.  My internet research indicates that most quilters who are successful with Minky use a temporary adhesive spray for basting, and some even spray-baste first and then add pins for additional security.  Most quilters who spray baste seem to prefer 505 Spray and Fix Temporary Fabric Adhesive spray, which is what I use for embroidery so I already have a can of that upstairs.  I may or may not already have a good thread for the actual quilting in my hoarde, but even if I have the basting spray and quilting thread I will still have to run out to JoAnn Fabrics at some point over the weekend to purchase satin binding for the quilt edges.

The boys have piano lessons this afternoon and they each have some homework that I'll need to supervise, but I'm optimistic that I will be able to wrap this project up by Monday at the latest.  Wish me luck!

Loving the Bernina Dual Feed for Pattern Matching!

Eleria fabric by Robert Allen, Graphite colorway, 24" repeat

I have a very full schedule today, but I had to share this.  When I set my heart on the Bernina 750QE sewing machine, I was aware that the 7 Series machines had a Dual Feed feature, but I thought it was just a silly gimmick, to be honest.  It wasn't a major selling point for me.  However, Bernina recommends engaging this little dual feed footsie for precise matching of plaids and stripes, or for "taming hard-to-manage fabrics." 

Yesterday I had to seam several widths of a Robert Allen drapery weight linen fabric with a weave just open enough to make it shifty and cantankerous and a large scale, high contrast pattern that would be very obvious and unattractive if it did not match carefully at the seams.  I decided this was a good opportunity to test drive the Dual Feed footsie.

Bernina introduced the Dual Feed feature on the 8 Series line and incorporated it into the new 7 Series machines as well.  It's an extra little "footsie" that comes down just behind your presser foot, like a little baby upper feed dog that tugs the top layer of fabric along each time the bottom feed dogs tug at the bottom layer of fabric, to help the layers feed evenly and to prevent shifting and misalignment of seams.  The Dual Feed only works with special "D" feet that have a groove cut out at the back to accommodate the Dual Feed footsie. 

Now, I should say that, if the seam in this fabric was destined to be in a visible location on the finished window treatment, like if it was a seam on the front of a flat cornice or a flat Roman shade, I would have carefully matched the pattern EXACTLY from the right side and hand-basted this seam before machine stitching it to ensure that it was as close to perfect as is humanly possible.  However, this seam has been plannned to fall inside of a box pleat, so it won't be directly visible -- it just needs to be a close enough match so that the pattern looks balanced from a distance when your eye sweeps from one width of fabric to the next.

So I used the eye of the brown birdie as a reference point, measured from the selvage on both sides of the fabric, and discovered that the pattern match occured 1 1/2" in on this particular fabric.  If this had been a solid fabric, I would have trimmed the selvages prior to stitching the seam, but again -- this linen weave was open and shifty enough that I wanted to keep that edge stable, and I woud be stitching far enough from the selvages that I wasn't concerned about puckering.  After sewing and opening out the seam to verify accuracy of the pattern match, I trimmed the selvages away with my pinking shears.


"Blind" Pattern Match with Dual Feed Function Engaged

I call this a "blind" pattern match, since I just matched up the pattern and pinned carefully at the cutting table, and then sewed the seam without basting it first from the right side.  I attached the metal seam guide bar to my presser foot at exactly 1 1/2" from the needle, put on my 1D presser foot, pulled down the Dual Feed footsie, and sewed this seam fairly quickly, only slowing down when I came to pins so I could remove them.  I am DELIGHTED with how well the pattern matches on this seam.  This is good enough for a drapery panel, in my opinion, let alone for a seam that is going to be hiding away in a valance box pleat where no one can appreciate it.  I almost want to put the seam smack dab in the MIDDLE of the window treatment and decorate it with beads or something, to make sure everyone notices how beautifully the pattern was matched!  ;-) 

Seriously, this is going to eliminate hand-basting in many of my projects where pattern matching is crucial.  I also felt that the dual feed gave my machine a little more muscle to pull the large, heavy fabric pieces through as they stitched.  Compared to my old sewing machine, I felt like the 750QE was doing a lot more of the work of handling the weight of that fabric bulk and I was just guiding it through the machine.  It also seemed to me that the dual feed was helping me get a straighter straight stitch on this 9 mm machine, more like that of a 5 mm or smaller sewing machine.

Have I mentioned lately how much I LOVE my new sewing machine?
Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!