Eiffel Tower Doll Quilt Quilted

Well, my free-motion quilting is done on my Eiffel Tower Doll Quilt. I got some *glorious* idea to do swirls, because the Lacey Scrolls fabric would look so great with swirls. I’ve done swirls on mug rugs before, but nothing larger. I definitely need more practice. My daughter likes it, so I’m happy about that.

Though I wouldn’t really want to exhibit the quilt [and considered making the pictures fuzzy, so the details wouldn’t show. Instead I named the photos Hot Mess of Swirls], I’m not feeling too badly about having done the meandering swirls, without really knowing how. It’s a process. The more I practice, the more comfortable I’ll become and better it will look. I actually like trying new things. Honestly. I also learned a lot from trying it on a real project, instead of scraps.

One thing I learned, some designs look better the more spread out they are. I tried to make it really tight like my stippling and I don’t think it worked well.

I also learned that I need to invest in some tools, such as an extension table. To do large swirls, the quilt needs to glide around more easily. It’s hard to keep the stitches even and rounded when it slips or is hard to move easily, while controlling the speed of the stitching. Working on mug rugs, I didn’t find this a problem. Now that the project is larger, swirls were a bit trickier without the extension table.

I also need to consider which machine to buy the extension table for. [having several machines is great, but buying accessories for each one can get pricey.] My Pfaff has trouble with its needle down feature. Half the time my Pfaff doesn’t end in the needle down position, despite being set to do just that. [so annoying] My Viking stops on a dime, needle down. Every. Single. Time.

I knew this going in. After doing some appliqué work on my Pfaff, I found it to be too inconsistent to do appliqué to my standards. My Viking has much better control over its settings, such as stitch length, stitch width, and the needle up/down feature never fails, making it much better at appliqué work.

I find the needle up/down position was not as crucial for the stippling FMQ, but definitely messed with me while trying to do the swirls FMQ. [Oh, well. Live and learn.]

Which leaves me to confirm my pervious thoughts on sewing machines, there is no perfect machine. There is good and bad in all things, and sewing machines are no exception.

I squared up the quilt and it’s ready for its binding. However, I won’t be doing it. My daughter wants to do the binding herself. She’s trying to decide on the fabric and I will teach her how to cut it out on the bias. It will be good practice for when she does her Kitty quilt, as it’s much larger and will be judged at fair.