I have had this top 'in house' for over a month. So, I have been thinking about what to stitch on this top for that long. My customer and I have been in communication and we agree that the top has some issues. It is a block of the month that she has worked very hard on to construct. This pattern has a lot of bias in it and it is showing up in the finished product. For that reason, I am going to blog about the progress so that we can all learn together how to handle these tops. This way I can also get advice from other longarm quilters as to what to stitch where and the best way to stitch it while making this fullness disappear. What we will end up with will be flat and square and beautiful. Just watch. This WILL happen.
Let's load the backing:
Our backing is a beautiful batik. I did have to square it up because it was torn off of the bolt. Make no mistake about this, just because it is torn, that does not mean it is square. The backing is 108 x 117 inches. I am spritzing it a little to get the wrinkles out as I load it on Olivia (my hand guided Gammill).
Now to the 'tale of the longarm quilter'. I went back to the batting room (my son's old bedroom) to get my kingsize black bat for this project. Don't have one..................Everything I have is Queen. Really thought I had a king. Called everyone I know. Called the total of 3 quilt shops within a 100 miles. No body had one. Karen Kendo messaged me from Montana or Wyoming (she is in a Judy Niemeyer workshop) that she had one and I could go to Harleyville and pick it up, but, by that time I had already ordered from Quilters Dream. They will have it to me by close of business on Thursday. Glory Be!!! I will only be 3 days behind. So, I moved into the Annex to load something on Penelope (my Statler system).
The first project on her list today required that I piece the backing.........so........that will move to the next project. I pulled the next project on the list and finally had her loaded and ready to go. Stitched 2 passes of the pattern and Penelope went non-responsive. Have no clue what happened. I rebooted the computer and now we are stitching again.
Some days the quilt fairies just don't want you to take a stitch.
Hopefully will finish up the Sister's Choice top today and then can start fresh tomorrow. Until then.
Keep your stitches straight and your tension well balanced,
