Whether you think they’re great or their tacky, silk flowers and leaves make a great three dimensional addition to a quilt surface.
From my fall leaf collection
At one guild meeting someone gave me some silk leaves that had been packaging for the tables. I didn’t know what I’d do with them. But the colors were great.I tucked them in my bag and said thanks. Then I forgot about them.
They cluttered around the studio for some while, and then I had a quilt that needed them. This quilt ran on the tension between oranges and blues. Those hot orange shaded leaves were wonderful! And I was hooked.
Cheese cloth leaves
I’d spent a lot of time making leaves of numerous things: cheesecloth, organza, hand dye, felt, and lace. I love them too. But it’s a more abstracted look. The silk leaves gave me instant leaves with fabulous detail.
Since then, I’ve haunted the dollar store and craft shops looking for leaves and flowers. What’s available changes with the seasons and the fashions. The fall leaves are obvious, but the flowers change with season as well. The good news is that even a small garland or batch can give you petals and leaves for years and years of quilts
‘A word about the fiber content. These aren’t silk. I’ve never heard them calling anything but that, but they are actually polyester. Sometimes they’re already heat treated for texture. Do they wash? Probably about as well as most things I use on quilts. They withstand water just fine, but they don’t handle abrasion and folding well. They need to be treated gently.
This quilt needed a few flowers in the background. I tried stitching them in with thick thread, but I really didn’t like the look. I found a silk mum I took apart. I didn’t like it at all as a flat flower, but when I folded it in quarters, it was perfect. I stitched in a green calix , stem and some lines to define the flowers. I’m in love.
Willow Marsh
Every flower is a surprise and not everything works the same way.
hydrangea petals
Smaller flowers work better stitched down as a whole.
Golden Cicada
You may need a wire cutter to take the flowers apart. They have those at the dollar store too.
Wire cutters
I keep bins of different leaves and flowers I’ve dismantled. I never know when I’ll need them. They add extra texture, color and pizzazz
There’s nothing like being on a roll with a piece. You’re sewing away. You have one more bit to do, or maybe three or maybe five. It’s a bit questionable but you push through because it’s so good to be done.
By now I should be prescient about that. That’s a ledge with a chasm right by it. And I should know I’m likely to fall. I did that this week.
three fish
I had that green heron quilt ready to go. Got the heron on. Looked at the fish and decided I needed an odd number. Three was a bit empty. So I decided on five.
five fish
Did I look? Actually I did. Did I think? Perhaps that’s the problem. My brain knows that odd numbers work better than even ones. My eye knew the fifth fish just didn’t fit in. I listened to my brain. Not so smart.
Theories don’t always work. If your eye tells you it’s wrong, then it’s wrong. Had I listened I would have saved myself three hours with a mustache trimmer and seam ripper. And a ruined fish.
Design is important. So is color. So is drawing. But in the end, it’s how the piece balances and flows when it’s all done. This is the part you can foul up with everything else right. And the answer is simple. You need to look at it.
Not just put it up and see. Put it where you can really analyze whether it balances and flows and whether there’s stuff.
I’m bad at this. That moment when I get that urge to finish…. it gets me every time I follow it.
So how do we look at a quilt differently?
Old school is to just back away far enough from it to see it. It’s not enough to see it laid on the table. You need to hang it to see it. I used to hang really large pieces off the porch and walked down the alley to really see it.
I’ve also used a a wide angle viewer. These let you view a big quilt in a small space. They are very valuable.
Another old school method is a ruby beholder, or a color evaluator. It’s a red or green piece of plastic where you can see the values in your quilt as opposed to the colors. It’s a huge help.
All of that steps back to a digital camera. And yes, your cell phone will probably do that.
Just get far enough back to photo the whole piece. And then, changed the photo to black and white. You can see the movement, whether something needs to be put over slightly to one side. Whether you’ve just got a hole or it’s too cluttered. Whether something disappears. It will also show you if you’ve got a value problem.
My bird is a bit subtle here. But I don’t think I mind that. He’s hunting after all, so he needs to be.
Leaves in place
It’s always better to do that before you sew things down. You would think I would learn. Experience is the best teacher, and some fools will have no other.
Every time I demo, I have someone ask if I really sew that fast. Yes. Yes I do.
But not on everything. It depends largely on the kind of sewing you’re doing.
I’ve always said there were two sewing speeds: straight and zigzag. Why? Because different techniques work better with different speeds.
Straight stitching is better at a medium speed. both foot pedal and hands. Too fast you lose control. Too slow you start wobbling. That would be for stippling, bobbin work, and line drawing.
Zigzag stitching is different, The faster you can sew with a zigzag stitch, the better you can fill in the space. It’s possible to go so fast you go over the edge or over your thumb. But barring that, machine speed is your friend , Now your hands are a whole different thing. They move at a crawl, holding hoop to slide it extra slowly, again so you can fill everything in well.
I don’t every really sew slowly. It makes me crazy. Particularly for the zigzag stitch. It just takes so long. You also lose those smooth lines sewing slowly.
Recently I bought a Bernina 790. It’s a proper speed demon, I’ve been working on these larger zigzag appliques and I realized something. They used to take me a lot more time. I’ve been cutting 2-4 days off the embroidery time with a faster machine.
It makes sense. I just hadn’t thought that way. The faster you sew the faster you’re done. I hadn’t realized what a difference that machine was making.
My dad used to say if there was a job that took to long, was too hard or too nasty, you had the wrong tool. The right tool could change all of that. I still haven’t trotted that machine out for bobbin work. I’ve been too busy doing zigzag embroidered appliques to get there.
On of the features of the new machine is that it counts stitches. It tells me I put three million stitches in since October. I think you can see how that happened. I did these fourth birds over the last the last month
What does that mean for you? Find the best machine you can to do the work you want to do. You can work hard. You can work smart. And you can let your machine help. That doesn’t mean the most expensive machine. Try machines out with what you want to do. You’ll know the difference. The right machine makes it so much easier.
When should you slow down sewing? Mostly when you loose control of your stitch or when you start breaking thread in a way that makes you crazy. Other than that, I’d blaze away.
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