HAND QUILTING WORKSHOP

I took a workshop on Saturday where I learned about Hand Quilting.  The gal that taught the workshop has been hand quilting for years and does most of her quilts by hand.  We learned about needles, thimbles and thread that is used, how to mark your quilt for hand quilting and how to hand quilt.

I was surprised at the method of hand quilting.  I thought that you put the needle down into the quilt and then up again but that is not the way at all.  You insert the needle and do a rocking stitch to pick up more stitches on your needle and use the thimble to push the needle through the fabric.  I hope that makes sense.  It is not an easy process.  In fact it was very strange to me and hard to get my fingers working the right way.  Some of the participants caught on right away and I did take pictures. 

Jeannette stressed that the main thing is that the stitches are consistent and that was very hard to do.  Some were large and some small.  Also it was hard to make the needle go thru so that there was a stitch on the other side of the work. 

One of Jeannette's quilts that was hand quilted.

We were a small group

Straight lines

A nice grid

Triangles

Here is my attempt at hand quilting.  This is just some of what I did in the 4 hours but I thought I would show my straight lines.  My stitches aren't very uniform but my lines are straight. 

This is the back of my quilt and as you can see there are stitches missing on the backing.  It was not easy doing the hand quilting but it was fun and I learned a lot. 

Practice makes perfect as Jeannette said.



This is the frame that Jeannette uses for her hand quilting.

Peggy

The Dandy Workshop

I have been making bags since I started quilting 6 years ago.  I have made tote bags, grocery bags, travel bags, and purses.  One of the bags that I really like is the Dandy Bag.  I found it on the Internet in 2010 and have made somewhere between 6 and 10 of these bags.  I have re sized them to make them larger and in many different colourways.  This is a fun bag to make.  This is the bag that Lynda and I took when we travelled to Europe a few years ago, and called it our day bag.  We carried our water bottle, hat, umbrella, Kleenex, and anything else that wasn't valuable.

Because I have made so many bags the Guild asked me to put on a workshop and I chose the Dandy Bag from Dandelion Quilts.  I added pockets and a zipper because that is what the participants asked for.  We had a great time and as you can see everyone chose beautiful fabrics for their bag.  Five of the 8 gals finished their bag on Saturday.

I forgot to ask if they minded having

their faces out on the Internet so I cropped

the picture to display the beautiful bags.

Peggy.