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Well, the saga with my frame has continued. We did replace one of the ratchets and also the handle bars (as they were sticking and giving me error messages) and then replaced half of a pole. Now this was situated in the dead bar so it was relatively easy to do. I have been using the frame since then but recently discovered that my deadbar is bent, i.e. when you advance your quilt and the deadbar rolls with it due to the bent it then tensions the quilt differently every time you advance. I had noticed that my quilts ...

It's been a while again since my last post but I have had some trouble with the new frame. Once I got used to it a bit I noticed that I had a 'bump' in the middle. Ever so slightly but it meant that the machine would just veer off to the right...very noticeable when quilting along. On top of that my rails were not tightened  properly in the middle which meant that they had wedged once I started quilting. Not a huge deal, but important if I wanted to sell the frame. The dealer has been out ...

Well, where are we at?

I tried one of the new pantographs on there that arrived just before Christmas. It's a new design from Hermione Agee from Lorien Quilting called Airy Clouds. Very cute for little baby quilts.

While still a bit wobbly here and there I am definitely feeling that I am getting the hang of this.

Well, Christmas has come and gone and in the blink of an eye we are in 2026!

I did continue practising on the studio frame. After I had somewhat successfully managed to quilt an entire practice piece with a pantograph, I then went onto one of the charity quilts. Still using the Daisy Dotz#2 design (available through Urban Elementz) I made it through this floral charity quilt.

Suited it really well and sunk right in so any irregularities are really not noticeable which was a bonus. When I was quilting it row by row I was almost at the ...

We spent another few days on levelling the frame...at some point the carriage had a slight tipping motion, so then we had to re-adjust the carriage and tracks and so it went on. But I think we now have got it right and the machine stitches without any major problems.

It's been a hectic few weeks. The frame arrived 2 weeks ago and has now been all set up. There were a few delays, ie. my ruler kit only arrived last Thursday and the last day of my workshop also fell in between. Must say I did not expect that much 'mucking' around. It took about a day to set it up in the spare room. Then came an extraordinary protracted trial of trying to find a comfortable height. So I had it a bit higher initially, then decided that I might want it one hole lower and then ...

I am running behind in the the quilting of the charity quilts. Have four more to go before I pick up new quilt tops, so I am really knuckling down trying to get this done (hopefully by mid - August). Very much in the mood for ruler quilting and the next quilt top presented the perfect opportunity to do some Baptist fans again.

Have not completely finished my baby quilt, however the binding is on and it just needs to be handstitched to the back.

Before I get into the baby quilt, here are some photos from the Garden Charity Quilt I talked about in previous posts. Noticed the other day that I actually had not put up any photos of the finished thing...and that after I did all that practice to be sure that I actually could execute thatt design. For readers who have not read about it as yet, I decided to do the Hndiquilter Flutterby Design over this charity quilt. Had to practice a bit to be able to do this though over a larger area.

First of all...thanks to everyone that responded to my last post. I received each comment via email! Yah!

Well, the AMQF has come and gone. Four days of all things quilting. I went every single day...not exactly how I had it all planned out but with having to drop off my quilt and picking it up, retail hall and one class it just turned out that way.

I have been a big fan of 100wt Invisafil Thread from Wonderfil Threads ever since I did Bethanne Nemesh' online workshops. Up to then I had been using Invisafil mainly for stitch-in-the-ditch but was encouraged through those workshops to give it a go for background quilting.

My list from last week included:

-make a start on my background filler project from way back

-continue on my scrap quilt blocks (have made 15 so far)

-continue on the new 'colourwash project

Worked consistently over the week which was a good feeling. Started my background filler project

Nice, but won't do...had all sorts of problems with Invisafil 100wt thread which was not totally new (the adjustment can get fiddly at times) but somewhat unexpected as I had used the same thread before on an earlier project. My tension was somewhat variable and I just could not ...

I have been hard at work finishing the last charity quilt out of the pile that I had. With this particular quilt I was just not feeling it and decided to do a minimum of quilting-in-the-ditch on it just to get it done.

Well, it's been 2 weeks since I started my cover for the machine. It has only taken me 3.5yrs and a bit to tackle this, so this was it. It had to be done.

I like to push the boundaries a bit with my sitdown longarm, i.e. see what else I can do on there and how difficult (or not) is it to push my quilt through the machine with the latest ideas I have. Given that I have a draw full of rulers I am always looking for new ideas to use my rulers to complete allover designs.

I had the bestest time at the show! The atmosphere was great, the vendor hall so very tempting and on top of that I had the biggest surprise on the day.

Last week I planned for:

Finished the quilting on another charity quilt which I ended up calling 'The Nude Quilt'. It is an exceptionally well made quilt top...the seams mainly line up and the maker has taken great care in painstakingly cutting out a motif to put into the corner stones for the sashing. Those little corner stones are just 1-1/2in squares, so that would have taken a lot of patience to cut out. The motifs then re-appear in the striking border.