25.4.10

wonkilicious

wonky cross quilt in teals and lemon

The wonky cross quilt is finished and had been washed for extra-wrinkly goodness. The finished dimensions are 36 x 48 1/2 , so it's a decent size for a crib quilt. I have mixed feelings about it, though. For starters, I should have thrown some more solids in there. While I thought sticking with the prints was a great idea at first, it almost feels too busy. Then there's the fact that I did a sloppy job quilting it. That's not totally my fault. As much as they say that only a lousy artist/craftsperson/technician blames their tools, my sewing machine has not been cooperating lately. In fact, as I was sewing 100-something fingerpuppets for Bazaar Bizarre last December, it started acting up, and I knew it would only go downhill from there. Perhaps I just need to take it in for a tune-up. I'm hoping it's just that. I do a pretty good job of maintaining it. I clean it regularly since I use it so much, making sure there's no lint trapped in the feed-dogs or any other part of the machine. You'd be shocked at what I have pulled out of my machine after sewing several batches of softies. Back to the problem on hand, however, whenever I quilt, my tension starts out nice and even with clean, even stitches, and then it all turns to shit. My stitches are not evenly spaced. The tension goes from perfect to tight to perfect to tight in just one 12 inch length of sewing. It doesn't matter how I hold the fabric or try to distribute the weight of the quilt. I end up ripping so much, it's ridiculous. The process of quilting has been rendered completely unpleasant with this machine. It's not even an old machine. It's a Kenmore, and I've had it for just 4 years. It should be noted that in those 4 years, I have sewn about 600 or more softies. That's a lot of sewing, especially when you take into account that my softies are fussy little things with lots of parts. Yep. I feel like maybe it's time for an upgrade. Tune-up or no tune-up, I am not so sure this machine can handle another holiday season. But I digress.... (I do that often.)

About the quilt: love the colors, not so keen on the busyness. I copped out on the back and just used a whole piece of the Michael Miller Zoology print - partly because I didn't want to get too fussy and just wanted to get it done, and partly because I hear that babies really respond to graphic black and white shapes. That Zoology print would be perfect for providing such stimulation. So I figure he can lay on either side of this and have a ball. My quilting leaves a bit to be desired, but hey, my machine is sucking dog balls lately. I just traced the shapes in the quilt, alternating between tracing inside the crosses to tracing the rectangles the crosses create. Pretty basic stuff, but with all the prints basic stitching was maybe the best way to go.

3 comments:

knithound brooklyn said...

I like it! It's busy but it's rather fun!

Louise said...

I like your quilt. What are 'softies'? (I don't know that much about quilting, if that's what it is). And I read the article you referred to a few days ago, and the comments on it. I thought your comment was a good one. My feeling is, you can only do what you can do. And you have to be OK with that. Pretty much what you said.

grumperina said...

I don't know, it looks pretty awesome from here! I love the prints!