I do a great job piecing - to the point of being neurotic about points meeting properly, etc.
I have mastered sandwiching and pinning the quilt to the point of going overboard with both quilt basting spray and a zillion safety pins.

My problem is that I can't get even stitches quilting on a sewing machine. I think the problem is that I am not supporting the quilt properly.

How do you do this? I have limited sewing space, and I am so frustrated that I can't get my quilting to look decent. I can do a nice job on wall hangings and table runners, but as soon as I try a bed size quilt it goes all wrong.

Any suggestions??? This is making me nuts!!!!I have 4 twin quilts to finish and I can't seem to
finish them nicely. I am tired of being so well acquainted with my seam ripper!!!

Bright

Here's a link to the Simply Quilts quilting videos. On the left of the screen, type in "machine quilting". There are several different videos on machine quilting. These are free to view...there's other subjects too. Hope this helps.

http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/pac_ctnt_988/text/0,,HGTV_22056_58466,00.html

Janice

I have experienced the same frustrations. Everything I'd try still had some puckers on the back, etc.

I had the best luck by rolling the sides like a jelly roll and starting in the middle. If my quilting was fairly close together it worked better. Everytime I got a section quilted, I'd roll everything out again and re-adjust.

I was thinking that hand quilting would take too long..... and it does take much longer than machine quilting........ but I love the look of hand quilting I don't know if I'll ever go back to machine quilting for large quilts.

Jean

Hi,
How do you secure the quilt when it is rolled up? I can't seem to keep it in a roll.

Bright

Bright, I haven't had too much trouble having the quilt unroll. The person that taught me to do this said to roll both sides to the middle and sit on the rolled ends to begin the stitching (sort of like riding a horse). It doesn't matter if it unrolls after you've stitched it. I think I tried large rubber bands once. I don't really remember how that worked. It's been a couple of years since I machine quilted a bed quilt.

I always tape quilt shows on Saturday mornings. This morning a lady was on there that was quilting blocks as she went. That way...it's MUCHO easier to handle then a full sized quilt. Then you just have to make a quilted strip to attach that. It looked so fun.

Also........She NEVER just stitches in the ditch. She uses a small wavy zig zag and just follows the line. She said it's much easier, and it looks GREAT! I'll try to find the show episode tomorrow.