Telecast Thursday - Organic Feathers on the Handi Quilter Infinity

This Telecast Thursday I'm playing with feathers on my Handi Quilter Infinity.

I love the look of elegant feathers, but haven't mastered the technique of creating perfect feathers - yet! Remember, practice makes perfect. In the meantime I'll settle for just creating some type of feather and am enjoying stitching free motion organic feathers. There's no stress to make them perfect and it's a very creative and freeing form of quilting.

Watch the video below or on my Youtube channel to see how I quilt out this free flowing design.

Subscribe to my Youtube channel to receive automatic notifications when new videos are posted. You can also click on the Chatterbox Quilts logo in the lower right corner on the video itself to subscribe. If you like what you see, please share my videos with your fellow creatives.

How are you doing with quilting feathers? Leave me a comment below to let me know your favourite type of feather to stitch and any tips you may have for me.

Creatively,

Telecast Thursday - Circle Variations with the Handi Quilter Infinity

Welcome to another Telecast Thursday! This week I'm getting loopy on my HQ Infinity. I'll show you how to take simple circles and create more intricate loop designs with them. These are easy for even beginner quilters to accomplish and you can do them on your long-arm or domestic sewing machine.

You can watch the video below or on my Youtube channel to see how simple it is to create these designs.

Subscribe to my Youtube channel to receive automatic notifications when new videos are posted. You can also click on the Chatterbox Quilts logo in the lower right corner on the video itself to subscribe. Please share my videos with your fellow creatives.

Leave me a comment below to tell me how your loopy quilting is coming along.

Creatively,

Telecast Thursday - Real Quilting: The Learning Curve

It's Telecast Thursday and I'm addressing another "Real Quilting" topic.

I've been enjoying playing and learning on my Handi Quilter Infinity, but there is definitely a learning curve with this machine. As with most new sewing or quilting machines there are many different functions and it does take time to become completely familiar with all - or even some - of them. While it can seem overwhelming to use a new machine, it is essential that you spend the time to learn about it so you will use it. It's just this issue that I am addressing in the video below.

You can watch the video on my Youtube channel.

Subscribe to my Youtube channel to receive automatic notifications when new videos are posted. You can also click on the Chatterbox Quilts logo in the lower right corner on the video itself to subscribe. Remember to like and share my videos with your fellow creatives.

I hope I've inspired you to overcome your fears about learning to use a new machine or tool. Let me know how you handle this situation by leaving a comment below.

Creatively,

Telecast Thursday - Your Quilting Space on the Handi Quilter Infinity

This Telecast Thursday I'm looking at the quilting space on my HQ Infinity. I want to avoid the look of linear quilting when I'm doing free motion quilting so working on one area at a time can resolve this issue. 

Watch the video below or on my Youtube channel to learn about your quilting space and how to create a non-linear quilted quilt.

Subscribe to my Youtube channel to receive automatic notifications when new videos are posted. You can also click on the Chatterbox Quilts logo in the lower right corner on the video itself to subscribe. Please like and share my videos with your fellow creatives.

Leave a comment below on how you define your quilting space.

Vintage Quilting on the Handi Quilter Infinity

I've been playing with my Handi Quilter Infinity, learning how to use it, trying out different threads and practising various free motion quilting designs. I'm sure that this machine is smarter than me and it works its hardest at making my attempts look as good as it can. Having said that, I definitely need to practice more to achieve the perfect quilt motifs I hope to one day create.

While filming my on-line course, The Joy of Vintage Sewing Machines, I needed to create several samples of the projects created in the class. I hadn't yet quilted some of these samples, so they were perfect to play with on the Infinity. The only challenge with this particular sample (the vintage sewing machine cabinet cover) was that I had used the pillowcase method to create it, so the quilt top, batting and backing were already stitched together. I attached extra fabric on both sides so I could use my grippy things to hold the edges of the quilt out to each side. Yes, "grippy things" is a quilting term. This worked very well and I had no issues with tension in quilting this project.

I used the seamed fabric as a registration mark for the bumps, hill, monster's teeth quilting: I put two of these motifs in each fabric strip - or tried to. 

If I'd really wanted the centre squiggle design to be even, I could've marked it. Maybe I'll try that next time.

I like swirls, but am used to making them over a larger area. The challenge with these was to keep them in the white strip of fabric. I need to work on making them look rounder, rather than an oval or deflated O.

I stitched in the ditch around each seam - always difficult to do without a vertical locking system on the long-arm. I winged it and didn't do too bad. Maybe next time I'll try to use a ruler for this part of the quilting. I suppose you don't have to SID on a long-arm machine, but it does stabilize the quilt more and can make certain areas of the quilt more prominent.

As you can see, I used simple designs on this project. I could've stitched it with white thread and smaller motifs to just give texture, but I wanted to try out the Superior Thread's So Fine variegated thread that I had recently purchase. Plus, I love the green and aqua colour of the thread.

Let me know your favourite quilt motifs so I can try them on the Infinity. Just leave a comment below.

Creatively,