Tropical Sunrise - Finished just in time for Bloggers Quilt Festival!

So happy to report that Tropical Sunrise is finished!  The last of the binding was stitched down on Monday morning just prior to our quilt guild meeting, where it made its debut entrance into the world of the finished quilt.  I'm so very happy, both to have this finally completed, and also because I'm liking the way it turned out.  We've had off and on showery weather the past few days, and since I don't have anyplace to hang it outside that will accommodate its size, these photos were all taken indoors under various lighting conditions.

I machine pieced this approximately two years ago on my Singer 201A Centennial machine, and began quilting it approximately 2 1/2 months ago.   All quilting was done on my Janome Horizon, using Aurifil 50 wt. thread throughout.  For the ditch quilting I used black (color 2692) on the top.  All free motion quilting was done with a wonderful variegated yellow/gold (color 4150) as the top thread, and for the bobbin thread I chose color 2370 which blended with the back for both ditch and free motion quilting.

 I really loved how the variegated gold Aurifil 4150 played with all of the batiks, blending into the background of some and providing gorgeous contrast on others.  This is fast becoming one of my favorite go-to colors for machine quilting!

For the free motion ferns I lightly sketched in a few guide points for the stem with a Sewline ceramic lead pencil, and then quilted all the fronds freehand, trying to keep them organic in nature.

Here is a closer view of  a primary block:

And a secondary block:

And shown here on a queen size bed - sorry the lighting is not good in this room.

Stats for this quilt include:
     Pattern Source:  The Premier Fall Issue of Quilt Sampler Magazine (2004)
     Pattern Designer:  Jill Petit of Jillybean's Pride, Oakville, Ontario
     Finished size:  87-1/2 x 112 inches
     Machine pieced and machine quilted by me on my domestic sewing machines

I would love to make a smaller throw size version of this quilt sometime in the future, and may just have enough batik scraps to make one approximately 60x60 inches in size, perfect for our couch.

So happy to have this major finish to enter in the Spring 2013 Bloggers Quilt Festival in the  Home Machine Quilted category.    You can see all the quilts entered in this category by clicking here.   There are many more categories in the Festival that you can access by checking out the main Festival post here or clicking on the Festival button in the right sidebar above.  Enjoy the Festival!

This quilt is #9 in the Home Machine Quilted Category.

Observations

I've been using my new Janome Horizon for several months now, have pieced two twin size quilts, and free motion quilting is now nearly complete on the second one.  I absolutely love the machine for piecing, though I still adore piecing on the old vintage Singers too - there is just something so soothing about their quiet tick-tick-tick as they stitch with beautiful straight precision.  The Janome is a totally super ditch quilter, however, with the built-in walking foot attachment.  I don't think I'll go back to the Singer 401 with its vintage walking foot for this task when it's so easy with the Janome.

I wonder if anyone else using the Horizon has experienced difficulties with free motion quilting when there is a pieced backing.  The quilt I'm working on right now, which I hope to finish this coming week, has a pieced strip down the back.  The Janome balks nearly every time it approaches a seam that lies underneath the batting, that is, a pieced backing seam.  This seems to happen whether or not there is a corresponding seam in the top layer.  On the very few occasions where a seam in the top layer is directly above a backing seam, the machine literally stops, and I'll need to hit the needle up button, raise the presser foot and move the fabric a tad, then needle down and continue.  Where the seam only exists below the batting layer, the needle just goes up and down and will move with an additional tug, but this sure interrupts any stitching rhythm I'd managed to achieve.  I'm about ready to give up on using a pieced backing for any future projects, this was so frustrating.

That said, I'm finally beginning to enjoy free motion quilting on this machine.  Having tried all sorts of variations including feed dogs up and down, auto stitch tension vs. manual, straight stitch setting vs the built-in DS-1 quilting stitch, I've found the best stitches are achieved using the recommended settings, auto tension, DS-1, feed dogs down.  What I haven't been able to use successfully is the open-toe foot without having numerous top thread breaks.  Using the closed toe foot totally eliminates that problem, but visibility for detailed work decreases drastically, and visibility of  the work is the greatest failing of the Horizon, in my opinion!  The entire machine is too low-slung and there are too many fixed items (needle threader, built-in-walking foot attachment holder, etc.) right in the way of one's line of sight.  The old Singer 15-91 has super visibility in comparison, and if I could fix the intermittent skipped stitch problem with that machine, I'd probably go back to it in a heartbeat for detailed quilting of feathers, etc.

Here are a couple quick previews of the current work, another planned gift, so shots of the entire quilt when finished will have to wait a while longer.

The problem with stitching over seams in the pieced back occurred mostly in the straight up and down lines in the horizontal sashing, and wiggly vertical lines in the narrow sashing strips between blocks.  I did not notice as many problems while doing the meandering within the blocks.

This is the pieced back.

I'm hoping Leah and others who use the Janome Horizon can offer some insights.  Fabrics are all cotton, thread is Aurifil 50/2, low loft poly batting, Schmetz 75/11 quilting needle.  I was pleased with the tension of the stitches on both sides using this thread/needle/batting combination and the recommended settings for the machine.  I'd just like to know how others cope with quilting pieced backings.

Linking up with Leah Day's UFO Sunday on the Free Motion Quilting Project.

JUNE - The Double Challenge with FMQ

The day after my post earlier this month with my practice piece for SewCalGal's Free Motion Quilting Challenge, the old Singer 15-91 was pushed to one corner of the sewing room, and in her place a brand spanking-new Janome Horizon 7700 sat on the cutting table, awaiting its first tryout.  A few days before my birthday my incredibly sweet husband announced that my gift would be a brand-new sewing machine, but I had to choose which one.  Hence, the double June challenge:  to create the block using a brand-new machine - me, who has never used a sewing machine newer than a 1960s Kenmore, and up until two weeks ago the only machines in the house were vintage Singers.  But, this is a year of learning, so cold-turkey it would be.  The new Janome would create the Challenge block presented by our teacher Cindy Needham.  There were a few adventures along the way, as you will soon see, with breaking threads and a fabric or batting, not sure which, that was determined to bunch up and create wrinkles across the top of the design.  So, this is how we progressed through the challenge, my Janome and me ...

Day 1

I started by drawing a 10 1/2 inch circle, added a few flowing lines and some spikey leaves and quilted those - probably my first mistake was not pinning more closely and completely enclosing the circle, trapping the fabric which either stretched or shifted while quilting.

Day 2

Drew and filled in feathers, added a couple more dividing lines.  Beginning to really spot some problem areas to be conquered.  Another lesson:  drawing too many lines close together gets really confusing when under the FMQ foot! 

Day 3

Drew grid and filled in with "Diane Shiko."  Big puffy areas becoming even more prominent, yet I like where the design is going.  Wet areas showing here from spritzing the blue washout lines.

Day 6 (or maybe 7?)  this morning around 6:30

I'm thinking this circle "block" is about finished, having stippled and curlique'd some of the worst puffs into relative submission.  A few ripples and small pleats seemed unavoidable however.

This is the back.

And here's a close-up.  Can see that there are a few areas around the upper right feather that still need background fill - another day.

Now to ponder awhile about how to quilt a border around all this so the final piece will be rectangular.  But that won't be finished this month, so this is my June entry.

Happy to report bonding with Janome is progressing well, though we're still working on finding that magic 'humm-purr.'  That will probably happen once the drop-in table arrives from the warehouse across the country.  The machine is still sitting on my cutting table and too high to FMQ comfortably.

I LOVED this month's challenge.  A big THANK YOU! to Cindy Needham, our most excellent tutorial expert, and to SewCalGal who goes above and beyond making this huge challenge such a success!