Tips and Tutorials Tuesdays – Page 4

I don’t know when I learned that quilting shadows were bad, but now I fret over them. I worry I’ll miss a shadow sliver and once it’s in the quilting phase I won’t be able to fix it. Quilting Shadows are those annoying slivers of fabric which show through a lighter fabric. They are easy to avoid if you’re pressing to the dark side all the time:

Seams pressed to the darker fabric.

But, make a simple four-block and you can’t press only to the dark side:

And, I like releasing the threads in the middle seam to reduce the bulk in the middle of the four-block. This also confirms you have a perfectly matched seam.

Now, the seams are pressed toward the white and away from the darker fabric, and, of course, this one has a blue shadow.

What to do?

TRIM THE SHADOWS!

The result is a block with NO DARK SHADOWS:

I’m linking up with The Late Night Quilters’ Tips and Tutorials Tuesday.

Getting out of the shadows,

Wanda

I am very good at raw edge applique, but needle-turn applique intimidated me, and every attempt looked sloppy. Until now. Carolyn Friedlander suggested in her book, Savor Each Stitch, that you baste the piece to the background one-quarter inch from the applique edge as a guide for turning under the fabric. This changed everything. I deviated from her instructions and instead I stitched one-quarter inch from the edge of the piece, separate from the background:

I applied starch on the edges and ironed:

I used temporary glue to attach to the background fabric:

At this point I had the choice to stitch down by machine or by hand. I choose by hand, using a Size 11 gold needle by John James and 50 weight thread from Mettler in a matching thread. I’m experimenting with curves as part of the Savor Each Stitch Book Bee and studying Contrast. The pink and orange seemed like a good place to start.