Peg Spradlin adds some elegance and beauty to your quilt top by teaching you how to add freeing feathers. Learn how to draft a traditional feather starting with the height and spine. As you become more comfortable with this you will be able to make feathered cables and feathered wreaths.
Laura Roberts teaches you how to cut novelty fabric into little squares and make them into a block. She recommends using fabric with motifs that are easy to cut out to make a block, but also shows you how to use stripes, a bias-cut strip, a border stripe, and templates you may have made.
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Do you like to keep leftover pieces of fabric in remembrance of a quilt you made that you love? Erin Russek is the same way and shows you how to make a journal she made to store them. She recommends using Strathmore visual journals because they have a solid cover. Then take the measurements, put…
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Heather Thomas presents helpful techniques for determining what color fabrics to use when making your quilts. Learn how colors interact with each other and how to ensure the colors “make” your quilt rather than “break” your quilt. Find out how to utilize different colored shapes and fabrics without creating visual chaos. See what color interactions…
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Dana Jones shows you several methods to incorporate flying geese into your quilt along with the reason for adding them. Learn how to make your own flying geese individually or use a system to make multiple at once.
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In my opinion, formal feathers should consist of curves only. The spine should curve to give a general shape, and the “height” or limits curves should gently echo the spine on each side of the spine. I disagree with retracing the pedal caps. If that is done, the result will be that every other pedal cap will stand out because it is doubled. I think only the stems of the pedals should be retraced, as any “wondering” off the line will not be as noticeable as it is on the caps. I tend to stitch the pedals on the concave side of the spine first, whichever side that may be. Then I continue the opposite side in the opposite direction along the spine. That means being able to stitch the pedals from the bottom up, or from the top down. Bottom down actually seems easier to me, as I can see the limit curve more clearly stitching in that direction. If you want nice looking formal feathers, don’t be in a hurry to bring your pedal stem back to the spine. The divergent angle between spine and stem should never be more than 15 degrees.
I loved the instruction using the spine and height lines but how did she transfer her design to the fabric?
Hi Christine. Thanks for contacting us. To be perfectly honest I’m not sure how she transferred the feathers. I do recognize the blue fabric marking pen that the majority of quilters like to use. I’m assuming that she either used a stencil and traced the design on the fabric or marked the spine using a ruler and freehanded the design with the marker. Most quilters I know either depend on a stencil for tracing or have been doing feathers for so long that they free-hand them. Minor irregularities are acceptable and the eye is so busy with the intricate design that they aren’t noticeable. Enjoy practicing a new skill.
Colleen
National Quilters Circle
Do you have the feed dogs down?
Hello,
Heather generally prefers to free motion quilt with her feed dogs up, as she feels a gives her a bit more grip on the fabric. However, free motion quilting is generally done with the feed dogs down. I would recommend trying out those techniques and seeing which one works best for you.
Cheers,
Ashley
National Quilters Circle Video Membership
I’ve made a dog quilt and need help on how to quilt it. I’ve done in the ditch around the squares and the different dogs . But how else should I quilt??? It seems undone.
Hello Pam,
Here are several tutorials that can help you decide what additional quilting to add:
https://www.nationalquilterscircle.com/video/machine-quilting-designs-and-ideas-003768/
https://www.nationalquilterscircle.com/video/quilt-design-ideas-for-machine-quilting-003639/
https://www.nationalquilterscircle.com/video/using-zentangle-patterns-quilt-designs-011721/
Cheers,
Ashley
National Quilters Circle Video Membership
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