Lobster

I am about to embark on my first wholecloth quilt. It's going to be hand-sewn, traditional Welsh quilting. It'll be slightly unconventional in that the front will be a semi-plain, a sort of gently marbled/sponged marigold yellow fabric, and the back will be a flannel patterned with the world's cutest owls. The picture attached shows the two fabrics, and the strip at the bottom was just me experimenting with possible binding fabrics, if I end up going for a binding rather than a knife edge. I've also attached a sketch of the planned quilting pattern. The overall size will be 36" x 52".

Question #1: I'll be using perle #8 and big stitch quilting (told you it was going to be a bit unconventional), and of my very small thread stash so far, you can see a ball of bright pink thread that looks quite nice in the photo, the thread on the right. I only have one small ball of that, and I'm going to be switching to a different brand of thread so that I can buy as much as I need. It will either be Rubi http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tchlink:top:en or Venus http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tchlink:top:en though the Rubi is cheaper and sounds nicer. Any opinions on which colours will work best? I want a medium tone, strong enough to stand out nicely but not too screamingly contrasting, and either orange or pink. At the moment I'm leaning towards the Saffron Orange 4474 in the Rubi.

Question #2: how much thread am I likely to use, bearing in mind that this will be hand-sewn? I've done Welsh quilting before, I've done big stitch quilting with perle #8 before, I've just never put the two together and then used a single thread throughout.

Jan in VA

I hope Holice will jump in here with a wise answer.

Jan in VA

Holice

Jan: Thanks for the compliment but wize I am not on this one. Pearl cotton is a whole different ball game due to its size and weight. It is going to take a whole sack full. Let me think on this. However, this is the way I would do it.

Divide the quilt in 1/4. It appears to be mirrowed imaged in 4ths. Then casually measure each motif. This doesn't have to be exact to get the total inches. Multimply by 4. Then take a sample piece and thread and cut a a certain amount of thread off - say 20" Stitch enough to take up 18" of the thread. Measure and compare with your inches you got from measuring the design. I realize this will take a bit of time but will give you a reasonable amount of thread you will need. I assume the Pearl cotton has some differences in dye lots so getting enough to finish the quilt might be important. In case there is a difference in dye lots, I would leave some units until last in case the dye lot was different and you had to buy more thread. Perhaps all of one kind of motif. This way the slight differece would not show.

A question: How do you plan on transferring the design to your fabric.

Tartan

I am using #8 perle cotton to do a redwork lap quilt right now. I am using the back stitch method which will be using a bit more than a running stitch. I did 1 row of embroidered verse around the outside of about 45 X 60? I also am doing a leaf outline in every other block. It is less stitching than you have on your sketch and I am just about done and I've used about 1 ball and 1/2. Mine were 10g balls and maybe that will help you guesstimate your needs?

Lobster

I suppose it may end up costing a bit more, but it'll be a lot quicker and easier to make. Assuming that yarn colours are reasonably consistent, and that any small variations wouldn't be enough to show up in quilting (presumably it would be different if I were actually crocheting with the yarn), I could probably get away with buying the thread as I need it. Right now I'm not 100% sure of the colour, so I may order one ball of that colour, a few balls in other colours so that I can start building up a good stash of this thread, and then I can always try another colour if I don't get on with the first one. I've just done the one quilt with perle #8 so far but I really like it, both in that it's quicker and easier to sew, and in that it shows off the quilting very nicely.

Does anyone have an opinion on the thread colour?

Lobster

Tartan - thanks, I might go for four 40m (5g ) or two 82 (10g) balls to begin with, then. I've just realised that it probably be much cheaper to go for Anchor threads instead, which is slightly annoying as I've been emailing this seller on eBay.

Holice - yikes, that would take more than a bit of time! You're correct in that it has symmetry both ways and that a quadrant will give you the whole thing (ignoring the corner where I randomly tried drawing some Welsh scissors and then went off them), but with all the double lines and filling and so on, it would take forever to calculate. I'd rather overestimate thread, or take the risk that the dye lots might be a bit different.

Thankfully the yellow fabric is fine enough that I should be able to trace onto it. The plan is to draw it out in full on pieces of A1 paper stuck together, pin the fabric on top, and then trace it with Crayola washable pen. I've used them before and I'm happy with how they wash out. I have a grand piano, so I have somewhere to leave it flat while I'm tracing it (I won't be able to do that in a single session) and then while it's waiting to be basted. I'm contemplating starching it to make it easier to deal with at the tracing and basting stages, but starched fabric always creases in the Q-snap like crazy, so probably not.

Holice

I made myself a light table by getting a 24"48 piece of plixieblass from the home store and pulled the leaves out of the dining table and put a light under.
It also helps if you will put something white down first. I use a white sheet and then your white paper with black lines. This seems to make the lines easier to see on darker fabric.
I believe you were scared off by my suggestion of measuring.....just take a tape measure and guesstimate the motifs. Not exact. At least that would give you a general idea. I sometimes use the easel pads lined in 1" grids for designing. You can tape enough together. Is the design your own creation using the Welsh motifs or from a book?

Lobster

I can make myself a light table if I need to, my sewing desk is glass and I've clipped a spotlight underneath it for this purpose before. But with fabric this light, I really don't think I'll need to. I'll be tracing over black lines on white paper, after all. My dining table is already pretty light, being birch, but I may try your tricky with the white sheet to see if that helps at all.

I've ordered two 10g balls of thread, along with a variety of colours to increase my thread stash. I went with DMC in the end, they're cheaper and I already have a shade card for them. Although it's still incredibly hard to tell, and for some reason they have a prejudice against turquoise. I picked a shade of orange which looked like it should work well. I think DMC are reliable enough that if I run out, I'll be OK getting thread from another batch. It's not as if it's going to be a solid area of thread, such as you'd get with crochet or embroidery.

The design is adapted from one I found on a Welsh quilting blog. I've spent a while reading books on Welsh quilting and saving images from online sources, so I'm fairly good at this sort of designing by now. I did Welsh quilting on a log cabin quilt last year, it turned out a treat. I've tried out drawing a quarter of the design full-size already, and the spacing works out better than it looks in this sketch.

liking quilting

I'm too new to know the answers you need; writing to say I love your pattern and will anxiously wait to see your completed project. My husband's grandmother was Welsh.

Lobster

I got side-tracked by making a netbook case for a friend of mine, which I've nearly finished, but once that is done, I will be getting started on this quilt. I went slightly insane looking at threads, especially working out the colours. In the end I decided to go for DMC Perle #8, as I already have a DMC shade chart. I bought two 10g balls of a nice strong orange which should look lovely against the quilt, and a bit less girly than the pink I'd originally been envisaging. DMC have a good reputation, and I've been using their embroidery threads for many years without noticing any problems with dye batches. So I think I should be OK if I run out of thread and need to buy more.

I also splashed out on a few threads from the same range so that I would have a nice range of colours. I feel a bit daft for buying so many threads in 30 weight quilting cotton years ago, as most of them have barely been used at all, but hey, if and when I take up machine quilting, they'll be handy again. Meanwhile I am getting very keen on quilting with perle #8. I shouldn't really call it "big stitch quilting", my stitch sizes are no larger than they were in my first year of hand-quilting with 30 weight thread. I've been doing perle #8 quilting on the netbook case in four different colours, and it's looking smashing.