need thread color advice please
 

Hi Y'all,
I am working on a quilt for a friend's soon-to-be-born baby girl. The nursery theme is *jungle*, and the colors are rose pink and raspberry. Yeah, I know. So I was planning to quilt my now-sandwiched quilt with an all-over picture from the back in a dark green thread, so that my pretty jungle picture will show up on the back as if it was a wholecloth quilt. However, I don't really want the pattern to show up on the front very strongly, as the front is already distressingly cluttered. My question: what color bobbin thread would you suggest? Pink? Green? Can you use clear (monofilament) as a bobbin thread? (I've never used monofilament for anything except fishing.)

Or should I just abandon my all-over-from-the-back idea, and quilt the front with treefrogs in the jungle squares, and SID the little squares. Sigh.

Thanks in advance.
Alison
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Alison,
I think you can use a medium green on the front and it will disappear into the quilt top because the material is so busy. I've done that successfully on a bunch of the quilts I have made. Surprisingly, using a contrasting color on the top will not pop as much as you think, should you choose to do that.

Your best option? Test drive your colors on a scrap. Do the pink on the top and the busy green on the back. Change the threads till you get the effect you are looking for. This will also have the advantage of getting your hands going on the FMQ for the quilt.

One note: Most folks on the board and those folks who have been teachers of mine do NOT recommend using clear or smoky monofilament for the bobbin...too many tension issues since it stretches under tension.

Good luck!

My thoughts would be to use the same colour for bobbin and top thread ... shows less if there's any mis-fires on the tension!

Your backing is a pretty strong colour (I really like it!). You may want to choose a heavier thread for the quilting to help it show above the pink; and then use a regular thread on the bobbin.

How about a dark green or dark purple?
Or perhaps you might use both selectively for different parts of your design?

Vicky S: Thank you! Sadly, it never even occurred to me to test drive different threads....and that is precisely what I will now do.

QuiltE: I love the idea of using green and purple on that wild pink back. Thanks!
Alison

Definitely no invisible thread on a baby quilt! I think almost every thread color is going to disappear on the front! When I can't decide what color thread to use I pull off a couple of feet and lay it across several areas of the quilt to help me decide.

Definitely no invisible thread on a baby quilt! I think almost every thread color is going to disappear on the front! When I can't decide what color thread to use I pull off a couple of feet and lay it across several areas of the quilt to help me decide.

What I am most concerned about are seemingly random lines crossing the pale pink areas of the small squares - because the quilting lines will only make sense in the context of the jungle picture on the back. I like your idea of laying the thread across those areas, since I can't really test actual quilting on the scrappy squares.

Why the adamant rejection of clear thread? Is it a safety issue?

clear thread has a tendency to come "undone" very easily and will also feel kind of sharp/poking at the ends if not buried very well....think about all those old comforters where the stitching has come undone....would be ok for adult quilts, but not a good addition for a baby quilt.

OK, that makes sense! Maybe the sharp, pokey feeling of undone clear quilting is why I've never had any urge to do anything with monofilament...

It's not just the sharp pokey feeling if an end comes undone. If the cotton thread breaks on the other side and there are areas of loose stitching on the mono side it can get wrapped around baby's fingers or toes and it could be long enough before some one notices to cause permanent damage due to loss of blood flow.

I'm having cold shudders thinking about this...yet another reason to stick with cotton for everything.