Originally Posted by phylby
I just completed a baby quilt using free form quilting technique for the first time. I practiced a little then dove in. It was lots of fun. But I noticed that in a few spots the top stitches were pulled trough to the back, making eyelashes. This was towards the end of the project. What causes this? Is there a cure?
thanks
If it only happened toward the end of the project I suspect it was fatigue (yours, not the machine <g>).
Relax your shoulders, arms, elbows and hands - I know it's difficult, but until you do this your arms are going to get fatigued. When you get this way your hand speed will be too fast for the machine speed on the curves and you'll end up with eyelashes.
Relax. Breath. Match your hand speed to the machine speed and decrease your hand speed only on the curves - machine speed stays the same.
There is only one cure. Practice. LOTS of it. I've only been doing it about 4 years and I'm still prone to fatigue.
And there is no rule against leaving the needle down, turning the machine off, and walking away - in the middle of quilting!!! Walk away, roll your shoulders, roll your neck, go do something "normal" with your arms (vacuum, laundry, weed garden), then come back to it. Just remember that if you had changed your needle position or your stitch length (and these things are automatically reset when you power off/on) - remember to change them again before you resume stitching!