Rachelcb80

Thank you so much for your very nice compliments. I'll try and answer your questions as best I can. I typically do not mark my quilts for quilting. In fact this was really the first quilt I've marked. I made a stencil for the little swirls around the basket and a stencil for the flower (made them out of the cheap, clear plastic sheeting you can get at Hancocks). I marked those and then just pebbled around the marked shapes. For my feathers I marked the spines because I'm just not good at traveling large distances on a quilt without a general line to guide me. I'm actually not that great at feathers yet and am a little regretful I used them on a quilt meant to show. One would think it should be simple to realize you shouldn't use a new skill on something that will be judged but conventional wisdom often escapes me.

I really don't have a set direction that I normally quilt. I position the quilt so the least amount of it is in the throat space and then that determines which direction I will quilt (away, towards me or side to side). For the border I quilted so that I was pushing the quilt away from me. Makes it easier than having it start to pile up in my lap.

This quilt is roughly 70" by nearly 80" I think. Silly that I can't remember but I measure, write it down and then don't think about it again. The larger throat space in the newer machines really does help when quilting, but it doesn't provide a magical solution to all quilting problems. I hate to hear it myself but practice and more practice is what will increase your skills. A nice new machine sometimes makes practice more fun though.