Originally Posted by
Ruby the Quilter
Mctavishing is really pretty - would love to learn how to do this on my Tin Lizzie.
It takes time to learn different techniques. McTavishing is fairly easy to learn, much easier than feathers. I love doing the technique, not near as good as Karen McT. is, but customers like it.
Most of my customers let me decide what to put on their quilts. I do have an automated system (TL18LS w/Qbot V3), but I don't use it very often. I look at the quilt and the pattern...and sometimes it takes a day or even a week just staring at the quilt...I decide what I want on the top. Sometimes, it needs a feather block or a feather border. Usually, the old gramma's tops I do, well they just need something that gramma would have hand quilted on them. I do a lot of SID (Stitch in the Ditch), also 1/4" outside the ditch on some items...it really depends on the top.
I've gotten some really wonky quilts & I have to take that into consideration. If the person was not the best at piecing...or tension was not great on their sewing machine...that is taken into consideration. Out of about 20 quilts in the past two months...I think I used a feather border once, a block motif maybe 3 times, Qbot designs about 6 times (alternated blocks on an appliqued quilt). Right now I have a 1920's quilt that is 8" squares on point. Customer wanted the quilt "Floppy", so she could cuddle in it while remembering here gramma, who made the quilt. She wanted an allover open "squiggle, or something like that." I am using an end to end design with the robot...it's called Chantilly Lace. Very pretty when done, looks nice...and I've done it large and open...this quilt will be real "Floppy", but will not be a simple meandering line. And even though it's on point, I'm surprised that it's done well, no issues really at all.