Diagonal lines ?
 

How do you do them? Any help would be appreciated. BTW, I want to do a twin size quilt in diagonal lines. Am I nuts? It's ok, I can take it, lol.

I've used blue painter's tape and hand quilted along the edge in order to keep it straight. I know others will give you even better tips. Good luck and don't forget to post a picture when you are done! :)

someone here just posted a gorgeous photo of diagonal stitched lines. it was a close up of a block with red in it. applique i think. she used tape too.
you can also mark straight lines with a long ruler and a Hera marker. that is a plastic hand held tool that indents marks and you have nothing to wash out. even JoAnn's sells those.

When it comes to long diagonal lines I am a huge fan of painters tape, comes in different widths !

I use a disappearing ink marker to mark the lines then quilt on the lines. If you are hand quilting the lines might disappear before you finish your project so mark as you go. If you are machine quilting, the marks can last up to 48 hours but I have had them disappear within a few hours. It probably depends on the temperature and humidity. They wash out in the washer but don't iron over the marks before you wash them out or you might set the ink permenantly.

If machine quilting, I would heavily starch both the backing and the top before layering. This would help prevent the bias from stretching as you stitch. I like blue painter's tape for straight lines.

As I have not yet tackled the challenge of freemotion quilting I do diagonal lines on all mine with a walking foot. I have drawn with (supposedly) washable pencil, eyeballed it from corner to corner on square blocks, used painters tape, and most recently tried the hera tool. The hera is my favorite! I used it after I had sandwiched my quilt and basted with safety pins. It worked really well with my hars wood floors. I will try again - this time without the sandwich and hope for the same results. You'll be fine! Just baste well.

You know, I recently did cross-hatch quilting lines on a wall hanging, and because I didn't have any painter's tape handy, I used disappearing ink to draw a line from one corner to the other (diagonally across my quilt, so that I ended up with a big X in the area where I wanted to do the cross-hatch quilting), sewed along those lines (very quickly, before the ink disappeared ;)), and then used the edge guide that came with my machine (a metal piece that extends out from the foot of my machine, and can be adjusted so that it follows the edge of the fabric when sewing a wide hem, etc.) to follow the lines I had already stitched, at 1 1/2" intervals (I also switched directions each time I sewed a line, so that my fabric didn't shift too much one direction or the other). It worked pretty slick, and saved me from having to run to the store for painter's tape :thumbup:

I have used diagonals on just about all the baby quilts I make. I use my Omnigrid yardstick to make the lines 1 1/2 inches wide. My favorite marker is the blue washable marker. I always make test marks on all the fabrics used in the quilt before I start piecing. Then when I am ready to mark, I get the test marks wet with cold water to double check they will come out. I have ironed over them and the marks still come out, but I wouldn't recommend this as the directions say not to. Anyway, I like to use a converging chevron pattern, so that begining X gets filled in on all sides with diagonals. I use my walking foot to follow the marked lines. After it is bound, I agitate the quilt in cold water, spin that out, then wash with warm. Into the dryer and it is done.

this shows the Hera marker I mentioned
http://www.quiltingboard.com/main-f1...ng-t25162.html

A Hera marker works great!!

One quilt I just sewed from one corner to the next on the squares but this wont work unless you have small squares.
For same size widths for lines I just use the attachment that came with my walking foot that fits in the hole in the back and is adjustible for whatever width you want. It works great.

I just started quilting with diagonal lines and am using a Frixion pen to draw on the lines. I find the center by folding my quilt at a diagonal matching up the corners and gently pressing with and iron to create a crease, from there I draw the lines in my quilts. I haven't used the bar for my walking foot, not sure how much I trust it.

Here is what I do...[ATTACH=CONFIG]313094[/ATTACH]

I like the bar that fits behind the foot, done many that way and they always have turned out.

I use the blue painter's tape -- I put it in the middle to get the first line straight and then use the width of the presser foot to follow along.

I mark the diagonals with disappearing ink and stitch on that line. Works very well for me.

Are you talking quilting or sewing a top on diagonal

I too use painters tape. I have it in diff widths.

doing the quilting lines straight, any design. could be grids, could be like sun rays, etc. but straight.

Best to use the bar that comes with your sewing machine.`Once you have sewn the first line, you set the bar to whatever width you want the lines to be apart and always make sure that the curved part runs along the previous line of stitching. It is also wise to alternate the direction of the stitching so that the quilt doesn't skew in one direction. Nancy Zieman gives a nice tutorial on one of her SWN programs.

I either draw the lines and stitch them or just use the longarm ruler to run down through the corners of the squares.

if you stitch in the ditch all the lenghtwise and crosswise seams first everything is stabilized to do crosswise but i know that is not the popular way anymore.

I just finished a cross-hatched baby quilt. Instructions I have seen (class instructors, books) say to sew all the diagonals in the same direction before starting in the other direction and "crossing" the first set of lines...Wonder which is right? I mark every line with water-soluable marking pen. It takes a little more time, but I find clearly discernable lines helpful. I am not so good with blue tape. The most important step, as far as I understand it, is to make sure you stitch your securing lines to minimize shifting, (in addition to basting). On my baby quilt I couldn't just sew a line from corner to corner or from top center to bottom center and side center to side center (because of the block pattern), so I had to do two Xs--side-to-side in the top half of the quilt and again in the lower half of the quilt to secure the sandwich before starting on my diagonal cross-hatching lines.

Tks for all your tips. My problem is that I can't sew a straight line to save my life. Been looking over the 'net some people suggest notebook paper to practice with. Marking isn't my problem, but sewing straight lines seem to be. Aaarrrrrgh!

One of the most freeing things I learned in a quilting class was to use wavy lines on purpose. I have started using the serpentine stitch (kind of a wavy big zig zag) and do diagonal lines. Since the lines aren't straight, when I go off course a little it doesn't show. Every time I do diagonal straight stitching I can't sew them straight.

I don't do a lot of cross hatching or diagonal lines, but do them on my bow tucks bags. I have a guide that fits into my walking foot that I use. Also heard the painters tape is great.

No one has mentioned this, so: I use a stencil with straight lines (mine's from Pam Clarke) with a pounce pad and white chalk. If the fabric is too light for white chalk, I use the white chalk with some blacklight chalk mixed in. The blacklight chalk shows up as fluorescent green under a black light. Both chalks come out with a wiping with a damp clean cloth, or by soaking the finished quilt in water. I used the blue chalk pounce once on a light background and had trouble getting all the blue out, so I'm not a fan of that, and prefer the blacklight powder instead.

I thought the powder chalk comes off with steam iron. Never heard of the blacklight powder only the white and blue.

This is what I do. Use painter's tape. I have had other masking tape leave a sticky residue which my walking foot was getting hung up on.

ionly have success when i mark the quilting lines.
Put an x from corner to corner.
Measure in inches down the side and ends and put mark
Then Connect the lines from side to bottom etc.
This is the only way I can keep them straight and not end up with squares or some other wonky shape

I also use the edge guide (also called a quilting guide) that came with my Bernina walking foot. I would say that the walking (aka "even feed") foot makes all the difference in the world in the outcome of this project. Whether you have a walking foot or not, it would be best to experiment with a sample of your fabric sandwich before trying it on the real deal.

I use blue painter's tape....love the fact that it comes in a variety of widths......walking foot is a must!

Hi,

I use the quilting quide (bar that attaches to back of your walking foot or pressure foot) that came with my machine, love that little tool! Painters tape, as mentioned, is great, too. I have been using my quilting guide for quilting lines on my purses instead of stippling, love the look.

Bev

I have been doing a lot of cross-hatching in my last few quilts, always using the blue painters tape. This time though, I decided to heck with marking it and to just wing it... and I must say, I just love the wonkiness that is happening! It is turning out to look like it was planned that way. LoL! It helps that the stitching is done in an uneven spacing, wavy-like way but really has a folk-ish feel to it. So, my advice is to step out of the box and don't fret so much on perfectly straight lines as that tends to gets boring and mundane after a while. Just have FUN, and keep it fresh. Good luck to ya!