Hello, I hope some of you can help me. I'm about to make a quilted door curtain for the front door and I plan to quilt it on my regular machine - probably just in the ditch along each centre patch of the star block, in a straight line carrying on through the strip blocks, in both directions.

It's large - 85" x 109". My question is, would you wrestle something this size through a regular machine? Or quilt it in sections? If I did it in sections, I would prefer to keep them vertical otherwise I'd worry that the seams across the backing would stop it hanging right.

Any advice on how to quilt it gratefully received! :D

I'm sorry, I don't know how to get it to appear here as a picture without you having to download! :oops:

if you save the file as a jpeg you'll be able to post it as a pic instead of a download.

if you're just doing SITD you might be able to quilt it in one piece.

have you ever quilting something close to this size on your machine?

The biggest I've done is a bed topper that was around 70" square, which I FMQd. It's the 109" length that worries me - that means at one point I'd have 54" of quilt rolled up through the throat - just wondered if that would be too much with a regular throat? It's times like this when I wish I could get a bigger throated machine! :shock: :D

since your design doesn't have any sashing strips you can do the following for quilt as you go.

make each block a quilt sandwich (top, batting, back) and quilt as desired.

then join the blocks together either vertical or horizontal rows (do it whatever way you prefer).

then trim down some of the batting on the seams in the back, press seams open, and whip stitch in place or you can use water soluble 1/4 basting tape.

then to cover the seams on the back - cut strips 1.5 inches, press the raw edges in to meet in the middle (its a bias strip without being cut on the bias).

then hand stitch these fabric strips across the seams on the back with whatever stitch you like.

Here it is so folks can see -

I'd do as Klu suggests, only in sections - it would be in 9-oatches consisting of
stripe-star-stripe
star-stripe-star
stripe-star-stripe

and
star-stripe-star
stripe-star-stripe
star-stripe-star

I have no clue, but it sure is pretty!

I usually quilt in sections. Each section has usually been the length of the quilt, with 3-5 sections across. I've found this method to be much easier than wrestling a big quilt through the machine.

Thanks for that Moonpi. :D

KLue, I didn't want to have horizontal seams on the back because when I experimented holding up a QAYG I made before, it doesn't hang right with the seams crosswise, although lengthwise is fine.

Dunster, what you suggest is what I was considering. If I SITD, obviously I'll have to do the seams I join after I'd joined. And if I did echo, how close to the edge of the sections could I go and still leave enough room to manoevre when joining?

Thanks everyone for helping (and Terri for liking it!) sorry to be a pain, I have no experience of machining such a big quilt and I don't want to hand quilt it - that door needs covering THIS winter! :lol: