My machine (Janome 4800) has a selection of decorative stitches that I've very rarely used, but this afternoon I began to wonder if I could use them for quilting, as I'm quilting a wall hanging, a log cabin Christmas tree (very appropriate to be working on that at the summer solstice of course...!) and am totally stuck as to how to quilt the background. So, with no idea of how I'm supposed to go about this, I've been experimenting. I've tried 3 patterns, a snowflake and 2 stars, the idea being to do short vertical lines of stitches randomly on the quilt. They all worked well on my practice piece, but on the actual quilt there were a lot of skipped stitches and sometimes only half the pattern. I was trying to keep off the seams, but I'm guessing that the log cabin blocks may have been the problem, as the practice piece, with no seams, was OK. I started with the walking foot, but found that I got better results with an ordinary one. The simplest of the stars is now coming out OK.
I'd be interested to hear any advice or thoughts from the experts on here on using decorative stitches for quilting.

Hi Anne,

Are you leaving the feed dogs up or down? The decorative stitches won't pick up properly with them down. You may also need to adjust the presser foot pressure slightly if you can...since the seams are slightly thicker, a little lighter pressure on the foot could make that difference.

I freq use my decrotive stitches for quilting.. If the stitich is a detailed one I make it larger than normal.. and I've had no problems sewing over seams.....

Feed dogs are up. I can't alter the pressure foot pressure on my machine (as far as I know..).

I can't change the size of the decorative stitches on this machine - but I don't want them to stand out too much on this quilt, so that's OK. I'm just after a bit of extra interest in the background quilting without taking the attention away from the centre of the wall hanging.

I would check your manual to be sure you can't change the foot pressure. I think most machines you can. I have used decorative stitches and liked them. I agree that making them larger often looks nice.

you just have to experiement. Decorative stitches are created for one or two layers of fabric. Walking foot just to go forward and limited in other directions.
So just have to experiment to see if they will work on the piece you are making.....One method does not fit all machines

One thing to keep in mind is that many of the decorative stitches make a lot of punctures in the fabric very close together. Over time, these perforations will act like they do on the edge of postage stamps: making it easy to tear. I used a lot of them on a quilt one time, and then I happened to hold it up with a light behind it and was surprised at how much light came through around those stitches.

They're fine for a wall hanging that won't get much handling or washing, but I'd have second thoughts about using them in a bed or lap quilt.

Good point - thankyou. I'd realised this when I took out some stitches, and was perilously near to making a hole in the backing.

I enlarge stitches when quilting. Have adjusted the tension on machine? What thread are you using?

When I have skipped stitches, I think it comes from me moving the quilt to fast... I just had that happen in fact, and I am pretty sure that I am the culprit. You figure on the practice piece, there is no drag, not so on a quilt... good luck!

I don't think I can enlarge the decorative stitches on my machine. The thread is Robison Anton 50 wt cotton. the tension looks OK, as far as I can tell - not quite sure what I'm looking for with the decorative stitches, but the straight stitches inbetween are fine.

it is important to use the proper foot for your machine- for the chosen stitch -- if you try to do a decorative stitch with the wrong foot on you can easily break your needle- which can be dangerous- or mess other things up-

decorative stitches are great design features when used for quilting- be adventurous-
but if you plan to quilt a pieced top= your practice piece should also be pieced--not necessarily the same-but some seams- and the same fabrics-batt as the real thing--if you want to see how (your) real one is going to come out.

My Bernina has a gazillion decorative stitches, but I'd venture to say about 90% of them would look ugly on the back of a quilt. You can use them for embroidering the piece before you quilt, but as for actual quilting, the stitches that are the simplest will look best on the backing of a quilt.

in Cotton Theory the lady uses decorative stices for her quilts and etc
why not!!!!!


here is a link
http://www.quiltyard.com/whatiscottontheory.phtml

I use my Pfaff embroidery stitches for quilting sometimes. I have a serpentine stitch that works really well. I believe I did lessen the foot pressure to go through all three layers and it worked very well. I really put that machine through it's paces last Christmas! I use the smaller stitches on mug rugs and have used some of them doing decorative quilting on sweatshirts, too.

I'm definitely a beginner, so I'm not sending advice, just my (limited) experience... I've used a decorative stitch along the seam because I didn't think I could stay in the ditch well enough... I just stitched the outside of the blocks and then used a cross-hatch for inside the blocks on one and sewed a button inside on another quilt with a smaller block.. Both came out looking cute, according to my sweet quilting friends (both of whom are also beginners)

I read with great interest the comment about so many holes in the fabric with decorative stitches... That could definitely become a problem!!

I'm watching this thread for all the advice the more experienced quilters have...

I use my Pfaff embroidery stitches for quilting sometimes. I have a serpentine stitch that works really well. I believe I did lessen the foot pressure to go through all three layers and it worked very well. I really put that machine through it's paces last Christmas! I use the smaller stitches on mug rugs and have used some of them doing decorative quilting on sweatshirts, too.

I have to wonder if you can open the hinged left side of the machine and change the pressure on the pressure foot. I have Janome machines and you can change the pressure on all of mine. the 3500 model is similar to your 4800.

Yes, if you look at her stitches, they're the simple ones that look nice on the back;>

My first thought is that would use an awful lot of thread. It seems like a good point that it makes a lot of holes in the fabric. Besides making the fabric weak it could allow the batting to migrate through.

Read the manual that came with your machine. It will tell you how to set your machine.

I have a Janome 4800 as well and I have used some of the decorative stitches for quilting. I have to be very careful and let the feed dogs feed the quilt, the least bit of pulling will result in skipped stitches and different lengths between designs. You can't enlarge the design but you can lengthen or shorten it. I haven't done it in a while but if I recall correctly I get better results with a walking foot.

I'm glad you mentioned the serpentine stitch. I was trying to remember what that was called. I have it on both my old Elna and Bernina, so probably most machines would have it. I've used it on quilts, and it's special without making any closer perforations than a straight stitch would. There are probably some others that would work well.

Thankyou so much for all the comments and advice. I've now gone back to the manual and reminded myself how to adjust the pressure foot pressure -duh - however, doing so made the problem worse. I've tried different top tensions, topstitch and quilting needles 11 and 14, 2 bobbin cases with different tensions, regular and walking foot, and I still can't get the decorative stitch to come out right on the quilt, though on the practice piece nearly every combination is OK!

Three things occur to me:
I'm not at all sure how I know when the tension is correct when using these stitches: the straight stitches in the row of stitching look fine top and bottom most of the time. However, I think that my rows seem to be pulling the quilt quite tight, so maybe I need a much lower tension.
The thread - although my machine does usually cope quite happily with the 50wt cotton thread that I'm using, maybe for quilting with these stitches I'd be better with a finer polyester?
The simplest of the 3 stitches I've tried - an outline of a star with no infilling - IS working OK. I wonder if the problem with the more complex stitches is with it being a log cabin block, plus the tightness of the stitching mentioned above - maybe the number and density of the stitching pulls the fabric in and there isn't enough "give" in the narrow strip I'm sewing down to be ablee to do this successfully?
Just thinking aloud here, and would be interested to hear your comments.
I'm actually enjoying this, rather than getting frustrated -the wall hanging isn't precious to me, so I'm pretty relaxed about using it as a learning exercise!

Hi. Just last week I was stitching decorative stitches onto the rag quilt I'm making (I've not finished it yet) and I found out that if I used the walking foot, my stitches do not align properly e.g. the filled stitch star would not be a whole complete star but broken up and not aligned.
When I change my presser foot to the one recommended by the machine (when I choose a stitch, the LCD panel on my machine will show the presser foot to use), the stitches come out good.
I supposed in my case, I have to use the foot as dictated by my machine for the stitches.
I started with a walking foot because I thought it would help me feed the layers of flannel evenly

That's exactly what I've found - the stitches aren't right with the ordinary foot either, in my case, but the problems are worse with the walking foot.

I use decorative stitching all the time on my quilts. I think it adds another design element, especially when I used different color threads. It does use a lot of thread. You have to be careful which stitches you use..I avoid the dense stitches (hard to remove if there's a problem and it's SLOW). Also if you use different colors on top and bottom, watch your thread tension. I only use W&N batting which only needs quilting every 10". I have a Janome6600 with a walking foot which I find I cannot use for some decorative stitches, especially when there is back/forth stitching. All a matter of practice and experience. When I first started, I worried that my quilts weren't quite up to standard, but I have gotten over that. While I like overall quilting patterns, I also love my decorative stitches. So do what makes you happy! Would love to see your work.

Thanks for this. Do you find you need a different top tension if you're using a decorative stitch? Higher or lower? As I said above, I'm not actually sure what I'm aiming for with the tension for these stitches.

Honestly, I'm not sure! I keep small sandwich pieces (with fabric and batting) for sample pieces before starting on my quilt. I begin with a mid range tension and adjust up or down, depending on how the stitches look (make sure you are using the actual threads you will use on the quilt, especially if you use different colors on top/bottom). Bascially, you want to make sure that top thread color doesn't pull thru to the back (and visa versa). If you're not sure what that would look like, play around with your tension and it should be pretty obvious. Also be very conscious of "pushing" your quilt thru as well the drag on the quilt as I've found both will distort your stitches. Good luck!

I've only used those stitches to sew the binding down..not to actually quilt. It would look nice though, well some of them would. Some look really bad on the back, so you have to check. I can only add that in my limited experience, I've found that when I have missed stitches, or other problems it is due to drag on either the quilt or the thread. When it happens, I look back at my thread holder and normally, a piece of the quilt has flopped over onto the spool and is dragging on the thread.

show pics of what you are doing...sounds like fun!

Success! I used the simplest of the stitches I'd tried, a star that was just an outline; an ordinary foot rather than a walking foot; tension on 2 and the Janome FMQ bobbin case. That came out fine on the log cabin strips, and I went on to do random lines of stitches on the background of the quilt. Not sure that I'll be able to take a photo, as the thread blends very well with the background, but when I've dealt with the million and one threads I've got to make disappear, I'll try.

Always a great sense of accomplishment when you've figured out how to do something! Congrats!!

I can't on mine either as far as I know & I have had it for 20 yrs.

Your your post further down. How did you adjust the pressure foot?

Feed dogs are up. I can't alter the pressure foot pressure on my machine (as far as I know..).[/quote]

I have used decorative stitches on cathedral window quilts and really think that it adds more texture and interest to the window "borders". I also use them for attaching binding and have used for fm quilting-all good.

the pictured quilt is all done w/ decorative stitches

There's a little black knob on the top of my machine that gives me 3 pressure foot pressure settings.

What a beautiful, complex quilt!

I have often used the Serpentine stitch instead of trying to quilt in the ditch. Using it wasn't a problem at the county fair last year as I got a blue ribbon for this quilt. I had originally tried straight ditch quilting and had so much trouble with it that I ripped out several rows (on this quilt) and redid them with the Serpentine stitch. It's become one of my main design element stitches.

If your Janome 4800 is a QC, you have all sorts of adjustments. Go to your manual, or online

I find if you use the same brand and thickness of thread, only different colors,it gives the best results in making decorative stitches.
Test them first on an exact sample block sandwich = create a mini-quilt - a one block quilt, or mug rug - if you can't bear to throw it away.