Wear do i go from here? Quilting ideas for tree skirt needed
 

hey
I have some of the quilting done for this tree skirt i have made for my aunt. I knew i wanted to stitch in the ditch around the twists, and do to cross hatch in the centre, but what do i do now in all of the open space? I was thinking of doing cross hatch through the entire thing but that might be to much? Or maybe just a larger cross hatch than i have in the centre? My free motion quilting isn't very strong yet and i don't want to mess up what i have done already. I know there are puckers and pulls in some areas, but hey, im still learning ;)
ty
Amy

That's very pretty. I would probably go with a cross hatch in the rest. Lots of stops & starts to go around the pinwheels unfortunately, but I think it will look really nice. You might want a large cross hatch, just to give you more space to deal with some of the challenges - you should be able to ease the fabric and get any "puddles" to end up between the cross hatches without actually pleating the fabric as you quilt, if you are careful.

For future reference, I think you might have had more luck if you had done the cross hatching before the pinwheels. I normally try to quilt center out, and do the larger areas first to stabilize the quilt.

Instead of doing a cross hatch, maybe just do diagional stitching?

you also might consider straight lines from the center - like rays of the sun

Very cute tree skirt! I love the crosshatching in the center. Check out Diane Gaudynski's book Guide To Machine Quilting. She has a technique in the book for freemotion crosshatching using a richochet motion. I'm not that good at freemotion and it was a nice technique. It does take some practice but it eliminates all of the the stopping and starting and gives a nice effect. She also discusses what and where to begin quilting which will help with some of the puckering issues. My local library had a copy. Yours might as well.

Otherwise, I like the idea of diagonal stitching or lines coming out from the center. Either way, it will be beautiful and I look forward to seeing your finished piece!

Very cute!!! I like the idea of quilting lines to look like the rays of the sun. Just my 2 cents worth.
Sue

I see there are snowflakes in some of your fabrics, if you check out free coloring pages you could find some larger snowflakes with straight lines & just stitch a few random ones down in the open spaces. I don't think I would try any more straight stitching now that you have already stitched the twisters.

Amy, I love your tree skirt. Have no idea how you should quilt it. I like the cross hatch in the middle.

AFQSinc

There are a lot of books at my local library in reference to quilting also. I even copy some for future reference. I practice my free motion quilting by making mug rugs and pot holders and just little things for friends and family. If I mess up, only I know because they thing it is a design. Or either they just don't want to hurt my feelings.

I think I'd do some stippling around the twister blocks. It would highlight the blocks yet not detract from the center of the quilt.

ali