I need your expertise! I made a scrappy quilt for my DS and didn't want edge-to-edge quilting, and I can't really afford a custom quilting job right now. I recently took a machine quilting class and still need to do a lot of practice. I've been practicing my hand quilting and love it. In fact I'd decided I would hand quilt this top... but, now that I have it out, I remember how many seams it has... every 1.5 inches is a seam. The pattern is called "Whacky Rails" and I've had it for years. Will I get in trouble trying to quilt over all the seams? Should I try to do a more primitive quilting with large stitches (haven't tried that... will it hinder my small stitching?) Should I give up thinking about hand quilting this one and start practicing on my own machine quilting?

sigh... I guess I just want my quilting friends to weigh in on this one???

Just wanted to say good luck!

You absolutely can handquilt over seams. I'm quilting the one in my avatar right now. Lot of seams. I'm finding that I can do about 6 stitches per inch, and have it look consistent (using Warm n Natural for batting, which I've now learned is a thicker batting, maybe you could do more stitches with a thinner or more compressable batting). I'm happy with that- the stitches don't look giant or primitive, and they are consistant (at least as consistant as my skill level enables!). Every now and then, if I run across a seam that overlaps with another- so has more layers- I stab it instead of rock it, so that the stitch won't be too big.

My take on your question is NO don't do hand quilting.
The way you describe it wth the small areas, it is really going to be chore and difficult to quilt over the seams unless you can figure out some way to do echo type quilting, down the center of each strip or some way that you don't have to go over the seam. I looked for the pattern on line and not sure I found it, but a close up pic would be helpful to us.

I appreciate this detailed response as I have wondered about this question as well. Thanks.

If I were doing it, I'd machine quilt it. I have no problem going over seams, but I don't enjoy it!

Janet

Ok friends, somehow I've managed to add a picture of part of the quilt to my original question... the dimensions are: each "diamond" is 8" square and strips are 1.5" wide...

You're very welcome, I hope it helps!

I'll try to post a photo later of what mine is looking like, and you can see if it looks like something you'd be happy with.

Kristin, I think we're about at the same level of expertise... I'm getting 6-7 stitches per inch, fairly consistently, too... I'm just a little concerned about all these seams....

I'm sure it's more work to go over the seams. But for me, this is the first thing I've quilted in literally seven years. So I guess I've forgotten how easy seamless quilting is, and have nothing to compare it to that makes me think this is too hard, lol! It will probably be a pleasant surprise to quilt my next top, which has lots of wide open spaces. :) Again, I'll try to post a photo later to show you what my results have been.