Quilting Sunbonnet Sue
 

There's another thread today asking for info about a quilt on a blog. When I went there and looked at her quilts (she quilts for other people) I saw a Sunbonnet Sue that is gorgeous! She did crosshatch quilting except on the SS's and used a black blanket stitch around them. My question is: would you do the quilting overall first and then applique the SS's on top or do the crosshatching just up to the edges of the SSs? Seems that would be very hard to do! But also, doing the blanket stitch around the SSs through the whole quilt layers would also be difficult. I love the look but how doable is it? Link is:

http://tanderwenquilts.blogspot.com/

it's someone else's quilt so she had to quilt up to the applique with each line, I'm sure it wasn't cheap

If it were me and I asked my cousin who quilts for others also, she agreed with me it's easier to do the appliques after unless you don't mind the crosshatching running across the applique. But she may have quilted up to the applique. Only the quilter and piecer know for sure.

You travel along the edge of the applique and then go back down on the line next to it. It gives the illusion the applique is has the cross hatching going on under neath it. It sure looks nice.

First hint ... zoom in on the pics
.......... and you will see that the black embroidery detail including the blanket stitching is uneven, meaning you can tell it was not machine stitched, but hand stitched. So the person who made the top had completed it, including SBS and her black embroidery.

Then a further look, and you will notice that the LA'r has outlined SBS with a regular stitch. Most likely, that would have been done at the start along with any SITD that she did around the sashing, and such. Then she would have done the detail work, including the cross hatching.

That's all part of "custom quilting" which is what the LA'r noted that the owner had requested.


It's a lovely quilt, with lots of detailed FMQ work, that works well with the quilt top. I spent a lot of time studying it earlier, for inspiration for my own DSM FMQing!

i love the way the LAr quilted a sashing look between each pair of SSs... they look like they are conversing :thumbup:

Thanks everyone for your input! You've told me things I never would have thought of.....too much of a newbie still!

I was feeling very frustrated because when I tried to go back in and look at the pics, a lot were "broken", including 3 of the SS pics. Cleared my cache...no help. Finally just closed FF, reloaded it and went back in and the pics showed again. This has been happening a lot, even with pics here on the QB. Anyone have any idea why?

Have you looked into the Sunbonnet Sue book by Eleanor Burns?? I was able to make three of them and successful sold them. I crosshatched the background because I enjoy quilting by machine but using when possible the look of hand quilting.

It's possible to hand applique one already quilted. My Mom did a baby quilt from a kit, it was already quilted with the pattern printed on. She did the entire quilt and not one stitch showed through to the back side.