quiltingfan

I have hand quilted a twin size quilt in 10 months. But I did put it away for 2 months because I got tired of seeing it. I am going to start on an old wedding ring quilt top that I inherited from my grandmother almost 20 years ago. It is hand sewn so I will finish it by hand sewing it. It will probably take me a year, since we will be moving during that time also. Since my sewing machine is in the living room I do not sew when my family is trying to watch a show or a movie but this way I can still quilt.

purplemem

I hand quilt when I watch tv. I made 2 queen size quilts last winter, both were hand quilted, took 6 weeks for each of them. It takes me about 3 weeks for a baby quilt. Those are the only sizes I've done.

It really makes my hands hurt, so I use a tool to pull the needle through the fabric. I bought spring-loaded curved blade needle nosed pliers to pull the needle with. It has helped the hand tension/pain immensely. I got these at Tractor Supply. I can load the needle with 5-6 stitches this way.
http://www.tractorsupply.com/tools/h...pliers-3807906

moreland

When you get started, I bet your stitches will be fine. I spent a winter quilting with a much more experienced quilter. I would think my stitches were awful, but the next time I'd go to quilt, I could not tell my quilting from her quilting. It got amazingly better while I was gone for 24 hours. :>)

sew cornie

Oh, I'm feeling so much better about my lack of speed. :lol: I'm entering into the 4th month and am about 2/3 done with my son's twin bed quilt. I feel like such a snail. I'd hoped to get it done by Christmas, . . . New Year's . . . . I'll be setting it aside this weekend to blast out some blocks for swap deadlines, but will begin again on Monday.

I don't work, but with young children, housework, cooking, groceries, etc., I don't get nearly the amount of time to sit with it as I'd like. I'm trying to get to it at least an hour each night, but some nights I'm just too exhausted. I think I only got to it two nights this week. Ugh. After these swap blocks are completed this weekend, it goes back to being sewing priority #1.

Thanks everyone for sharing. I do feel much more normal now. :lol:

jpwagner

A few years ago I designed a generous queen size applique quilt for a raffle for our Guild. the various blocks were made up into kits and we selected qualified appliquers in the group to do the blocks. the result was outstanding and I couldn't stand to give it to someone else to hand quilt. So I did it myself.

I decided to keep track of my hours. I chose to do a diagonal grid, about 1 1/2" apart, both ways, and outline the applique patches.

It took 300 hours, looked fantastic. And I couldn't hand stitch for over a year because my hands hurt!

BTW, we earned over $3000 which we used for our programs.

sewbaby

I hand quilted a queen in 2 months just working on it in the evenings while hubby watched tv just hate sitting and starring at the boob tube. I always have a design i'm working on , one being pieced, one on the machine, well at least on one of the machines ( i have 5) sometimes I have two on machines and their are my tops waiting and the one i'm doing by hand.

Fox

Hand quilting? I started a full size embroidered album quilt a few months before my son was born. It took about a year to embroider, and...well, with all the starts and stops...okay, the kid is now 38 years old and the quilt is in a bag in the closet, still not finished!

KarenSimon

I LOVE to hand quilt. Yes, it seems to take forever. But I think if you have 4 or 5 projects going at the same time helps. In various steps from cutting, to piecing, to quilting. You work a little at a time on each. It seem I never get bored. Now I do get bored with housework.

cumberlandquiltchick

I hand quilted a quilt in one week, I guess it's not quite a double, will have to measure, but it's bigger than a lap. It was the first one I've ever quilted.
However, I really stayed with it. I used a BIG hoop and if I had trouble pulling needle through, used these little spring loaded pliers w/rubber handles. Also, I invested in a GOOD thimble from someone at Jax Quiltfest this year. It fits and my finger can breath. Also, It was just straight stitching, no curves. I think the amount of quilting has to be considered. This was nothing too intricate.

spinnergs

I keep a log of all my projects and some notes on events happening. It took me three years to hand dye, piece, applique and hand quilt one queen size quilt. I work four days and life happens. This quilt was very closely hand quilted and won some blue ribbons at shows and Missouri state fair, so maybe it is worth the effort. The queen size I am hand quilting now I started piecing in November and have it almost finished but the stitches are farther apart because the receipient requested a "soft" quilt. My machine quilted ones are rather stiff with thread play.