I’m quite new at patchwork; is my quilt “good enough” to quilt? | Of course! Most quilts look great after quilting. However, if you think there are a few errors in your quilt, quilting the quilt will not fix the quilt but mistakes, will be made less obvious with the right choice of quilting design. Measuring your borders before you add them to your quilt is one way of ensuring they do not end up ‘wavy’ or too tight. If you are not sure how to do this, just email me and I’ll send you a sheet explaining how to successfully add borders to your quilt. By measuring borders so they are not “wavy” or too tight is often the answer to a good result. Just remember, you will get a great result from our quilting if your top is flat, square and well pressed. | What type of quilting should I choose? | There is so much to consider here – who is the quilt for? Will it be well cared for? What is your budget? Often, an all over pattern is the best answer – it’s the most economical option –and there are hundreds of great patterns to choose from. | How long will I have to wait for my quilt to be quilted? | For edge to edge quilting, it can be as little as a one week turnaround! It will depend on how many quilts are booked in any one week. I can let you know at any time what the waiting period is. For anything else (i.e. custom quilting) - 6-8 weeks. | Is the thread included in the total cost of quilting? | Yes, there are no hidden costs. Thread is not extra. It is included in the overall cost. | | I’ve been told by another quilter that my quilt borders ‘pleated’. What is pleating? | Pleating is when the fabric folds on itself and gets caught up in the quilting. This usually occurs when the borders are longer at the outside edge than they are at the inside edge Fabric has a natural tendency to stretch and it is very important to take the measurements for borders by measuring through the centre of the quilt, not along the outside edge. If you simply just keep adding borders without measuring through the centre, the borders will become full and wavy. Did you know that you can accumulate over 8 inches of extra fabric this way?! Contact me for an instruction sheet on how to put borders on quilts. | Should I pre-wash fabrics and or batting? | There are so many views on this one. I have decided not to recommend pre-washing as it makes the fabric very soft, sometimes making quilting a little more difficult. With quality modern quilting materials, pre-washing should not be necessary. If you think colours might run however, colour catchers (available in most supermarkets) will collect colour runs during the quilt’s first gentle machine wash. | What is bearding? | Bearding means that the fibres in the batting have pulled apart and are migrating through the fabric fibres of your quilt. What you will see at first is little wisps of batting poking through the material. After you wash the quilt you may notice that the surface has started to get lint balls all over it like a fuzzy sweater. Once this happens, there's not much you can do however you can salvage the quilt by removing the quilting, replacing the batting with a good quality one and quilting again. If this has happened to you, contact me for advice on removing the current quilting. | |
