Quilting Paisley on Vinyl Fabric
I’m quilting on vinyl fabric again this week, this time with Paisley! See how quilting over vinyl works with a bit of travel stitching on a longarm:
Click Here to watch / listen to Katie’s podcast episode. Click to time: 15:26 to hear just the interview about quilting on vinyl and leather.
Check out my other video on quilting with vinyl on my longarm. I quilted Undulation, my newest and most favorite quilting design and I think you’ll love the effect!
Click Here to check out the Grace longarm system I’m using in this video. I’m a dealer for Grace Company and you can get a special discount on your frame if you use the coupon code: hellomyquiltingfriends at checkout!
Quilting Paisley over Vinyl Fabric
I had a second piece of vinyl fabric from Katie and decided to stitch it up a notch with Paisley. The challenge with this design was travel stitching. This is the technique of quilting back over another line of quilting.
I love the look of quilting over this fun vinyl fabric!
Designs like Paisley require travel stitching to form the design. Traveling also creates extra thread texture on the quilt and it looks great… most of the time!
I admit, this is still a struggle for me on my Grace Qnique longarm. On a home machine, I have a lot more control over the stitches and where the quilt is going. I simply don’t have the same level of control on my longarm on the frame yet and I made a lot more mistakes on this piece.
Throw More Thread At It
Rather than freak out and throw in the towel, I kept quilting and threw more thread at it. Sure, some of my Paisley shapes are a bit on the demented side, but I’m sure Katie can cut around them while making her bags.
My Paisley design wasn’t nearly as perfect as Undulation so I threw more thread at it!
At least I hope so! It’s hard to make mistakes, especially in a video and have the design not turn out perfect. But this is the process of learning any quilting skill. You have to spend out on materials in order to get to the good stuff – the skill, the ability to control the machine, the ability to make those gorgeous stitches consistently.
So all in all, this was great practice, and I loved quilting on the vinyl fabric.
Longarm Quilting Settings
Quick reminder: I was using a stitch length of 12 stitches per inch, with my favorite Isacord Sterling thread, and size 18 needles. I didn’t change my needles or thread for quilting on the vinyl, which surprised me.
Step back from your quilting (and squint really hard) and I promise you won’t see the mistakes as easily!
One thing I did notice a few days after quilting these pieces was a large amount of plastic flakes in my longarm bobbin area. I guess all those needle holes were chipping away at the fabric a bit. Just keep this in mind and be sure to clean out your machine (either home or longarm) thoroughly after quilting vinyl fabric.
What material would you like me to quilt with next? Share your ideas in the comments below!
Let’s go quilt,
Leah Day
Thank you so much for not editing away the wobbly stitching and the bobbin running out on the paisley frame quilting video. As I strive to get better with frame quilting, I thought that I was the only one who bumped into things, or ran out of bobbin thread at the WRONG time. To see a pro (I consider you a pro on frame quilting too) have the same issues, it gives me hope for myself.
Oh yes, there is no escaping little mistakes like this, Lorelei! It happens and we just have to run with it and keep going!