Creative ways to fix quilting mistakes with Beth Collins
This week I’m chatting with Beth Moore Collins about fixing quilting mistakes. I can’t count how many quilts I’ve made over the years that reached a critical point and then something stopped working. I enjoyed chatting with Beth about this topic and thinking of new ways to work through quilting issues:
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Fast forward to time 28:35 for the interview with Beth!
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Leah’s Quilting News
It’s been a very busy week of catch up since our trip to Florida. On the drive back I realized I’d been hesitating to fully commit on certain goals. It’s like I’ve been standing on the edge of a diving board, waiting to jump in.
I finally pushed myself to commit contacted a midwife that had been recommended by a friend. I’m excited about this new relationship. I know contacting this one woman will not make me pregnant, but it’s a good first step in the right direction.
I finally made a solid start to this goddess quilt design!
I’m also committing to working on my pregnant goddess quilt, Eye of Calm. During the podcast intro I was getting to the next step on the freezer paper templates and preparing to begin this quilt construction process.
It’s hard to find space to work on this quilt like this. It’s large and involves lots of little pieces that are time consuming to put together. I’ll just have to figure out how to manage that because I really want to create this quilt too.
New Tutorials Coming Soon!
A giant roll of pantograph patterns came in last week. I can’t wait to share a new batch tutorials on pantograph’s hopefully starting at the end of this week.
New tutorials on pantograph quilting coming soon!
I’ve also filmed the rest of the Ms. Bunny sewing tutorials. I decided to film a video on sewing her dress and another video for her the dress closure options. I also made one last video on sewing her cute panties too!
More Ms. Bunny doll tutorials coming soon!
I haven’t shared these tutorials yet, but they will be coming as soon as I can get them edited and uploaded. Click Here to find the Ms. Bunny sewing pattern and sew along with me!
Ideas for fixing Quilting Mistakes
Beth Moore Collins is a professional artist and now a quilter too! Check out her quilt and pictures at QuiltInstinct on Instagram and Flickr and BCollins on Pinterest as well.
She first shared about the quilt she’s working on right now which is all challenging because it’s made with colors she rarely uses: neutrals and browns. It’s also a very intricately pieced medallion that’s super impressive!
This beautiful quilt has proved a big challenge for Beth to work with a lack of color.
I love hearing that Beth makes a list of all of her UFOs (unfinished projects) at the beginning of every year and focuses on knocking them out. She also sets yearly and monthly goals to improve her quilting skills.
She participated in our Rainbow Log Cabin quilt along last year and learned about walking foot quilting. However, after quilting another quilt with her walking foot she realized she just didn’t like the effect so she spent an entire trip picking out every stitch of the quilting.
Tip #1 – It’s Okay To Rip
So Beth is obviously not afraid to rip out stitches! Personally I’d rather just make another whole quilt than do that much ripping, but Beth had a good point that if you bother to make something, you should make it so that you love it.
She made a major change to that quilt design and won a ribbon with it!
After ripping out a lot of stitches and making a major change to this quilt, Beth had a show winner!
Beth also mentioned taking a Christmas quilt and appliquéing real clothes over the Santa cowboy. I love how this quilt came out:
This little Christmas quilt turned out super cute with the addition of real clothes on the Santa!
It’s so cheerful and creative plus has added dimensional texture from the clothes on the surface. So that leads to our second tip:
Tip #2 – Don’t Be Afraid to Make Radical Changes
Beth is also not afraid to take something apart and rearrange it. This rubies and gold quilt was pieced and taken apart and rearranged three times before she was happy with it.
Beth took these blocks apart three times until she got them just right!
Beth helps many quilters work on their quilt and move to the next step. From what she’s seen, most quilters struggle with color. Her advice was to watch out for using too many medium values.
Medium values will merge together read as one color. Try to mix in very light lights and dark darks in order to make your middle values stand out.
Tip #3 – Live with Your Quilt
Beth also advised hanging your quilt up or putting it on display in some way so you can see the colors and design every day. If you live with it, you will begin to see it differently and may be able to identify what’s bugging you about a problematic quilt.
I hope you enjoyed learning these creative ways to fix quilting mistakes. Check out Beth’s quilts and pictures at QuiltInstinct on Instagram and Flickr and BCollins on Pinterest as well.
Let’s go quilt,
Leah Day
