Never stop learning.

This post will be about that one should never stop learning. I learned huge in January.

I was quilting an antique block quilt that I assembled out of some blocks a quilting friend gave me. The blocks had the blue pre printed quilting lines on them. Oh cool I thought!!

Well that’s where my learning process begins. After I pieced the quilt, I pinned it on to my Longarm. I used double batting, cotton as a base batting as my base layer and a layer of white cotton on top, normally I do it the other way around cotton on the bottom and wool on top. The reason I flipped that process this times was, the quilt blocks were white and I didn’t want to discolor the white with the natural colored wool batting. Well that worked out well, no issues at all. So good to know that flipping the batting works great.

I chose to quilt the top with ruler work and free-motion to add lots of texture, that worked well too. As I am almost done quilting the top, I start to think; oh I hope the blue lines will wash out!

As I am binding the quilt, I am still wondering, probably for a reason.

Finally finished. It is a 60“ sq, and it turned out gorgeous. I filled the bath tub with cold water. Added some soap, a tbsp of washing soda, and a quick swirl, off the quilt top goes, for a good over night soak.

The next morning I couldn’t wait to go and check on it. I drained the water and put the quilt top in a container. The next step was the washer, added some more soap and a little borax because the quilt top was yellowish and also hat brownish stains. They washed out mostly. But guess what didn’t wash out, yup, you guessed it. The blue lines.

Oh, No! Now what. I dried it on a sheet flat on the floor, because I didn’t want it in the dryer. Just in case.

Well long story short, if you have antic blocks with pre printed quilting lines, check the blocks before you start quilting. Not sure if I would have gone all out on this quilt if I would have known that before hand.

But I did, and it’s hanging in my studio, unless you stand super close, you will probably not notice,

Happy quilting.

Quilt blocks by:

maker unknown.

Longarm quilted by:

Iris Noitalay.