How Should I Quilt It? – A Review
June 19, 2024
Hi!
It’s time for a new review, and this week I’ve attended an online Creative Spark class from expert quilter Christina Cameli, called “How Should I Quilt it?” Whether you are a beginner, or expert quilter, this is ALWAYS a question that we ask ourselves, and I was really happy to see the depth in how Christina approached and answered this question.
She shared heaps of insights, and with her downloadable form for you to keep too, there’s a clearly defined process that she walks you through, in looking at your quilts, and helping you figure out the best way for you to quilt it.
Of course, this info is relevant too, if you’re taking your quilt to a longarmer to be quilted as well. If you have an idea of what you want, then you are better able to talk to your quilter about what you’re thinking about and why, and anything that helps that process is a bonus. Trust me… I know….
Only once have I had a quilt professionally quilted that I hated when it came back to me, and as it was a quilt I really liked to start with, it was a bit heartbreaking to see how it came back. It was my fault as I just told her to quilt it how she liked, and based on her previous jobs, I assumed it would be great. (For reference, it was a smaller quilt with small brightly coloured intricately pieced blocks spread over a white background. I was picturing all the great things that could be quilted on the negative space, and it came back with large free motioned ugly flowers on stems radiating out from the centre, and was quilted in bright VARIEGATED thread on my pretty white background! Say no more… 🙁 )
Christina spoke about how to look at your quilt for inspiration for your quilting decisions. She asks What / How do you think about your quilt? Her words for this fun quilt above were celebratory and expansive, and she quilted it accordingly.
This modern pieced quilt was used for several examples of different approaches as to how to quilt it. Christina demonstrated many ideas, including using the shapes from the piecing, and how they might be repeated onto the borders.
In “How Should I Quilt It?”, Christina also looked at focal points on your quilts, and how to decide what should be quilted to stand out. She helps you work through what you love about your quilt, and how best to show it off with the quilting.
Christina covered using the piecing to help you quilt too…, and discussed how negative space can be effectively used for “quilted connections between blocks”. (THIS is what I had in mind for my quilt – NOT bold ugly flowers randomly all over the top!)
Christina also discussed density of your quilting, and why it needs to be considered.
Take the example below – think about if your quilt will be washed. Whilst the stitching is the same, the one on the left is as it was quilted, and the one on the right has been washed. Shrinkage causes your quilted design to pucker up a lot more, and if this is not the result you were after, you need to consider just how dense your quilting should be, when looking at the end use for your quilt.
Christina encourages you to think big in your quilting. You don’t have to know how to do it yet, but be bold and play around with your ideas. For example, do you want to hide a quilted butterfly in there somewhere? How about adding a quilted quote?
In this lecture, Christina talks through the process of coming up with quilting design ideas in detail, and then she covers how to plan out the designs prior to quilting them.
This is a great way to get you thinking and planning out possibilities of how to quilt each quilt, based on the quilt design and its merits, rather than just quilting it the same way you always do.
She shares ideas for dealing with applique, and how to decide on the type of batting you want to use, and I found her discussion of how to break up large spaces really enlightening too.
I certainly learnt some useful ways of approaching my quilting from Christina’s “How Should I Quilt It?” talk, and at only $20, if you’re quilting your own quilts (or even if you want to have a better understanding of what you want before you take it to be quilted), I would urge you to make the investment in yourself and grab a coffee and a notebook and pen, and sit down and listen.
You can find this lecture on Creative Spark’s online class platform, or by clicking this link: https://creativespark.ctpub.com/courses/how-should-i-quilt-it
As usual, I have no affiliation, and I do not make any money through this review – it is my honest opinion on a class that was given to me to check out, and I am glad I did!
Best of all, I have also been given one FREE class to give away too!!! If you’re interested in furthering your quilting journey, and learning from one of the best, please leave me a comment below saying why you’d like to learn more about quilting from Christina Cameli’s “How Should I Quilt It?” class, and I’ll draw one lucky winner next Tuesday 25th June.
Good luck, get commenting, and Enjoy your week!
10 responses to “How Should I Quilt It? – A Review”
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Hi Jody,
Ethel here from Italy, I have just given my first ever out of the family circle, quilt to a daughter in-laws parents for their 40 wedding anniversery and I washed it before passing it on. The batting shrunk again!!! after I had already pre-washed it, leaving it quite “puckered”. I was not happy about that. It didn’t bother me if it were a grand daughter or son, as they were going to be rough with theirs!! i know I shouldn’t have looked at it this way….. but I did. Here’s hoping they won’t be annoyed with the free motinon quilting.
Hi Ethel! I’m sorry that happened, but I’m sure they’ll love it.
(And if you don’t tell them, they probably won’t even know that it’s not as perfect as you wanted!)
I do minimal longarm quilting and only use pantographs because of my lack of confidence in my ability to freemotion. Would love to learn more and gain some skills.
Since I do all of my own quilting, I would love to have access to the class. I do a lot of “in the ditch” or curved lines following the pattern, and stipple, but need to be able to do other designs.
Currently I only do straight line quilting – boring…. would be wonderful to learn more about other options and insights.
I do all my own quilting, and I find deciding what quilting design would best show off the patchwork extremely difficult. Christina’s designs are awesome, and directions in her books are great. But, what to choose?!! After all that work of choosing a pattern/fabric/ironing/cutting/sewing (and the expense), and finally ending up with a quilt top I love, I need to still love it once it is quilted.
Love machine quilting and always interested in learning new information on how to quilt your quilt.
I almost always get stuck when I have to decide how to quilt my top. I am pretty confident in my ability to do free motion quilting but I just can’t seem to figure out the designs I want to use. I think this course could help me in my decision-making.
I do my own quilting so information on how to choose what to quilt would be helpful.
I do all my own quilting on my longarm and always need ideas on what would look best