Rachel "Ivy" Clarke

Does that mean what I think it means??

Yes! This morning I finally finsihed the free-motion quilting on my Mod Sampler. Oy, what an ordeal. I seemed to have had the worst time with this and I can't really figure out why. I'd done free-motion before, on a jerry-rigged machine without a darning foot or anything and never seemed to have a problem. I also don't seem to have any problems with the free-form stippling design-on-the-fly like some people do--I'm actually fairly good at it (if I do say so myself) and enjoy that part of the process. So why, this time around, with the propfer feet and instructions and techniques, did I encounter so many problems?

In addition to the whole bobbin debacle that stalled me about halfway through, I had constant thred breakage the whole time. I tried several different types and brands of thread, as well as changing out needles and cleaning that machine, but the problem never stopped. Just from trimming threads I counted a minimum of at least 50 breaks during the process. That's pretty unacceptible and I'll have to figure out what the issue is before I attempt this again, because not only is it toally inefficient, but it looks bad on the finished project. Also, because of all the stops and starts, both due to the thread breakage and just taking breaks, working on it some each day, I'm pretty sure my stippling style changed from the beginning to the end. But by this morning, when I was on the last row of blocks and could see the light at the end of the tunnel, I just didn't care any more. All I wanted was to be done. It's certainly not my best work, which is a little disappointing, and it'll never make it into a quilt show, but I'm happy enough with it to put it on my couch, and that's really all that matters.