Big Stitch Quilting Without a Hoop - Tutorial

[Music] everybody I'm Debra Richmond from the close of turtle and today we're going to be looking at the clip behind me we're going to do looking at big stitch quilting this is a quilt that I've done recently finished with Big Switch quilting it's fast it's easy it's inexpensive and I want to show it to you to show you how to do it to see if there's maybe a way you can start incorporating big stitching to your projects so let's get started so let's take a closer look at the quilt so this is a very geometric quilt it is a log-cabin and because it is a geometric I wanted to put some lines on there that we're going to give it a different to be curved and give it a softer look and it also gives your eye to different places to rest first on the geometric and then as you come in closer and you see the wavy lines of the quilting just gives it a little more interest I did use pearl cotton for this you can also use embroidery floss you can use three ply or four ply the pearl cotton is a number eight I find that works the best you can try a number five if you have some Pro cotton at home you want to use it up it just depends on your fabrics and how the weave how close the weave is so that if it's a tighter weave you're going to need a smaller thread so just give it a try but eight works with everything I've tried so far what I did we're going to talk about marking we're going to talk about how to start a thread and how to stop a thread so that you'll have really all the basics you need to know to try this on some of your own projects so the concept for the quilting was very very simple all I've done is I have drawn lines on there that are wavy and I started with a few and I added them until I just felt like there were enough it was really just whatever you like to put on it you see here is another one sometimes the lines cross sometimes they did not there really wasn't any rules just wanted some nice wavy lines I'll show you the back of the quilt you don't really see quite as much of a stitching on this one I've used a small print on the back and so that hides some of the stitches that is a tip that I have for your backings when you choose them if you kind of want to hide your stitches uses and the larger the better if you want your stitches to show then you go ahead and use a solid and so you've got a lot of different variation as far as what you would like to see when they flip the quilt over so here's what we're going to be working with today I've got three different marking pencils to show you I also have the needles that I use our big stitch needles this particular brand is by pepper quarry and you can get all of these on our website I also use a vel Donnie Pro cotton at the number eight this one is very gate and variegated is fun because as you as you sew and quilt through you get some variation in life and dark so play with different types of colors as well so let's start with talking about the marking pencils I have a three different one here ones here to show you I have a lot of different marketing utensils these are three I use quite a bit now the first one is from sew line there we go and this is a nice they call it a ceramic lead marking pencil in by clicking in the end you do hope that's how you get your lead to come out it's a very soft hard enough to hold up but soft enough to give you a nice line when you draw on it so we're going to go ahead and put our first line on here and I am just going to go ahead and draw the swervy line just like that so you can see how easy this one draws with it's really nice if you don't want to buy a special pencil I have used a regular mechanical pencil just like this many times and I've had no problem with it washing out if you are some people are a little bit leery about using regular leaded pencils afraid they won't wash out I only say test the tool first before you start to use it but very often same ideas you click it very often I will pick up one of these if I don't have one of my others near me and again works very easy for marking now I'm going to show you I put this together so that has black on the back so that I can show you what to do on dark fabrics okay this is one that I started using more recently I absolutely love it it's called the general pastel chalk on white they come in different colors this is the white I like it because the lead does not crumble it's hard enough again hard enough to hold up so that we can draw with it but not so soft that it crumbles when we can't sharpen it so this one just is really nice and again you're going to see how very easy this one is to draw with that's just really important so that's what shows up a nice nice bright line for you to follow so if you're using Derrick fabrics definitely this type of generals pencil in the lighter colors is the way to go all right so for our demonstration today we have our pieces are basted together as you'll see in the little marks in here I use a quilt tech basting gun you can use whatever type of basting you prefer many people will safety pin some people will baste with threads now when I'm going to do something that is a long curve you're lying like this or anytime it's a long line I don't use the hoop I used to use the hoop all the time with my other hand quilting I'm starting to learn how to go without a hoop because there are times when hoop is great and there are times when using the doubter hoop is nice this is the time when using without a hoop is really nice because you're going to be moving at who cast early because this is such a fast stitch alright so I'm going to go ahead and start this thread what I like to do is I am going to come out I'm going to start with right here but I'm going to poke my noodle in here about almost an inch away bring it to the stitching line I'm going to pull that through just so that there's a it comes not all the way through but that is now underneath and the tail is right here underneath the fabric I'm going to give it a back stitch here and I'm going to come up beyond the stitch and I'm going to get another back stitch just so you can feel really secure about that starting your thread I do not use mats other people do I do not use nuts because I've had that problems with other hand clothing where the nuts would pop through to the top once I wash the quilt and it just didn't look good so I have always gone with this method now once you've got this anchored and you're ready to stitch and stitching is just really very easy you're just going to stitch along you're going to be able because not using a hoop you're going to be able to have your left hand if you're right-handed right-handed is using the needle left hand can be manipulating that thread to push it onto the needle so you can get a lot of different stitches on one insertion okay so now let me tell you a little bit about what you're seeing you don't have to have really even stitches for big stitch in fact it looks better I think if they are not if you find that your stitches are getting real small remind yourself to go big because that that's what gives you a nice look especially on when you're on a quilt top you have a print and so you're not seeing these needles these stitches quite as stark the uneven stitches is actually adds to the look okay so just do some more you can use a symbol I'm not using one today but if I had one I would be putting it probably on my thumb but for this with with using without example it's really nice because it's nice to be able to push that fabric back and forth now if you're working at a large piece a lot of people ask me what do you do when you have to go way to the middle of a piece what you're going to do is you're going to take your arm you're going to just punch your quilt up on it so that you can get to the point in the middle where you are working it's really there's no secret really you just kind of bunch it all up so you're kind of holding it in the crook of your arm and then you can keep quilting on whatever part you're at now with your big stitch quilting you can use a light contrasting thread you can use a thread that is the same color as your fabric it is really a lot of different design choices but this is just a really nice easy way to finish a quilt because it's just fast you don't have to think about it and before you know it that quilt is done when I when I did the pink one that I showed you a minute ago I was really surprised how fast it finished I before I knew it I was done and I added a bunch of lines just to make sure I had as many as I wanted but it's really this is very forgiving and very easy now let me show you how you end a thrust let's get to the end of this and I'm going to go a little faster again big stitches is what it's all about this is really nice if you're a beginner closer because it gives you a good idea of how to handle quilts before learning how to do the more traditional stitching the more traditional stitching is very very similar to big stitch is just much smaller stitches and I'm still just following my line okay so let's say into the end of my thread and I want to end it here what I'm going to do is I'm going to now take this needle and insert it into the fabric just behind that light where I came up last time I could do well let's do in front so we're going to finish out our last stitch and what I'm doing is I am going to weave this needle between these stitches so that it is the thread tail that I'm going to leave is going to be in between there we go it went in between these last few stitches so while you can't see it you did see what I just did was took that thread and did this with it that's going to leave it snug enough so that you are not going to have any trouble with it coming out whether you wash this quilt or not I've washed a lot of my quotes the thread the ends tails don't come out you would just then clip it off right there and you start another thread here using a couple back stitches and starting again and then just to show you the back you can see that the same stitches that we put in the front looks pretty much the same on the back so that you have a nice stitch line on both sides so I hope you start thinking about big stitch quilting how you can use it in some of your products it's great for baby quilts for small quilts for charity quilts for utility quilts it's great for a lot of different projects I absolutely love the dimensions that it gives to a quilt it really adds quite a bit because you're seeing a lot of threads and the colors now all the products that we used in this video you can find on our website that goes a turtle and that event quilted turtlecom thanks Peter and be sure to subscribe to our channel you can do so here by clicking the subscribe button that way you'll find out about new videos as any cover pillow [Music]

Channel: Deborah Richmond

Views: 69,491

Rating: 4.870647 out of 5

Keywords: big stitch quilting, big stitch embroidery, quilting, how to finish your quilt, big stitch quilting without hoop

Id: GIFvBlraaU0

Length: 11min 31sec (691 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 20 2017