Sunday, December 20, 2009

The Good, the Bad and the Evil

Friday night, I spent some time bonding with my quilting frame, Lenny, and machine, Squiggy. (Those names still crack me up!!) After working on the comfort quilt and all of the problems that I encountered, I really needed time to just fiddle with the frame and the machine and the thread and everything to find the right combination. I had picked up some top stitch needles on the recommendation of my very good buddy, Michelle. I was trying to stick with the needles that the manual said to use. I mean, why would they tell you to use one specific type of needle if you need to use another one?

The Good - So I had 2 different sizes of needles and a Kid Komfort charity quilt that I loaded onto the frame. I was very aware of how I was loading the fabric and batting since I had some issues with this on the last quilt. Everything went fine and I was ready to start sewing. The new needles work great! I was able to use up some bobbins that were left over from other quilts to free them up for new quilts.

Another good thing was that if I have a good bobbin in the machine, I can use the Connecting Threads thread that I bought without having thread breaks. Woo hoo!! This is very good since I have so much of this thread! I will just have to deal with the excess lint, but I'm OK with that!

The Bad - I started having a couple of spots with skipped stitches on the last thing I quilted. It wasn't too big of a deal and I just went back over the spots again before I removed it from the frame. Also, I still can't use the humongous cones of glow in the dark thread that I won at the quilt retreat in April. I'm think that these might go into the 1,000th post giveaway...

And the Evil - I'm still having bobbin issues. When I bought the machine, it came with like 5 bobbins. Of course, this is just not enough! I have since bought the 'correct' bobbins like 5 different times and only a couple of times have they actually been the right bobbins. Because of this, some of the bobbins have gotten mixed up and I can't tell which bobbin is right just by looking at them. Sometimes I can tell by putting them into the bobbin case, but not always then either. So I keep working on separating the good from the bad.

It will be great knowing that the Connecting Threads Thread will work with a good bobbin. I'm actually very happy about that!

OK, so here is what I did on Friday!

The Kid Komfort quilt

100_2282

Close up - trust me, these stitches look great in person!

100_2283

And the place mats. These will be a cinch to bind, now!

100_2285

As long as I had put off trouble shooting the problems, this was not as much of a chore as I thought it was going to be. I'm so happy that I was able to quilt and move along on these projects! But the machine still needs a cleaning and I will add it to my list of things to do in the New Year!

5 comments:

Three Birds Inspired said...

Have you tried the pre-wound bobbins? I use those all the time. I get the "L" size and that fits perfectly in the bobbin case. I usually use SuperBobs from Superior thread but have also bought from a company in North Carolina which had really good prices and I think those are Coats & Clark. We also use them in the APQS long arm.

Michelle said...

I'm glad things started working for you. I'm telling ya....you gotta try the fil-tec magna glide bobbins. You will fall in love!
All your projects look great!
Have a wonderful week.
Michelle

Jennifer said...

Glad that it is going better. Skipped stitches for me usually means that I need to put in a new needle. The advice I got was to change the needle every two bobbins (I can't say I follow that advice though!). I just got some glow in the dark and I got it to work in the bobbin w/no problems...you might try that before you chuck it!

Rhonda said...

Your quilting looks great from here in central Texas......LOL....I don't have a quilting machine but I use bobbin pads which seem to stop slip-age...hope that helps.

Michelle said...

I notice too, when I skip stitches sometimes, it is in the area of thick seams, or sometimes that the fabric is a bit different. Usually when I skip stitches, I double check for stray threads in the bobbin area, or excessive lint, and I always check the upper threading to see that it is ok...but if all else fails, I change the needle. (Why is it that we don't want to change needles? I don't, unless I have to. Maybe it is the same reason we don't change rotary blades until we realize we are about to break our wrists from the strain of trying to get them to cut!)