Tonight while watching some tv with the family, I went back to hand quilting my Giant New York Sunflower quilt. I really haven't gotten very far on it and I needed the peace that I get from hand quilting. Don't get me wrong, I love machine quilting. Especially for utility quilts that I know are going to be lugged around, cuddled in and washed often. I don't have as much faith in my hand stitching to withstand all that. With machine quilting, though, I love the challenge of it and the speed of it (working on the intricacy and accuracy of it lol). Hand quilting is tranquil and calming to me. Much more so than machine quilting.
Anywho, as I was stitching, I was thinking about how every time I have tried to use a hoop, it just doesn't work for me. I do much better with just letting the quilt lie in my lap and all over while stitching and then it dawned on me WHY it doesn't work for me....AHA! I don't move the needle when I am hand stitching..I move the FABRIC on to the needle! Honest..the needle stays fairly steady in my right hand (and I am right handed) and my left hand moves the fabric up and down on the needle. Hmmm..why is that? Then I realized I also knit that way! My right hand holds the needle steady and my left hand moves the other needle and yarn ON to the right needle. I really have no idea how or when I started doing it that way, but if I try to move the needle up and down into the fabric, it just feels wrong and I can't do it. Hence, the hoop tightens up the fabric too much for me to move it around onto the needle.
Well, I know this wasn't an exciting post, but it was kind of cool for me to learn something new about myself. Now..does anyone else stitch this way or is it just me? Or have you, like me, never even noticed how you do it?? lol
A purist would say you are doing the hand quilting all wrong but I say if it works then go with it. I use a hoop but have to have it up close to me as if I was doing cross stitch.And the size is important for me too-too big or too small and I am stuck.
ReplyDeleteI would just be concerned that the fabric would distort being moved so much.
I quilt just like you, without a hoop and with the left hand doing all the real work. Now I think about it, I knit like that too. I've always put it down to the fact that I was a lefthander, who was made to become a righthander when I went to school (way back in the dark ages, when they did things like that).
ReplyDeleteAs Kathy says, if it works for you, why change it? I've crocheted for over 60 years and have never held my crochet hook the way the experts say it should be held. It works for me and that's what's important.
ReplyDeleteI do it this way too. I think it is easier.
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