Quilting Rules its OK to Break

Hi I’m Nicole Gilbert and this is the Stop Scrolling, Start Sewing podcast.  Each Wednesday join me as I share the ins and outs of that quilt life.  If you don't have a sewing machine, can bust out a super fly Y seam,  or just want to hear about the newest or coolest quilty news, this is the podcast for you.

In this episode I'm chatting about all my favorite quilting rules to break.  And also one that I totally agree with, yikes!

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Transcript

Hi, I'm Nicole Gilbert, and this is the stop scrolling start sewing podcast. Each Wednesday, join me as I share the ins and outs of that quilt life. If you don't have a sewing machine, you can bust out a pretty fly YCM. Or you're just looking for the latest quilting news. This is the podcast for you.

Hey, folks, Nicole here and welcome to season three, Episode 14 of the stop scrolling start sewing podcast, whether you're listening on the way to work, or watching on YouTube, thank you for spending a bit of your day with me.

On this episode of the podcast, we are chatting about quilting rules, okay? I hate quoting rules.

And more importantly, breaking them. Okay, I love breaking the rules. But you gotta know what the rules are. Before you can break.

So let's talk about quilting rules where they came from what you hear. We're kind of at this like, wonderful, weird, I guess depending on which side of the argument you're on time in, like social Zeitgeist where everyone knows what a Karen is. And also, I feel really bad for people whose names are actually Karen. Because this is like, come it. Like, I always think about that. I'm just like, I went to high school with a girl named Karen and she was really nice. I liked her. I guess neither here nor there, though.

We're at this point, where

as a whole, were kind of like, this is my circus. These are my monkeys. This is how I choose to train them mind your own business. And I am so here for it. I apply that like thought process, to all the things in my life to raising my kids.

They're my monkeys.

To everything in my cold studio like,

this is this is my home. This is This is nothing. I know what's going on in here. I know what I'm doing in here, which means I can do whatever you want in here. Not least of all because it's mine.

But that being said, there's still

there's certain rules you can't break. No matter what. We're not talking about those today.

What I would I guess where I'm trying to go with this. I'm having one of those moments guys, bear with me. Um,

the quilt version of Karen is often referred to as the quilt police. And the quilt police have kind of evolved as the years go by.

In the past, quote, police have been like, you can not put your binding on with a machine.

I think there's still probably people who are like that, but I don't like to spend too much time thinking about them. If I'm being 100% Honest.

Quote, police have said

you're not a real quilter. If you use a long arm machine, or you use edge to edge or you do quilt in the hoop, that's not being a real quilter. If you're somebody who like pieces left, right and center, you have a million tops, and they never get quilted. They're like you're not a real quilter i 100% disagree with that.

Do I understand what the word quilts means and quilting and the three layers and all of that jazz, obviously, I get it.

But like don't yuck my yum. And so for those of you who are like I love cutting, I love piecing I love choosing fabrics, and then I'm on to the next one.

Awesome, that's great. Know what you love and do it. That's the whole thing that we're doing here. This is a hobby people. So that's kind of where I want you to like kind of start thinking not because you have to think that way. But because I want you to know how I'm thinking and that's how I'm thinking. So that's kind of what's going on in my head when I think of all of these rules.

I'm thinking about how am I going brakeman Okay, so

up before I dive in.

I think I mentioned this in a previous episode or last week's episode, but we are in the heart of the holiday season. People are going on vacation.

People are traveling people have lives, it is what it is. There will

might be any gaps, because I am well planned. But

these episodes will be inherently a little bit shorter than usual. Just because I want, I want you to listen to me be like, Girl, that's awesome. Go sell some stuff and then go spend some time with your family. Those are my rules for you guys today. Okay? All right. So for pretty much until right after the new year, the episodes will be consistently a little bit more concise, so that you can spend a little bit less time with me and more time with your family. You see, I'm like forcing you guys I know you guys want to just hang out with me all the time. And I appreciate that. But

go hang out. Go be a people person. You only have to do it for two weeks out of the year. And then you can go back to being an introvert in your Sewing Studio. I 100%. Live by this as well.

I will be

in a ski lodge with all my in laws for a week. So we're all we're all together. Okay. So first quilting rule, pressing.

Okay. And I say pressing because I got some things to say about pressing. Okay, I got three different rules

of which I'm trying to break. Okay, so number one with pressing,

always press to the dark side.

A lot that's again, always pressed to the dark side. What do you think about that? I personally, wholeheartedly despise that piece of information. Mostly because

it

inhibits my creativity. And it also makes me think I'm not a good quilter. Here's why.

And I also I'm gonna say for those of you who have been my students, and you're like girl, you told me to press to the dark side, there's a reason I tell you to push to the dark side. And I'm gonna tell you right now. So for newer quilters, I do suggest pressing to the dark side. Because having that fold over of your seam allowance, kind of in case, your seams will give it nice strength and integrity. And the reason why I think this is important for new Sowers is because I also tell my sewing students to have a slightly longer stitch length than I currently use. I use like a 1.8, sometimes a 2.0. That's my preferred length. Now, for my students, it's a 2.0 or 2.2. The reason why I want them to use that longer stitch length is so that it's easier to pick out. You're going to make mistakes, we know you're going to make mistakes, and that's okay. That's how we learn. That's how we get better. But since we're using a longer stick length, I want your stitches to be have like a little bit more integrity.

So let's press it the dark side. Okay.

I only press open, said it. Some of you are going to be like I can't even with this girl and turn off and that's fine. No, it's not fine. I want you to stay. But I get it.

It's a it's a one or the other thing. I'm a press open kind of a person, I use a short stitch length. My Stitches have great integrity, I'm not worried about them unraveling for several reasons. I use touch stitch length,

I quilt 99% of the things that I produce are quilting. And because they're quilting, they're pieced together, which means every stitch is going to get intersected several times.

Either it's getting stitched over while it's getting connected to the next piece, or it's getting stitched over while in quilting. There's a lot it's getting encapsulated by the quilt binding. There's a lot of places where it's getting crossed over and sealed and the ends are getting stitched down. So I'm not worried about my edges unraveling. One side note, one thing I did hear from a fellow long armor, which I thought was genius, and I was like oh my gosh, I need to tell everybody about this. And then I forgot. So I'm telling you now,

she suggested if you don't personally long arm or quilts, your quilts on your domestic machine or by hand and you send them out to a long arm.

Take an eighth of an inch seam

all the way around the edges of your quilt. And that will keep all of those threads and seams together. And that's really whether or not you're pressing open or to the dark side and I just was like you know what I'm here for it. I appreciate it. And that's awesome. But also you want to make sure it's an eighth of an inch. So that that way once you square up and you bind, you don't see it. So that's awesome.

That was a rambley way of saying I like to press my seams open. So you're welcome. The next thing with pressing would be apt never press with steam.

I like

I don't even know what to say to that. I really don't.

I

I wholeheartedly disagree. I just do. I love steam. I love best press. I love faultless. I love flatter. I love it. I love it all. And so yes, those last three that I've just mentioned, are starches and starch alternatives. However, the principle of steam kind of applies, what's happening there is you're adding moisture to your fabric. And yes, those other things have additional agents to make things nice and stiff and stay hard and flat. But you're adding moisture to your project, your iron is heating up that moisture, the moisture is getting removed, and your fabric is staying in the position that the moisture was that it was in when the moisture was removed. That is great.

It's kind of like blow drying your hair, you use a round brush, you're blown it out, it stays in the position that you use it, which is why you got to keep turning that round bush and pulling your hair out.

It's the same concept. So I think that we should all be using more steam, or starch, or starch alternative.

Whatever is your jam, put it in your iron if you want to. I personally don't, I like to have spray bottles

and kind of spray it on and then do it.

But that's mostly because not all irons can accept steam in the same way and meaning they don't hold the water. And then the water does things especially if you have hard water at your house. If you've chosen not to use like distilled water.

It can it can mess up your your iron. So

I like I'm giving you these ideas. And I'm kind of first of all super rambley. So sorry about that. But

I'm, I'm kind of giving you both sides I'm saying you seem you seem you seem and then I'm like don't put it in your iron.

I want you to see that. There's a reason why these rules exist or have started. But there's also ways to work around them.

So like pressing our seams open, there's an integrity issue that can come and arise. But this is how I go around it. Steam, moisture, water can mess up your iron. This is how I go around it.

So I just want to kind of keep you keep that in mind.

Okay, I'm so rambley

right now. And quite frankly, I'm enjoying my time with you. So thank you. Okay, so next one.

Always pre wash your fabrics. That's the next quote rule.

No.

Mommy got time for that. So here's the thing.

We want to make sure that our fabrics are colorfast

won't shrink on us won't cause coverings and won't pull it holes. This is why we pre wash. Okay, now I'm going to tell you why I say no. There's times to pre wash.

I will say 99% of the time I no longer pre wash and that's because the quilting cotton that I use is of a high enough quality that preservation processes in the finishing of these cotton's Nolan void those issues that I just mentioned.

Very little bleeding, very little shrinking.

And without shrinking you don't get puckering or holes if you're using like a nylon or polyester thread.

So that's why I do

that being said, not all fabric is created equal. Notice that I said I use very high quality quilting cotton's high quality quilting cotton's our quilt shop quality cut it's the same manufacturers that make

fabric for big box retailers do not sell to your mom and pop small quilt shops. Okay, and when I say mom and pops that includes awesome huge companies like fat quarter shop and Missouri Star. They were very small and they are just like

Do you Jenny and Kimberly, you guys are awesome. But there's a there's a quality difference between big box and what you can get at your independent retailers.

So that would be your first step to see okay, am I buying quality cartons? Those big brands that we all know and love free spirit moda Riley Blake, these are that is the realm that we're talking about. The quality of the cotton's is so good.

Now,

when do I wash it, just so that you guys know there are times I wash it, if I am not entirely sure of the origin of a piece of fabric, I have some fabric kicking around around in all of this mess back here, that is years and years and years and years and years old, before I knew better.

And I don't necessarily know what the origin is. And so anytime I incorporate some of that into a scrap quilt, kind of all those scraps have to get washed. Because what you do want, you need to do to them all for consistency sake, and so that one doesn't drink and one does, you know you don't want that unevenness. That's how you get the puckering.

And you have to wash anything that's not

high quality quote cotton, so that we don't have bleeding any issues. I also wash when I'm using different substrates. So I don't always use Quilted cotton, and different substrates will shrink at different rates. So I want to get all that shrinkage out. So you know, my quilting cotton might only shrink one to 3%. But, you know, a denim might shrink 5%. And that differential, that difference will create puckers on my scenes. And I don't want puckers. So that is another time that I do indeed pre wash. But overall, I'll do that no more. The next one, I might be a Karen, I'm not gonna lie. The next one is ripping fabric.

You should never rip the fabric.

I kind of agree with that. It hurts my heart right now. Because it's like a quote rule. And I want to be super cool. And I want to be like, break them all.

It's just not my jam. It's not my thing. Some people are totally fine doing that. Actually, lots of people. Actually,

I was assisting another educator at an in person event.

And we had to have two full yard cuts to three yard cuts of fabric at each machine. And so you're talking about like bolts and bolts of fabric. And there was like 15 machines give or take, you know a few

it's a lot of cutting. And also kind of hard, you know, because when you're cutting that wide of fabric, not three yards, but when you're cutting across the width. Unless you have one of those super, super long rulers, you're gonna have to reposition you want everybody to have a straight thing. It's a whole thing. And so we wrecked

it hurt my heart. It was totally fine.

I'm here to say you can break this rule.

I just will not be among you criminals. No, I'm kidding. You can totally break this rule and it's totally fine. I just don't like it. I don't like the ride. I actually one thing I will say one time, I hope. And honestly I don't know if any of you out there are listening. And if you're not, then I'm saying this for no reason. But really

one day I purchased and actually I think this is also why I was pretty ticked off about it. It was a pre order. I pre ordered a fabric bundle. fat quarter tower, pre ordered a fat quarter tower.

And my fat quarter was had ripped edges.

A

very unhappy

one because I pre ordered it so I expected it to be a factory cut, which is probably where this really stems from like, if I preorder a fabric bundle, I expect it to be a

factory cut. So one it was store cut, but then if it was store cut, you could have at least done rotary cutter so that it was like nice and neat. This was all ripped,

which annoyed me. Why do people rip fabric because when you rip it up automatically perfectly on the green. That's how the rips happen. How do you keep this fraying when you do rip it? You clip a little corner a little dog you're off the corners and it will stop that that from unraveling further.

It's also super fast, super convenient. I mean you we did like a one inch roll clip and then rip and there goes a three yard cut clip rip through your cup

would rip through your cut. So I mean, yes, it was efficient.

I will not do it in my personal studio. I do not like it. If I'm doing like something on my long arm,

where like it's like, okay, take this whole chunk off, I will

kind of offset the fabric so that I can just quick load it. Run my long arm, and then in the squaring up, I'll get that big chunk off the side.

I've really dislike ripping fabric. So that is one thing where I am a quilty, Karen

can help myself. I will not rip. Okay, final shebang for you.

Okay, last one.

Binding must be cut on the bias. I just don't see why. I genuinely don't. Now, if it's round, if it's got scallops, absolutely. If it's got stripes, please cut your stripes on a bias so you get that beautiful tentpole you are missing an opportunity if you don't. But those are the only three reasons why I would cut my my binding on the bias because you just don't need it. You can totally use green tape to cut to bind a square quilt. You know, when you're mitering your corners, you're bringing it over. You're stitching at the 45 degree you're flipping it up, you're bringing it straight down. These are all straight angles that you're doing. We do not need the stretch the movement of bias. So why take the extra time? Unless circular? Scallops? Stripes. That's it. Otherwise, keep it movin bias. All right.

So there you have it. Those are my quilty rules. And when I break them, which spoiler I pretty much make them all.

Except for ripping fabric. I would love to hear what cruelty rules you cannot stand, what cruelty rules you refuse to break. And just overall what you are doing this holiday season because I am going to be with it withdrawals from all of you as I am kind of off the grid. So I will see you soon. And congratulations. You have just finished another episode of the stop scrolling start sewing podcast. Thank you so much for hanging out with me and make sure you never miss an episode. By hitting subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. And also wherever you watch on and by wherever you're watching me on YouTube.

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