Empty Spools Retreat 2023

I'm excited to announce that I will be teaching at Empty Spools next year. I have had a lot of inquiries for classes and retreats, so here is your chance. I'm taking this year off from traveling and teaching except for a few local quilt guilds because of COVID and family and personal health issues. So, if you're looking for classes from me, you will have to wait until 2023 (unless you're a member of one of this year's guilds).  I do have some YouTube classes, but in-person is so much better. 

Waratah: Commercial fabrics, batiks, and hand-dyes     .

If you don't know about  Empty Spools Seminars, they are 5-day quilt art retreats. They are held at Asilomar Confrence Center, an historical retreat in beautiful Pacific Grove, California, which is on the Central Coast between Monterey and Carmel. You spend the week with one noted quilt instructor and focus on that instructor's technique. I'm teaching session 5, from May 5-10, 2023 and they are taking sign-ups now. Click the link.

A Gardens Delight: Commercial fabrics and batiks

All my quilts here are made with only fabric, and no paint. Back in the early years of my art quilting, it was important to me to just use fabrics, and most of them were commercially available. I then started using batiks and my own hand-dyes, which I still use. 

...and Our Flag Was Still There: Hand-dyes and batiks 

3-years ago we experienced a devastating fire in Paradise, California, which killed 85 people.  The Camp Fire wiped out 95% of Paradise, destroyed 14,000 homes and displaced 27,000 people, many of whom lost not only their home, but their business, as well. I lost everything, including dozens of quilts and 20 years of accumulated fabric stash, along with a studio full of every tool, supply and sewing machine a quilter could ever want. 

Camellia: Photo above and quilt below - hand-dyed and batik fabrics 

I started to rebuild my stash and then COVID-19 hit and shops closed down.  Not having a fabric stash has changed how I work, think,and create. So, last week, I broke down and started using paints. I know! I'm working on a hydrangea quilt (my second try) and I just don't have the fabric stash to make it work.  I will be posting my progress on the hydrangea and, so far, it is coming along nicely thanks to the paint. And yes, it is easier with paint and I am learning a new technique to implement with my old technique. So sign up for my Empty Spools Seminar workshop and I will be sending you a new supply list that will go along with the one on the retreat website.  You can email me when any questions and I will share with you all my tips, tricks, and insights for using fabric, fusible web, and paint. You can reach me at melbula@comcast.net.

Keys to Successful Renegade Thread Play

 Clematis Flower Pattern and Kits

The Keys to successful Renegade Thread Play are to have a few of the right tools and follow your cut fused piece on each petal. All the work you did of cutting out those little strips and wedges or vines in the petals are your hit lines for how to curve your thread when quilting.  

1.    Do not go fast. Medium fast is great.

2.    Having something on you hand is a must for better control. Aka, Gloves. It really makes for better stitches.

3.    Having the right needle for the job.  What is the Job? Trying to quilt through thick fusible web while making beautiful line drawings with thread and coloring at the same time. 

You need a big hole in the eye of the needle and a needle that is designed to go through thick fabric like fusible.  Topstitch needle size 80/12 or 90/14, or a Jeans Denim needle size 80/12 or 90/14. I start out with the 80/12, but if you have skipped stitches try the 90/14. 

4.    Heat is your friend when sewing through Steam-A-Seam 2.   Warm up the area that you are about to quilt with your hot DRY iron. Steam will make your quilt wet. You can't quilt through a wet quilt. The heat melts and softens the fusible web. This makes its easy to sew through. This only works with Steam A Seam 2.   That is why I use it. You can iron it over and over. Not all fusible can take over ironing.

5.    Lower your top thread tension. I wish I could give you a magical number, but every sewing machine has its own number, and that number can change from day to day. Depending on how moody your machine is. The manufactures number for regular domestic sewing is around 4, 5. But when doing free motion quilting you are pulling and tugging on the fabric under the needle which means you need the tension to be looser than normal.  You need to have the tension at a lower number like 3, 2, or 1.  I move the number down a little at a time, always looking at the front and back of my stitches, to see if I have equal tension on both sides.

6.    I am using Rayon thread to do Renegade Thread Play. I love this thread because of it shine and comes in vibrant colors.  Rayon is very delicate and can break or fray very easily if you do not know how to handle it. I coat every spool of rayon thread before I thread my machine and after I wind my bobbin with Sewers Aid. Its a lubricate that keeps the thread from being nicked or frayed while moving through the sewing machine and needle.  I squeeze 3 to 4 lines of sewers aid a crossed the spool, length wise and squish it in.

The short video below will show you how I use Sewers Aid to helps with sticky build up on my needle.

To watch VIDEO - Click in the middle to play.

More videos are on my YouTube Channel-Melinda Bula Designs

Sticky Scissors No More by Melinda Bula