I made pretty good progress on quilting the Chakra Mini Quilt over the weekend, and I thought I’d share a bit more about the “in progress” portion of quilting these detailed chakra / medallions. I am using my domestic machine, Olive (a Bernina 820), and I have 12wt Aurifil in the bobbin and 50wt on the top. I went through an extensive process to determine that this is the best set up for my machine, and I wrote a guest post for the Aurifil Auribuzz blog about that process: Guest Post: Quilting With Aurifil’s 12wt by Quilting Jetgirl. You may find when trying out different combinations with your machine that 12wt works just fine on the top with a large enough needle (many people have success with a 100 needle).
So after drawing out each chakra and medallion design using a Mark-B-Gone washable marker, I free motion quilt with the drawing up and 50wt on top. The 12wt side will be the “front” when the quilt is complete. Once the quilting is all done, I will wash the quilt top to remove the marker and block it square and flat to dry before trimming square and binding.
Each chakra requires 4 spools of thread: I use a lighter shade of the color on the outside of each chakra and a deeper, richer color for the center. And each color takes 2 weights of thread (12, 50).
Once again, I am loving how the yellow chakra turned out; I did not change its design from the first mini quilt. All the others have new interior motifs this time around.
Chakra Mini Quilt WIP
I really and truly believe that if you can draw it, you can quilt it. If you are hesitant to start free motion quilting, spend some time drawing designs with pencil and paper. Then mark out some of those designs using a marking device on fabric and practice tracing what you have drawn. It’s working well for me on this project, I believe!
Wow!! I am lost for words, this is fantastic.
This is stunning ♥
Just beautiful as always.
They look fantastic. I’ll have to play with heavier thread because I like the look of it a lot. Is there a reason you chose to quilt on your domestic instead of the longarm?
So beautiful! It’s almost time for me to bite the bullet so to speak and try free motion quilting! You make it look so easy I see the beautiful designs you come up with and it makes me want to jump in and try it! I can’t wait to see it all finished and bound!
This is awesome and I like the design of the yellow one too! So pretty.
Wow, this is incredibly beautiful!
The yellow Chakra has to be my favorite as well. I’m blown away every time I see these. I’M going to get out my pencils… thank you!!!
I’m impressed you can use the back as the front. These are looking SO good!
I just love seeing these! When my machine comes back from it’s cleaning I hope to give something like this a try! You are so inspiring!
These are all so beautiful! I need to try using the 12 wt in the bobbin. You do it so expertly!
These are amazing Yvonne. I love how the colors go from light to dark.
I’ve really enjoyed seeing the progress on this over on IG. I had no idea you were quilting it back to front, so to speak. It’s a really interesting technique and I’m loving the result!
Thank you for showing your progress and explaining the process. Your swirls are so perfect and the colors are so pretty. I can’t imagine anyone not liking this piece.
They’re all so pretty, Yvonne! I agree that if you can draw it you can quilt it and in my case I can usually quilt it better than I can draw it, lol 🙂
I would love to see a video of how you quilt this~I’m such a chicken (insulting chickens everywhere!)
I really love the rich texture that the thicker thread gives to these. Taking the time to figure out what worked for Olive is really paying off. These are just as pretty as the first ones you made.
I have been doodling some medallions similar to these. I love seeing how yours is turning out.
This is just beautiful Yvonne! Good tips as well. Maybe one day.
This is just gorgeous. I have been thinking about making something similar for my “massage guru” friend and this is a good push in the right direction.
The quilting is just beautiful! I have quilted with Aurifil 12 wt on the top on my machine (Bernina 150) with a size 90 needle with great success.
Beautiful project! Looking forward to see it all finished 🙂
These look awesome. I love how different each looks from the front and back by using the different thread weights.