Barbara Shapel Workshop

 Congratulations to Ellen for getting Spin in Brown accepted into PIQF New Quilts of Northern California.  Her Orange Rhyme quilt was in last years PIQF and her quilting is amazing.

I recently took a workshop with Barbara Shapel who also does amazing threadwork.  I would have never thought I could make such a beautiful thread work, but she breaks it down into manageable steps.  This is what I completed after the 1 day Heron Moon class.

 Barbara was able to cover 4 different quilting stitches.  The background stitch used a Monopoly filament thread on top and a matching background polyester thread in the bobbin with a 60/8 needle.  It was just a back and forth stitch that she asked us to cross over the lines.  The caffein stitch (moon) used a zigzag stitch with 1.4 width and 1.3 length in a white rayon thread with a 70/10 jeans needle.  The beak used 3 different colors of yellow to orange with a fill stitch that was put in a hoop and stitched side to side.  The feather stitch was an undulating line that came to a point and went back up to the top.

This is the night side                                                                               This is the day side

It is a two sided quilt.  The back looks just as good as the front.  By putting the same color of thread in the bobbin, you are able to get the same thread work on the other side of your quilt.

I can't believe I finished this.  I learned a lot during the workshop.  Mabry told me my machine needed oil and told me how to put oil on a q tip to clean out the bobbin case.  Rachel showed me how she uses a tweezer to put the thread through the needle.  Especially those tiny 60/8 needles.  I could not find that needle at JoAnns fabrics and Cindi let me have one for class.  I had also never used spray basting to baste the 3 layers together and Diane showed me how to use it.  I gave Diane a quilt sandwich to practice her stitches on and I think I gave Cindi some of that magical moon thread.  The teacher was wonderful and full of thread knowledge, but all the students in the class helped each other.  Wow, I actually made this.