Red Riding Hood Place Mats: The New Quilting Foot

Look - a new toy!

When I bought my sewing machine, it was a bit impulsive. I was headed to a class in the mountains and needed a machine that cold do FMQ type things. Since I had no clue what a darning foot was or even what it meant to "drop the feed dogs" I asked the instructor for her recommendation. I knew I would buy whatever she told me because I was overwhelmed by machine choices. I couldnt find one at my local quilt shops and ended up hooking up with a shop in Texas. She told me she could get it to me in time and would "throw in" the foot I needed. Worked for me!

Since then I've been humming along with that foot trying different projects here and there, some more successful than others. There were plaguing problems in all of them though. I could never get the tension right. The bobbin thread almost always pulled through at not so regular intervals. The big plastic piece was in my way all the time. The worst part, the spring has a little squeak in it. I thought the tension problem was user error and the maybe the squeak could be handled with a little oil. I really wanted an open toe though and decided to just try a different one. Since my machine is Janome, I ordered the Janome branded set and hoped for the best.

Remember those I'm a Mac, I'm a PC commercials? (I'm a PC by the way). That is kind of what they reminded me of. It is amazing how different they are. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to learn how to use it all over again! Even looking at them, you can see they are no where near the same in quality of construction. Look at the difference in the springs!

For my 80s friends, this is how I see them...

One of them a little clumsy and counterproductive and the other a master of creation and invention with a lot of room for user error!

My first attempt with the new foot is house place mat. I had no clue how different it would be. It actually puts a little bit of pressure on the fabric and doesn't glide right past seams as easily and the old one does. I really think this is a good thing, but it threw me off my game getting started for sure.  I started with a swirly line thinking it would be cool to mimic the smoke from the chimney. Worked ok, but then I thought - what if I alternated the smoke like lines with some wavy lines. I tried it and I ended up with wallpaper!

I did short cut the trees a bit. I wanted to mimic the lines in the house panel, but not copy them. I put wavy lines in skipping over the green tree parts. I think its fine, though not the most artistic thing ever.

All that is left it to bind up the wolf mat, put them on the table and show them off as a finished set. Be sure to come back by and check it out. I hope to have it up early next week.


If you'd like to see all of the posts related to Red - here is a handy index!

Thanks again to the designer of the block patterns, Cyrille @ BubbleStitch Quilts