Quilting Baptist Fan

[April Jaehn]

Ladies,

When machine quilting a Baptist fan, do you use the walking foot or fmq it. Last night I did a swoon block with fmq and while I'm proud of it because it is my first would the lines be more uniform with the walking foot? Or do you think it would distort since it's not straight line?
Can you tell I'm a newbie I was also stoked because I made my own template for drawing them out, but didn't have a fabric marker. The unfortunate part is my water soluable marker left marks. Since it was my first time I'm not letting it bother me.

: )april

[Blondie]

Hi April
I have never done a Baptist fan on the machine but I would think it would be more uniform with a walking foot. I would LOVE to see how yours looks. The Baptist Fan is my favorite of all - how clever of you to make your own template.
Blessings and good luck. I betcha others with more Machine Quilting experience will be chiming in here soon.

[Slokarma]

I'm love the Baptist Fan too and am always on the lookout for a stencil. I made my own stencil too from that circle ruler and I taped off about 1/3 of it. ( I ran across this idea on a blog) I did burn it onto stencil paper, but i sure could use some practice. I just bought a roll of "preview" paper. That should be here this week. I haven't been too successful with anything else.

Anyways, I have tried my hand several times and I can only see me doing it FMQ, unless the fan is really huge. But for my taste, there is too much stopping and turning for me to use a walking foot.

I have searched and will keep searching for advice and tips and what ever I can find about the Baptist fan. appreciate everybody else's advice!

For marking I used a regular mechanical pencil…one of my fav tools. I also use a piece of colored chalk or tailors chalk, which is a bit narrower than regular chalk. Most of those quilt pencils don't stay sharpened enough and I'm constantly breaking the lead and having to resharpen. I did try using that spray powder and a stencil. It worked like a charm BUT i put the can away and it leaked out something causing the rest of it to be no good. I really liked this stuff, but it's pricey if you can only use it one time. and now I'm learning to use the pounce pad….which i can't get to work like Eleanor Burns on TV…go figure.

[Claire Hallman]

I did one fairly large lap quilt on the walking foot with a Baptist fan and it took a very long time both to draw and to quilt but it turned out pretty well. I made the fans rather large and used a guide for the smaller and smaller fans after marking the largest outside fan shape. It probably would look better with smaller spacing but I like large spaced quilting most of the time.

Sorry I made it so small you can't see it. Will try to enlarge the picture later. That is a bit better but you really can't see the quilting, sorry.

[auntiemern]

Claire, that is beautiful. I love the baptist fan...reminds me of my granny. When she quilted for others...he would charge 'by the piece' or 'by the fan'.

[Slokarma]

That is lovely Claire. I just couldn't imagine doing a fan that big, but it turned out very nice.

That's another DUH for me... It's amazes me how short sighted my brain can be!

[Pegger]

I used a walking foot for mine. Won't do that again. To much turning for continuous line. It turned out well, phew it wore me out. I used the same circle ruler as Slokarma did but used a water soluble pen. Wish I had pounced. Turned into a big job for a lap quilt.

[April Jaehn]

Argh. Just lost my post.

Claire, your quilt is beautiful. I love the look of the big fans!

I didn't even think about all the turning with the walking foot. I might have to make another trial block to see if I can keep my sanity throughout. My swoon quilt is 80x80, so it's going to be a bit of work. The Baptist fan is just so pretty though all quilted up!

[donnamcrod]

Has anyone use TopAnchor's Baptist Fan rotating template? Is it helpful or anything you would recommend?

[Slokarma]

I don't have a long arm, so I've been looking for something to help with a domestic. But after watching it, I am going to try marking with a compass. I need something to help with spacing.