When making this block I had some trouble with shadowing. Shadowing is when one fabric shows through another and creates two different colors. If you look carefully at the block below, you can see a faint line about 1/8 inch away from the top edge of the orange petal. The light yellow and the gray behind the orange petal show through differently. It's faint, but I couldn't stand it so I had to fix it.
To do this, I cut a new orange piece to layer on top. I took a second piece about 1/16 of an inch away from the original line to ensure the original piece was fully covered.
I then layered this over the original piece as shown below. It will be a little thicker, but when using double blanket-stitch it isn't a problem because the thickness of thread hides the two layers. This works with both Steam-a-Seam 2 regular and lite weight fusibles. The line is gone.
If I know ahead of time that shadowing is going to happen another alternative is to line the piece in white fabric. You use one piece of white that is 1/16 of an inch smaller than the original piece and then the original piece on top. The white fabric helps to block other colors from showing through. I have found it is equally effective to use two layers of the same color.
Now back to the stitching....
- Outer Yellow Petals - Polyneon by Madeira - I love the sheen of this thread and it is really silky and easy to work with.
- Inner Light Blue Petals - Deco-Bob by WonderFil - It turns out this thread is 80 weight, who knew? I love it. It behaves well and is easy to use.
- Light Yellow Central Petal - Polyneon by Madeira
- Orange Central Petal - Aurifil 50 weight cotton thread - I use this thread all the time for piecing quilts and machine quilting. I admit I own 90% of the colors (few browns and grays as I prefer bright colors). It has very little lint and it takes me a long time to use up a 1422 yards. Since it is 100% cotton it has no sheen, but for this orange I really wanted a flat look.
- Dark Blue Dot - Fufu thread - again, I love the texture and shine of this thread
- Orange Dot - Aurifil 50 weight cotton
I am having so much fun trying out all my different threads. When I start my next project I will definitely be thinking about what I want to use a flat thread on and what I want to really shine!
Suzy
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