Blog
October 2006
Ribbon Quilts: The Finished Products
This is what happens when I get bored in the middle of the summer and start asking questions like “How does one make a ribbon quilt, and can I do it?”
The large quilt is about 44×48 inches and has 115 or so printed ribbons in it (and various unprinted ribbons). The center block and the outer border are Zone and State awards and a few show Championships/Reserve Championships. The pattern is a modified Courthouse Steps.
The smaller quilt is about 18″ square and uses 19 printed ribbons (and various unprinted ribbons). The horse head is appliqued on–I sewed the brown ribbons together to make a block, cut out the shapes, and used iron-on fusion to hold them in place. Then I machine quilted with a zig-zag stitch over the edges of the applique. No seams to turn under or anything like that. Since the quilt is so small, I wanted to do something unique with it–hence the applique instead of a regular pattern.
How to make a ribbon quilt
When I was trying to decide what to do with my old horse show ribbons, I saw some quilts a professional makes. I liked the idea of quilts quite a bit, and she is a beautiful sewer, no doubt about it–but I couldn’t really afford the cost of having someone else make the quilt for me. I wondered if I could do it and decided the only way to find out was… to do it. (View the finished quilts)
Pattern Selection
If you aren’t planning to use all your ribbons, you need to measure them (length and width) and determine your total fabric “area” for each color. Then look through pattern books and sites, and find a quilt that will work with your colors/available fabric amounts. If you sew regularly, you might consider getting a program like Electric Quilt, which lets you design your own quilts–it would be easier to test out the different patterns with your available colors.
I was planning to use all my ribbons, including the championship and year-ends, so I just cut off all the rosettes and started laying out designs on the floor. I wanted to use all the printed parts of the ribbons and wasn’t worried about the rest, so I rearranged until I found a pattern I liked.
Prepping the Ribbons
Mine were very, very dusty and very, very creased, so I washed them in cool water with a very mild soap. Then I quickly ran the iron over them to get out the worst creases and left them to dry overnight. They turned out beautifully.
However, if the iron is too hot I found it would rub off the printing. If you don’t need to wash your ribbons, you might want to try ironing with a thin damp cloth between the iron and the ribbons–that might help with the rub-off that I was seeing (of course, my ribbons were also old; I’m sure that didn’t help).
Pay attention to any very crooked ribbons–those will be hard to sew and, if you can, you should put them in the “don’t use” pile.
Prepping the Machine
I bought new needles for the machine–as thin as I could get them. I didn’t want to make large holes, because ribbons tend to show the holes and not close over. Regular all-purpose thread worked great for me. I ran a couple of test ribbons (pink and purple unprinted pieces I wasn’t planning on using) and adjusted the tension. I forget which way I had to adjust, but it wasn’t on the default setting. Also, while I tested, I found out the ribbons slide a bit while I sew. I didn’t want to pin them (the whole visible hole issue), so I found I had to hold the ribbons fairly tight while sewing them–that’s probably why I had to make so many adjustments to the thread tension.
Take your time testing, because once you figure out what works to get a nice seam, the rest of the quilt is EASY.
Sewing
My pattern was a modified Courthouse Steps, so I was sewing straight line after straight line. It went very quickly. Every now and then I squared up my blocks, to make sure everything was the same size and would line up correctly. Once I had all nine blocks done, I sewed three together for a row, and then sewed all three rows together. Like an idiot, I put one row on upside down, so I had to rip the seam and sew it back again. Moral of the story: remember you’re dealing with printed fabrics and it does matter which way things face.
Backing and Binding
I wanted to back the quilt so I could type out my results and put them on the quilt as well. I used a thin batting and a heavy cotton material; in the future, I’d go with a heavy muslin and no batting. I did end up pinning the backing and batting in place so that it wouldn’t shift while I was sewing it down–I just made sure the pins went through the seams so the holes wouldn’t show on the front of the quilt. Instead of binding, I sewed right-sides-together and then turned the quilt inside (or rightside…whichever you like) out. I hand-sewed the opening. I like the look, but you might prefer to sew regularly and bind the quilt.
I am not quilting down the batting. Instead, I’m going to sew some tabs on the quilt to hang some of the rosettes. I figure the tabs will work in the same way “tying” a quilt works–they’ll be enough to keep the batting in place, but I won’t have to worry about quilting down the whole thing.
Lessons Learned
In some ways, I find quilting ribbons easier than regular fabric–or, at least, there’s less cutting involved. It takes a little more time to make sure everything is staying lined up and square, but otherwise it was straightforward.
The biggest problem was the thread tension–it could be great for a while, and then it would suddenly slip and the back of the seam would be loops and snags.
The needles also broke two or three times. However, keep in mind that I was using very thin needles–they weren’t made for sewing through something as heavy as ribbons. Changing needles is easy, and it was worth buying extra needles so that I’d have smaller holes along the seams.
My seam allowances were TINY–as close to the edge of the ribbon as I could get them. That’s hard to maintain, and takes concentration. But any bigger, and you start to lose printed material on the front.
Despite my best intentions, the ribbons aren’t always perfectly straight in the front. Sometimes the ribbons were crooked, and to get them in the quilt I had to turn the ribbon slightly for the straight seam. I’ve been debating whether it would be better to trim all the ribbons straight before starting, or if that would cause problems because some wouldn’t be as wide as others. My crookedness problem I was able to correct each time I squared up the blocks.
Metalic thread is evil. I had considered using it because it would match the print on the ribbons, but it was IMPOSSIBLE to work with. I could not get the thread tension right, and it would snag and pull every time. I’m just glad I figured that out before I got to the “to quilt the top or not” stage–it would have been a disaster if I’d tried top quilting with metalic thread.
Despite the problems, I really enjoyed making the quilt. It took about three days to make and looks fantastic hanging on the wall. I was worried it was going to be too “hard” or something, but, really, it was a straightforward job. The hardest part was setting the thread tension and then going slowly enough to keep everything straight–everything else was much the same as regular quilting.
Per Request: Books on Dressage
Riderone’s request for information about books on dressage comes at a good time, because I’ve been thinking about this topic lately. I actually don’t own any instructional horse books. I don’t know why I don’t, and lately I’ve been pondering the same question: what books to buy first?
Funny but true: the only instructional horse book I’ve ever owned was called Judging Hunt Seat Equitation or something like that, and it was given to me for Christmas when I was a teen. I promptly “lost” the book, because I was certain my mother and my trainer were plotting some devious scheme to make me actually judge a local schooling show (one the older teens put on every year for the young kids). It never occured to me that my trainer might have recommended the book simply because it was a good overview of what judges look for in equitation. Boy, talk about distrustful teens!
Anyway. Dressage books.
Fortunately, I have a solution for us both. I lurk (and sometimes post) on the Chronicle of the Horse bulletin board. In the dressage forum, someone else recently started a post called “If you could recommend ONE dressage book…“. The votes for books (and some of the comments as to why) are:
- Dressage in Harmony (Zettl)—5 votes
- Podhajsky—; 5 votes (not everyone gave a book title, but his name comes up several times)
- The Principles of Riding (Handbook from the German National Equestrian Federation)—3 votes
- Dressage with Kyra (or similar title, by Kyra Kirkland)—2 votes
- The Dressage Manual (by Benjt Ljundquist)—2 votes (“understandable”)
- Riding Logic (Museler)—2 votes (and one poster who thinks some of the examples are wrong)
- Horsemanship (Suenig)—2 votes (and another poster who likes the book but wouldn’t recommend it to a beginner)
- Basic Training of the Young Horse (Klimke)—1 vote
- Dressage: A study of the finer points of riding (Henry Wynmalen)—1 vote
- The USDF Book of Dressage—1 vote
- Dressage in Lightness (Sylvia Loch)—1 vote (“some very good descriptions of how a horse interprets the aids”)
- Common Sense Dressage (Sally O’Connor)—1 vote (recc’d for the exercises)
- Dressage Forumla (Erik Heberman)—1 vote (“great concepts to take down the road”)
- Real Life Dressage (Carl Hester)—1 vote
- Riding and Jumping
Personally, I lean towards Podhajsky and Zettle, as these are the names I see most frequently in “recommended reading” discussions (in addition to this thread).
(And if I somehow got the vote count wrong, forgive me. I’ve been known to count my fingers and get eleven, sometimes.)
Is dressage fun? And other questions
Occassionaly I check my site statistics to see what search terms people are actually using to find my site. For the paranoid among us: don’t worry. My stats are aggregate and I don’t know who typed in which term.
Lately, I’ve been getting some interesting search terms, including a few questions, so I thought I’d help clear up confusion.
Search Term: halt near x
Dear People Trying to Find this Site’s Credentials:
It doesn’t have any.
Love, the pseudo-anonymous Halt Near x
Search Term: gold buttons coat fashionable
Dear Fashion Conscious:
I am so sorry you found this site in a fashion-related search. For what it’s worth, I think gold anything is a bit tacky. Give me silver or platinum any day. I’m also partial to bronze.
But keep in mind that what I know about fashion would take an entire season of “What Not To Wear” to fix, and at the end of the season the hosts would have to be locked in a dark, padded room for six months to recover. I doubt even the Fab Five could help me.
Love, “What is this ‘fashion’ thing of which you speak?” Halt Near X
Search Term: Is dressage boring compared to jumping?
Dear Jumper Fan,
You have, like, eight to twelve jumps in the arena, right? What do you think you’re doing in the space between all those jumps?
Ok, think of it like this:
The whole time you’re jumping, you have to think about your line, your impulsion, rating the horse, lead changes, getting to the right spot, bending through the turns, etc etc etc. Right? The actual jumps are sort of incidental. Fun–but incidental. Most of the work is spent on getting to/getting away from the jumps–not going over them.
Dressage is just like that, but without the jumps. Of course, if you just thought, “What is this bending thing of which you speak?”, then dressage might not be for you. But if you enjoy the technical aspects of jumping, you might be pleasantly surprised by how much fun dressage really is.
It helps if you’re a bit obsessive/compulsive, though.
Love, the very obsessive Halt Near X
Blowing the budget, for a good cause
We all know I’m on a budget, saving for The Wonder Horse To Be. I even cut back my book buying, which is a Big Deal. I buy books like other people buy cigarettes.
I’ve also been on a long, slow lifestyle adjustment. This time last year, I was fifty pounds overweight. Not a national crisis, I agree, but I could feel the effect of the extra weight in my back. Not good.
Also, I went to put on my field boots and they didn’t fit. Not even close. Ditto my full chaps. One or two other things convinced me that I would be happier if I could lose even forty pounds.
Because I know myself well, I knew a quick, dramatic diet was not the answer. It had to be the whole “lifestyle” thing, and I don’t change habits easily. I knew this would be a long, slow battle.
Given the “long, slow” bit, you’d think I’d have gone out and bought some temporary field boots or half chaps or something, right? Oh no. See, I keep my old boots and chaps in the closet and tell myself “I’ll wear these again some day, so no need to buy new ones.” Some people have “skinny” jeans; I have “skinny” boots and chaps.
I’ve been riding with sherberty pink polos wrapped around my legs.
Oh, I know. Believe me, I know. If I had to go the polo route, at least I could have shelled out ten dollars for cheap black ones, right? I mean, I hate the sherberty pink color. I think it was supposed to be a regular reminder of what I was working for, but… oy. I’m lucky my instructor just let it slide. I’m lucky the junior riders thought it was a cool fashion statement.
It’s been a year since I started this weight-loss thing. My boots and chaps still don’t fit. But!
But I have lost twenty pounds. A pant size and a half (I’m in that icky in-between stage). An inch and a half off my calves. I couldn’t fit into extra-wide half chaps last fall; I tried on large half chaps at the store this weekend and they fit.
I just couldn’t help it. I bought the chaps. They are purrrrrrrrty: full-grain leather, close contact, brand name $$$ chaps.
At least when I blow the budget I blow it big. And for a good cause.