So cool...
I am having a hard time figuring out how to do the rocking horse quilting stitch. I am hand quilting, but I've never had anyone show me how to do that particular stitch, and when I read it, it doesn't make any sense. I've watched youtube on it, and I still can't figure it out. So I just dive down and up and don't do multiple stitches on my needle cuz I don't get it.
It irritates the heck out of me.
A few years back, I had a lady walk into my store, and she said her work was in a book. I had the book, went to it, and sure enough, there was her hand-worked totally amazing quilt, hand-stitched. She asked if I had the old style of Mountain Mist quilt batts. I said, yes, I did (my fave for machine quilting, and I usually bought 4 boxes at a time, reordered when I was down to the last dozen, so I had both new and old types. Needless to mention, the new battings manufactured by Stearns and Foster Co. (Mountain Mist Batting co.) were not white, were not glazene-finished, and do not separate into more than one batts. :|
She took all I had. Then she patiently showed me how she did what she did (19 to the inch) in the manner that you described. She took the batting by the edge, gently pulled it apart, and came up with two thin queen-sized thin battings for two of her inimitable works.
Then she lit into a demo showing me how she did it, rocking the needle up and down through cotton top, the corrected batt, and cotton backing. I don't usually do hand quilting, but even 10 thumbs me did it.
I'd give anything if I could remember her name. Seems the quilt showed up in the good old book, "Quilts, Quilts, Quilts" by Diana McClun and Laura Knownes. It was so beautifully done. She had the quilt with her, same as was in the book. I was totally astonished. Not sure I could do it again, but keep in mind, there's more going there than just technique. Those materials used by authors who do these amazing feats are often not just the frosting on the cake, but the main body of their success at what they do that looks like magic to us less enlightened beings. i.e., are you using the same JJames size 11 quilt between needle the author promotes? Yes or no, answer to yourself.
Uh, that's the last time I did hand quilting, I'm pretty sure. But those who love hand quilting, try a thinner batting. I do machine quilt sometimes using thinner batting called "cotton flannel." Now that I've moved to the subtropics by comparison to overfrozen Wyoming, not only is flannel great for making southern quilts, it works well in miniature doll quilts, wallhangings, quilted mug mats and quilted placemats. The upside of using a thin batting on the table is that the goblets are less likely to topple over as they often do with a thick, frost-free batt made for 60-degrees-below-zero weather.
Hope that helps. The other day at charity bees, one of our hand-quilters said something to the effect "I hand-quilted that thing, and I used the stick-and-stick-and-stick method to get through that batting!"
I knew exactly and precisely what she meant.
Finally got it!
the wool shrank, pulled, and came unsewn in places and at that time I had no clue how to make it better. I wish I had them now!
