The quilt on the frame has 32 “block” motifs to be quilted — I’ve now got 9 of them done. Because it’s cream colored thread on neutral fabric blocks, I’m having an interesting time trying to see where I’m going.

With my overhead light and my machine light on, this is what it looks like:

Talk about quilting blind!

Luckily, I have a really lightweight light fixture that gives off a beautiful white light. It’s light enough I can set the whole thing up on the quilt itself. I turn this on, get it as close as I can to where I’m stitching. I also turn off the machine light.

And that which was impossible to see, is now visible:

I’m really pleased with how this quilting is going. I can do this particular block design all at once, continuous curve, pebbling and feathered motifs. As you can see, I draw in the big curl thingies, to remind myself of approximately where they go, but as you can also see: I don’t actually quilt what I’ve drawn, because they are usually too wonky! Mostly, I’m reminding myself which one is supposed to be big and which is supposed to be little.

I’m using a purple air erasable marker to mark my guidelines. I just have the one right now, and I keep losing it. It’s the only thing I have right now to mark light colored fabric, so I need to (a) stop losing it and (b) get another one!