Loops and Grids

Did you happen to catch the July 5, 2022 HQ Watch and Learn on Facebook? More grid work! You can watch it here.  Kristina used loops in one of her examples. And I promised to do some grid designs with loops this week!  Let’s start by talking through Kristina’s design.

Break Up Your Grid

Instead of filling the grid boxes as is, let’s break up the boxes with a diagonal line.

You might want to mark these lines on the grid (as shown). Or you can just add a little mark, that will remind you which way that diagonal goes. It’s so easy to get distracted when quilting a repeating design like this one. So some sort of reminder is always helpful.

You can use a ruler when you stitch the diagonal. I like to use one, if the diagonal line I’m stitching is longer than a couple of inches. I like my gridwork to look crisp. You will get crisper results with a ruler.

But, you do you! You can certainly free-motion it. Remember, there are no quilt police. Are there?

The Path

Here is the path Kristina used. It’s a good one to make this loops design continuous.

Start in the upper left corner and stitch the diagonal through one grid box.

Next, stitch the loops traveling back up to the upper left corner.

Travel across the top of the grid box.

Then it’s rinse and repeat all the way across your grid.

Stitch down the right side of the grid.

Next, travel back to the left, filling in the boxes as you go. You need to change up the path a bit on this 2nd row. Start by stitching to the left along the top of the grid box.

Continue by stitching down the diagonal.

Then stitch the loops.

Rinse and repeat.

The next row will be stitched just like row 1. And so on, alternating stitch paths, to fill your grid.

The photo above shows the design stitched as described.

To finish it off, you can choose to stitch the vertical grid lines and finish stitching the perimeter. You can see an example of how to do this in last week’s blog post.  And here is the same stitch out with the vertical grid lines stitched:

You can use this technique with any shape to fill the triangle. Try a stipple or bubbles. Straight lines? Spirals? S-shapes? Did you notice I stitched my diagonal in the other direction and filled the right side triangle?  Change it up! Make it your own.

Just remember the path alternates with each subsequent row.

Pro-tip: Remember mantras?  (If you don’t, click the link and read the post.) Think of a mantra to use for each row. Another trick is to have a visual “mantra”. It’s an image you keep in your mind as you quilt. For row one you could use:

Then when you move on to row two:

If you are a computerized quilter, keep an eye on the Quiltable website. This design and more grid designs will be available soon in digital format.

HQ Watch & Learn

Watch the video to see Kristina draw this out and then stitch it. Be sure to watch the Handi Quilter Watch and Learn show every Tuesday on our Facebook page. The fun starts at noon Mountain time. If you are there as it airs you can ask questions in the comments and get expert answers. It’s full of great tips and tricks and interesting inspiration. Just like this blog you never know what you’ll see next!

By Mary Beth Krapil