Welcome to the Handi Quilter Blog

PAQA-S 2022 Exhibit

I had the distinct pleasure of  seeing the PAQA-S 2022 Exhibit at the Sertoma Arts Center in Raleigh, NC this month. PAQA-S is the Professional Art Quilters Alliance-South that promotes innovative art quilts, art cloth, and art garments. The 2022 exhibit is titled ArtQuilts Emerge. Their theme is described on the website as follows: In […]

Read More

Perfection

With this series of posts about free-motion quilting for beginners, I have been emphasizing the importance of practice. I encourage all my students to quilt every day. I think of practice not as attempting to achieve perfection, but of attempting to improve. It is a way of generating new ideas and trying new techniques. Sometimes […]

Read More

What is Timing Anyway?

If you have had a longarm machine for any amount of time you have probably heard the word “timing”. And you probably didn’t hear it in a good way. The timing on any sewing machine has to be just right in order to create good stitches. When your timing goes out, you usually cannot sew […]

Read More

Taking off on a Diagonal Tangent

Last week we used a diagonal path for filling a grid. Let’s take off on a tangent and try a few new things with using diagonal quilting combined with grids. I like to try to find a way to quilt a design that makes it easy to stitch AND gives me great looking results. Win-win! […]

Read More

Fun with Loops and Grids

We filled half-square triangles with loops to create some fun texture. Now let’s get a a little crazy and create some more fun with loops. Work on the diagonal It’s time to branch out and try a little something different. Rather than travel horizontally or even vertically, we can choose a diagonal stitch path. We’ll […]

Read More

Find the Right Surge Protector or Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS)

In the US we are in thunderstorm season. Summertime brings storms with lots of rain, thunder and lightening. Those storms can also cause power outages. It is important to protect precious electrical equipment (like our longarm machines) from power surges. It would also be helpful to be able to finish quilting  a block design, or […]

Read More

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 […]

Read More

More Filled Grid Variations – Swirl

Last week we filled grids with straight lines, curves and S-shapes. That leaves two more of the 5 basic shapes to create even more filled grid variations, swirl and loop. Swirl The swirl is a fun one to quilt because it flows so easily. If you are not proficient at quilting swirls, remember to practice […]

Read More

Filled Grid Variations

Now that you’ve got the basics of filled grids from our last post, it’s time to kick it up a notch and explore some filled grid variations. If you’ve been following along with this Free Motion Quilting for Beginners series, I bet you can guess what I’m going to say next. IYKYK.  If you’re new […]

Read More

Filled Grids

We are back this week to our discussion of grid-work. Next up are filled grids. When you want maximum texture on your quilts, filled grids are the way to go. Whenever parts of the grid framework are stitched and other parts are left un-stitched the result is texture. Why? Stitching tamps down the batting and […]

Read More

“Spirals can be used in blocks and borders too. And they are great combined with other shapes to create gorgeous designs.”

FREE MOTION QUILTING FOR BEGINNERSimg

MORE ARTICLES