I was at the American Quilter’s Society show in Des Moines, IA recently. As I made my way through the quilt displays I noticed so many very intricately pieced quilts. These intricate quilts must have taken months or maybe even years to complete. Of course I took lots of pictures to share with you. Check […]
Read MoreI’ve got a cure for your tension headache. Tension is the first thing you need to learn when starting out with longarm quilting. It’s not hard to learn. Many quilters have a bit of a mental block about it. We have been told repeatedly to not touch the tension on our domestic machine’s bobbin. Fear […]
Read MoreThe PAQA-S 2022 Exhibit was at the Sertoma Arts Center in Raleigh, NC last month. PAQA-S is the Professional Art Quilters Alliance-South that promotes innovative art quilts, art cloth, and art garments. Last week I shared some of the quilts I saw there. You can read that post here. This week is Part 2, sharing […]
Read MoreI 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 MoreWith 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 MoreIf 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 MoreLast 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 MoreWe 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 MoreDid 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 MoreLast 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 […]
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