The first and last quilt of 2024

Back in February, I was making headway on my scrap projects when I ran across a stack of teal-ish fabrics. I quickly left the project that I was working on and made this top instead…..

The top sat in my studio all year and now….the last few days of 2024, it is time to quilt it!!

I am happy with the quilting on this one…

and am looking forward to trying a new binding technique on it…….. Wish me luck!!!

Baby Quilt FINISHED!

Yesterday, I left you with the completed top….

I got it basted and sat down to do the quilting…..but where to begin?

My original plan was to video the quilting, but with the matching thread, you couldn’t see ANYTHING that I was doing….

….so….scratch that plan!!

I wanted to continue the flower theme so decided to work with Angela Walters “Petunia” ruler…..

If you use it correctly, it makes a fun flower!!….

I wanted to keep the quilting continuous, so I chose to quilt the flowers in a line.

I added the swirl in the center and the prongs leading out to the petals.

In the lower section, I wanted to do something different so just quilted parallel straight lines…..

That just left the center flowers!!

I outlined the flowers and leaves, going around each piece twice. I think that the double stitching will help secure the appliques for the long term.

…and in the background, I quilted the design that I call “You-turn”….

I am delighted with the quilt and am thinking about turning it into a pattern…what do you think?

Then, it was time to make the label. I printed the label, using a picture of the flowers on the quilt…..

To ship it, I rolled it into a cute roll, folded the label over and added my note…..

It is now winging its way to Kentucky, hopefully to be a comfort to a sweet little girl!!

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If you have an interest in ruler quilting, check out this online course…..

Click HERE for more information

Quilting Around in Circles

After getting all of the Concentric Circles marked (from yesterday’s post)……

…it was time to start quilting.

BUT…things didn’t go particularly well!!

I started on my domestic machine using a walking foot and realized that it was going to take a LONG….LONG time to quilt this top.

Move over to Julio (my Juki Sit-Down Long-Arm).

Have a watch to see what happened next!!

So, in the long run, I am very happy with how the quilting turned out….

I mentioned in the video that I tried a “Flanged Binding” for the first time. Keep an eye out for a future post about how to accomplish this EASY task!!

Tomorrow I will show you the finished quilt and a few of the other quilts from our guild members!!

See you then……

For Free-Motion Quilting ideas, be sure to check out my YouTube channel…… https://www.youtube.com/c/francesquilts/videos

That’s a LOT of marking

After I pieced my challenge top…..

….it was time to think about the quilting.

Actually, I had been thinking about the quilting since I started the project, and most of the design was based on how I wanted to quilt it using Concentric Circles.

I quickly realized that I was NOT capable of quilting these large circles without marking them first….

UGH…..I HATE MARKING!!

But, I came up with a solution that made quick work of this onerous task….

Spoiler alert….the quilting was NOT a painless process!!!

Come back tomorrow for that!!!

For Free-Motion Quilting ideas, be sure to check out my YouTube channel…… https://www.youtube.com/c/francesquilts/videos

Free Motion Quilting at IQF

Today I thought I would switch things up a bit and present a video of some of my favorites from the Machine Quilting Category at the International Quilt Festival.

I hope you enjoy it!!