Free Motion Challenge: The End of the Beginning

With the end of 2012 comes the end of the yearlong Free Motion Challenge by SewCalGal.  It has been interesting, educational, fun and well, challenging.  I was able to complete 11 of the monthly challenges and one of the bonus tutorials.   Each of the experts has her/his own special approach to FMQ, so I felt as though I had private instruction on free motion quilting in all its variations.

The list of things I learned doing this Challenge would be quite long indeed, but several things stand out:  how to let the sound of the sewing machine help me regulate my speed, how to follow a marked design, how to use different motifs in adjacent areas and most importantly, that frequent practice really makes a difference.

I enjoyed doing all of the challenges and will certainly return to the tutorials to improve and reinforce the skills I learned.  This is not the end of my personal free motion challenge;  it's the end of the beginning.

Thank you to all of the free motion experts who contributed to the challenge and especially to SewCalGal who organized this year-long adventure.  It has been a wonderful experience!

Here's my album of samples, my free motion journey of 2012.

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

Bonus #3

 Happy quilting!  Happy New Year!

December: A Gift and a Bonus Tutorial

 The Free Motion Challenge teacher for December was Patsy Thompson who provided a wonderful lesson on quilting borders in text, pictures and video.  The lesson and challenge had several parts, and while I started the month with good intentions, I did not complete the challenge to my satisfaction.  I'm going to spend some time in January doing the December challenge.  Patsy is a wonderful teacher who has made lots of instructional DVDs that are now on my wish list.

 I did, however, bake hundreds of cookies, decorate the house and the tree, make some Christmas gifts and do all other things Christmas-y.

And I completed one of the Bonus Tutorials that SewCalGal added to the Free Motion Challenge.  The one I did was by Diane Loomis who taught us to do machine trapunto.  This is something I have always wanted to try, and the tutorial was very clear and easy to follow.  I am really pleased with the results and am certainly going to incorporate trapunto into some projects in the future.  Diane suggested we use silk thread for our sample.  The thread I used was a #50, so it is more obvious than the #100 she suggested.  I used off-white fabric on the top and a pale gold and white rose print on the back.  I followed her directions to the letter and marked the cross-hatching lines for the background.
I am really happy with the top.

I'm even happier with the back because the gold thread works so well on the fabric.  I have more of the backing fabric left and I'm going to try this again using it as the top.

Thank you, Diane Loomis! And thank you, SewCalGal!


One of the Christmas-y sewing projects was this little Christmas quilt I made for friends.  I machine quilted garlands on the trees with metallic thread and hearts on the hearts with red thread. 

I love how the red striped binding and the gifty backing.

We had a wonderful Christmas and hope you did too.

Powerless Finish for October

Hurricane Sandy paid us a visit this week.  Here in Northern New Jersey many people have been without power, telephone and cell phone service since Monday when the storm landed in New Jersey near Atlantic City.  Although we have been powerless, we consider ourselves lucky.  Everyone in our family is fine.  We were especially worried about my sister and brother-in-law who live on their catamaran.  They have been moored in Annapolis which was right in the predicted path of the storm.  Fortunately, they are fine, their boat is fine, and all of their cruising friends are okay.   Our friends and neighbors are okay, too;  our house was not touched; and the only tree that came down was a pine in the back of our yard.  It flattened our swing set, but our daughter is 25, so she doesn't use it any more!

I had worked on October's Free Motion Challenge sporadically throughout the month, but I had put off posting pictures until this week.  But oops! No internet! No cell phone!  Our public library opened on Thursday and provided Wifi and power strips, but there were too many people on the network and I was unable to upload my photos.
Fortunately, our friend Marge got power back this morning (Friday) and called to invite us to spend some time at her house getting warm and charging our devices.  So here, finally, are my samples from October's Challenge.  Our teacher was Teri Lucas; our challenge was to quilt our names and use echo quilting and other motifs to fill a square. 

 I really liked this lesson.  Teri suggested we change threads for each different quilting motif.  I did that for one sample (upper right) and then decided to stick with my favorite quilting thread, Superior's King Tut.  Thank you, Teri! And thank you, SewCalGal for providing your readers with this wonderful challenge!

July's Free Motion Quilting Challenge

 This month our teacher for the Free Motion Quilting Challenge is Angela Walters, a young modern quilter whose lesson was a design she calls "Tiles" in which you divide the quilting space into smaller units and quilt each one before moving on to the next.
I had fun practicing this style until my machine began to act a little like it is in need of some TLC.  So although I wanted to do more practicing before coming up with a "final" piece, my machine is packed up and ready to visit the sewing machine spa for a little R&R.
So here are my samples for July.  I started by using the back of a plaid fabric that I thought would help me keep my lines straight.  Not so much.
And instead of using the same pattern in every "tile" as Angela did, I mixed it up and tried different ones, including some of the motifs taught by previous teachers in this challenge.

 I did quilt in the month and a heart in hand.  Okay, for a first attempt, not too bad. For this sample I used regular 60 weight thread in the needle and bobbin.

 Then I switched to Superior Rainbows thread in the needle with The Bottom Line in the bobbin.  I like this look much better.  I used a 90/14 quilting needle and did not have any problems, although I did have to decrease the top tension.  I didn't follow Angela's tile directions, just divided the space with random lines.

 For the last two samples, I did attempt Angela's swirl motif, using the Rainbows thread again. 

The Final Four

 I think that if my machine hadn't gotten tired, I would have done a few more samples and improved on my spacing and the straightness of the tile lines (or maybe not.)
This lesson was fun to do and helped me to learn a little about dividing the quilting space into manageable sized areas.
Thanks, Angela, for sharing your expertise and ideas.

June: Celebrations and (of course) THE CHALLENGE!

The month of June is a busy one for our family. Emily's birthday is on the 16th, Dave's is on the 20th, Father's Day always falls around then, and Dave's and my wedding anniversary is on the 22nd.  Whew!  We buy a lot of cards and eat out much more often than usual.  All of these dates remind us of how quickly our lives spin past and how important it is to appreciate each and every day. 
 This year was one of those significant birthdays for Dave.  Here's one of my favorite pictures of him, taken when he taught at the Edinburgh Academy.  Except for gray hair and beard, he still looks the same (minus the kilt!)

Thirty-eight years ago, this was the scene......

 And twenty-five years ago, our sweet girl arrived.....

 

 Here she is being greeted by her grandmother, her Aunt Marce, and her cousin Drew.

 

Despite all this celebrating, I did manage to complete my Free Motion Challenge for June. The teacher for this month was Cindy Needham who does exquisite machine quilting on whole cloth quilts.  Her tutorial included several parts in which she explained her choices of tools, her method of beginning and ending and burying threads, and her method of dividing the quilting space and quilting differently in each section, much like the Zentagle doodle method.

For some of my practice pieces I used quilt sandwiches I had used to try some decorative threads for bobbin quilting.  Since those threads were white, I used YLI Rainbows thread so I could see the difference between the two.

After several practice sessions, my final attempt is here.   I have a Bernina  and I have done some of the challenges using the BSR, but I did all of this month's quilting without it, and I am happy with the result.  My stitches are more even than I had expected them to be, and I think Cindy's suggestion about letting the rhythm of your machine help you to keep your foot and hands in sync really worked for me.  This is one lesson I think I shall be trying again and again.

 

 

I quilted the name of the month and a heart in hand, too, and I think I will do this on all the challenges for the rest of the year.

 

 I hope that those of you who are celebrating this month and quilting this month have as much fun as I did!

May's Free Motion Challenge

Sew Cal Gal's Free Motion Challenge continues, this month with a pair of video lessons from Leah Day.  I have followed Leah's blog and her personal challenge of creating 365 filler designs for free motion quilting.  She is very talented and I was really looking forward to her lesson.  She did not disappoint.  She showed two "foundational" designs, designs which start with a foundation line that becomes the basis of your quilting. 
I got myself organized this month by making lots of 9" blocks of muslin and batting so that I would be ready to practice whenever I had a little time.  That strategy worked well for me and I'm going to do the same thing for the rest of the challenge. 


Here are a few of the practice blocks.

So here is the big reveal.  First up, the stipple-like curvy quilting:

 

 And the second pattern with angular sewing around the foundation line: (Leah calls this railroad ties)

I liked this exercise because it focused on filling the allotted space evenly.  I was not entirely successful, but I learned a lot from practicing.  I used Superior Threads Rainbow in the top and Superior's Bottom Line in the bobbin.

This was not the only quilty sewing that was done this month.  I made a small patchwork teddy bear and a matching quilt for a friend's baby shower.  (And forgot to take a picture!)  And I am finishing a little quilt for my guild's challenge.  That one is a secret until our June luncheon, so I'll post about that later.

March FMQ: Doodling with Ann Fahl

Ann Fahl is the featured teacher for  this month's Free Motion Quilting Challenge organized by Sew Cal Gal.  I really enjoyed the "assignment!"  Ms. Fahl contributed a very comprehensive lesson with lots of information and advice about threads, needles, blocking and basting.  When I was at the AQS show in Lancaster I treated myself to some colorful threads at the Superior and Aurifil booths, and this month I had fun trying some of them out. 
So here's my final product for March.  I tried some of Ms. Fahl's suggested designs and added some doodles of my own.  The threads I used for this sample were Superior's Rainbows and The Bottom Line in the bobbin.  I was a little skeptical when I saw how fine these threads are, but I am really happy with the results!  I started in the upper right doing loops, moved down the right side adding stars and hearts.  Then in the lower right I tried some spirals and morphed them into daisies on the left, a few flower doodles, two heart-in-hands that look like clown hands, and finally loops again at the top left.

I took this photo with my iPhone using a camera app that I read about in the NY Times on Thursday.  It's called Camera Awesome and it has lots of cool features that help you take better pictures and edit them on the spot!  You can read about it here.
In my next post, I'll tell you about my guild's recent retreat and show you my secret to staying organized when piecing quilt blocks.

February Free Motion Quilting

With only two hours to go in the month, I have to post less than stellar attempts at Diane Gaudynski's echoed plumes.  February has whizzed by, even though there is an extra day this year.  So here are my feeble plumes.  I made a promise to myself that I'll do a lot more practicing on the March lesson. (And of course, there are two more days in March, so that will help.)

 

But that's not the only sewing I did in February.  I made this whirligig quilt for a friend's new grandson, using the tutorial from Turtle Hill Quilter.  I had to take the photos in less than optimum conditions, so you'll have to excuse the shadows.  The fabrics are all children's and novelty fabrics, so the wee one can play a little I Spy.

Here's the front:

and the back:

 

 

And finally, I made this quilt top to for my daughter.  I used a charm pack of Kaffe Fassett fabrics for the background and some hand-dyed fabrics for the hearts and hands.  I traced my husband's and my hands and we each drew our own hearts;  I appliqued them by machine using decorative stitches on my Bernina.  The feature that allows you to make one stitch at a time came in handy on all those tight corners and curves.  I'm planning to hand quilt this and have it ready when DD finishes redecorating her room.  

 

We did a little shopping recently at the mall, and stopped for lunch where I snapped DD and her dad.