Tag Archives: free motion quilting

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My new 100 Day Project is underway. With 9 days left on Quilting the Countdown, I'm on Day 10 of my new project, 100 Days of Free Motion Quilting.

I'm committed to at least 15 minutes of free motion quilting each day, though I'm certainly averaging a bit more. The first quilt (and 9 of my first 10 days quilting) has been my elephant quilt (from Elizabeth Hartman's Spectacular Savanna pattern).

I began by quilting the trunk and head. Then began on the ears.

I used nested Cs to fill each section on the ear. You can really see the dimension of the quilting in the dramatic lighting of the last photo above.

Today I got started on the filler for the right ear. It takes me about 15 minutes to fill two sections. I think the first ear was about an hour of quilting all told.

 

On Saturday I took a break from the elephant to quilt my Virtual Vacation submission to Project QUILTING.

This quilt had a combination of straight line and curves free motion quilting. I used the seaweed and coral as my inspiration for the free motion quilting on this section of my quilt.

I think I have three more days of quilting the right elephant ear and then I suspect a filler motif in the background will go more quickly. Maybe I'll have that one finished by my next update on Day 20. You can see daily pics on Instagram @sarahgoerquilts.

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I have 18 days left in my Quilting the Countdown 100 Day Project, but I just couldn't resist jumping in with the large community of folks starting a new 100 Day Project Today.

I decided I would commit to 15 minutes of free motion quilting a day for the next 100 days. I currently have (at least) four of my own finished quilt tops, one of which is basted. Plus I'll be making four Project QUILTING submissions and two other quilt along quilt tops in the next two months and they will all need quilting. And also, I'll be helping my daughter quilt her project and my son quilt his. While they will actually be doing the quilting, I'm going to count assisting them with their quilting for my project. My quilts often get hung up at the "just needs quilting" stage (followed by getting stuck at the "just needs binding" step). And I'd love to finish some of these older and larger WIPs. The quilting step just always feels like a long and arduous task. I also have a mental hangup about the task of switching the machine over to free motion quilting. This really doesn't take long. I switch the foot on the machine, rethread the machine and put in matching bobbin thread, install my supreme slider, and put on my machingers gloves. [affiliate links] That is all maybe five minutes. But it always feels like such a blocker. Hopefully if I do this for 100 days I'll get over this mental block moving forward.

Today I got started on the small quilt that I had basted. Using Aurifil 50wt Dove (#2600) I quilted this first section. I had exactly 15 minutes of bobbin thread so that worked out well! Tomorrow morning I'll wind a bobbin and continue.

I'll update weekly here on my blog and daily on Instagram @sarahgoerquilts.

Today, January 31, is Day 1. So we will finish this up on May 10. Be sure to follow the community of folks participating on IG led by @lindsayjeanthomson by following #The100DayProject. This isn't a project just for quilters. There are quite a variety of makers and the project doesn't even have to be creativity-based. You can find all the details about The 100 Day Project on their website.

I'd love to know if you're participating and what you've chosen. If you're just learning about the project you can jump in anytime. :-)

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Thank you to everyone who showed off their star projects last month.

Another first of the month, another Show Me Something quilt challenge and linkup. In August, Show Me Something Free Motion!

Free-motion quilting has so many opportunities: all-over stipple or meander, echoing motifs on fabric or in piecing, detailed micro-quilting, ruler work! Triangular meandering is one of my favorite motifs.

Sometime in August please Show Me Something Free Motion! Choose a quilt project you've already finished or use Show Me Something as a one-month quilt challenge to finish something new. Just make sure to linkup by August 30. See all the details below.

Some of my favorite FMQ resources (affiliate links on books):

Some of my favorite FMQ tools (affiliate links):

Here are the linkup details:

  • The monthly Show Me Something quilt linkup will start on the first of the month and continue until midnight (PST) on the last day of the month.
  • You may linkup a maximum of 3 new or old finished projects that fit the theme.
  • You may linkup a blog post or Instagram post.
  • If you linkup from a blog post, please link back to this post in your post. If you post from Instagram, you can tag me @sarahgoerquilts.
  • Visit others in the community who share their projects... and leave comments. :-)

Copy the HTML text in the box below to include the image below on your blog with a link to this post. Be sure to insert it as HTML and not as text in a visual editor. Let me know if you try and it doesn't work.

Show Me Something Free Motion linkup

 

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