April FMQ Challenge

This month Mr Quilt, Don Linn, was the April expert on SewCalGal's 2012 Freemotion Quilting Challenge.  He demonstrated an interesting method for transferring your quilting design. After being somewhat stumped by my lack of an embroidery hoop, and scratching my head around what I would do as an alternative, Sue made a very timely post - thank you Sue!  I found a design I liked in my Karen McTavish Custom Curves book, enlarged, and mirrored it and using one of my embroidery machine hoops - Sue's excellent idea, I transferred it to netting, then to my runner, and got it quilted today.

traced onto the netting, ready to transfer

transferred, ready to quilt

quilted

While I don't often transfer a design to my quilt tops, I do like how this one came out, and will be using this method again - at least 3 more times on this runner, for sure!

Free Motion Feathers for February

I have had such a good time with this month's tutorial!  I love quilting feathers, so was very happy to learn a new technique - I love the echo back down along the feather the Diane Gaudynski does, and will definitely be keeping it as part of my feather repertoire!
Here's my take on Diane's feathers

a close up of this baby quilt I used them on

You can see a few more pictures on my blog - here or here.

Can't wait to see what comes next!

Days 13 & 14 - Janet

unfortunately, life has intervened, and I was unable to get any quilting time in my last two days of the challenge :(
Still, I am very pleased with what I was able to accomplish and will continue to try and get some time in on most days.  It has definitely helped me understand the type of quilting that I prefer to do - freeform, texture rather than strictly following a plan, so this is a good thing!
I have seen so much wonderful quilting so far, and anticipate seeing a lot more in the coming week!

Day 12 Janet

I was going through my reader this morning and I came across this tutorial at Addicted to Quilts.  I love Desley's quilting and I just love the look of this!  I decided that this was going to be my project for today.  I seldom mark my quilts, preferring to be a bit of a free spirit with my quilting, and so things end up quite organic feeling.  I'll mark a spine for feathers, just to have a starting point, but often go off track, so this was good practice for me.  Because I do free form as opposed to more traditional feathers, mine are not so plump and luscious looking as Desley's, and I just might have to go try some more traditional ones!  All in all, I can see me using this one after a bit more practice!

Desley linked to this tutorial at Jenny's Doodling Needle which is also very inspiring, but way easier on a long arm machine.  Still, I love me a challenge, and just might have to see what I can come up with!

p.s. the finished version of my second Sunny Days quilt can be seen here

Day 10 & 11 - Janet

just a quick one tonight!
Day 10 doodling

Day 11 some fills for Sunny Days 2

 My version of clam shells

Some Pebbling and Waves and Shells

Days 8 & 9 - Janet

Day 8 - Yesterday was busy so I didn't get a chance to post, but I did get some stitching in.  I had so much fun last weekend with my Sunny Days quilt, I decided to play again!  Same idea, only this time with some raw edge applique.  I got the sun fused to the background, and a layer of batting FMQ/trapunto'd to it, and then got it sandwiched and ready to go.



Sun FMQ appliqued with layer of batting
(sorry about the colour it was late and dark!)

Day 9 - Then today I had some real FMQ fun.  I wanted to do different things then the thread work one, so started with the sky where I echoed the sunrays, and did a little curved cross hatching in the process.  My object with this was to try and keep my stitches neat and a relatively equal distance apart.



I used a 50/3 varigated King Tut thread by superior up top and Gutterman 50/2 in the bobbin  80/112 topstitch needle

Then, because I really like the Gold holoshimmer sliver I used on the sun last time, and the McTavishing I did in the sky, I combined these two in one of the sun swirls.  I like it!

Now I have to decide what I'm going to do in the rest of the sun - I am going to leave that one swirl unquilted so that you get the pouffy effect on it, but I'll need to do some more on this tomorrow.

Happy quilting!
Janet

Day 7 Janet

Did another row on the row robin, and then decided to practice some sashings possibilities, as I will probably start on those tomorrow

A variety of curl designs 

 All variations on a single curl

I think I've narrowed it down to between the very basic curl or a curl and single plume

Day 6 - Janet

Well tonight the quilting feels much better!  Smoother, less jerky and much more comfortable.  Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of time, so only managed to fit in a couple more blocks with the continuous curves.  I hope tomorrow feels good and I can get some more accomplished!

Happy quilting!

Day 5 Janet

Not very inspired tonight, and just couldn't get into a smooth rythym so after adding a bit more gold sliver to my Sunny Days, just played on sample sandwich. 

Day 4 - Janet

Nothing to fancy today!  I've decided I will quilt my Row Robin with variations on continuous curves.  This will work in most of the rows, but there is one that I'll have to do something different in.  I'll figure that out later.
Here's today's progress - stars in 2 rows done, still need to do a filler in the backround and the sashing.

Janet - Day 3

no sunshine today, back to the rain, and I just wasn't getting overly inspired today! 
I did finish off the last bit of McTavishing on my little Sunny Days quilt from yesterday

And then did a little more FM stitch in the ditch on the row robin quilt, but I still don't know what to practice on it, so just grapped a sandwich to play on.  One thing I want to do more practice with is stitching straight lines when I'm FMQing, so that was my exercise today

and then I tried some curved crosshatching

But, using the edge of my hopping foot as my guide means that these quilting lines are all really close together, and I fear if I do this on a real quilt, I'll end up with a piece of stiff cardboard!  What are your favourite battings to keep a quilt supple, even when there is a lot of quilting on it?

(all quilting today done with Gutterman cotton thread 50W, top and bobbin, 80/12 topstitch needle (this is my fave needle to use just about always), Acrtic Cotton batting and muslin.  The Sunny Days quilt has a mixture of Gutterman cotton 50W, Sulky rayon and Holoshimmer thread on top with Gutterman cotton 50W in the bobbin, all on a polished cotton sheeting which demanded that I use a Microtex needle.  A poly blend batting was used.  All quilting done on my HV Lily 555, feed dogs down.)

Janet's Day 2

Well my day did not turn out quite the same way as I had imagined it would!  I had fully expected to continue to work on my row robin quilt that I started yesterday.  Boring, but needs to be done.  But the sun shone today!  It was beautiful out - actually even warm!  So I had to enjoy the weather for awhile.
Once I came back inside, the sun was still so nice, I decided to do something just for it!  I've had this idea for awhile - ever since I saw this quilt that Emma did.  I thought it was just so neat!  Today was my day to try.  I came up with a sketch (lousy picture)

Pulled out my threads and got started!

Added some metalic holographic sliver for some sparkle!

McTavished the sky

and this is as far as I got today!

Just a little bit left to finish, and then some threads to bury.

Oh I love me a sunny day!
Cheers,
Janet

Day 1

Well I've started! now to keep going for the next 21 14 consecutive days!
This is the machine that I plan on using for this challenge, although I do have a HV Mega Quilter as well that has a deeper throat, I quite enjoy working on my HV Lily 555.



this was before I put my quilting foot on

Today I decided I would do some continuous curves in the squares that appear in several of the rows of my quilt.  Thought being if they are consistent, it will help pull the quilting together throughout.

I also worked on some FMQ in the ditch on one of the rows.

While my fall back quilting design has become feathers, I really want to try to not use feathers in this quilt, although I expect the odd one will make an appearance!

Now to figure out what comes next?
Janet

Practice piece

Well I'm really looking forward to this challenge, and am planning on using one of my tops that has been languishing in my UFO pile.

sorry about the picture, there was some bright sun shining through the kitchen window, and I certainly wasn't telling it to go away!

This top was put together as a Row Robin through one of my guilds a few years ago, and while I love the colours, I've never gotten around to quilting it as there are, shall we say, a few challenges with it lying flat.  This is not an unusaul occurance when many people are involved in piecing a top, and being somewhat ripper phobic, I've never unpicked and tried to fix it up.  But, I think it will make a great piece to practice on, and the finished quilt will be donated to the Japan relief efforts.  I need to piece together a backing, iron this as flat and smooth as possible, and get it sandwiched up for Friday.  My plan is to try something different in each of the rows and to try out different fills for the sashings and border.  Should be fun!

Can't wait to see everyone's work!
Cheers,
Janet/What Comes Next?