Thank YOU!

Wow! What a week it has been. This past weekend, the event that Kathleen, myself and a couple other ladies, and the ladies from Seasons of Home, spent the last year preparing for has come and gone. Small Town Quilt Show-In a Big Town Way. 

Thank you so much to everyone that come and visited the show, took a class, taught and most of all, thank you all for your sweet comments. With very few glitches we felt like it was a success! Thank you all!

Now, back to quilting and spending time with my kiddos! :)

Swoon for Genny!

Genny pieced this adorable version of the popular Swoon quilt, I love her version, it's so cheery!

When Genny brought me her quilt she told me I could machine quilt it however I wanted, she just wanted custom machine quilting. I remembered seeing one that Angela Walters had machine quilted and I loved the way she quilted the background, so I took inspiration from Angela and added in a little bit of my own ideas and this is the final result! I love it!

Of course, here is the photo eye-candy, how could I not take a bunch of pictures of this quilt!

As I was finishing up the machine quilting yesterday the light was shining just perfectly through the studio window, how could I not get a photo of the cool texture in this quilt!

And...the backing, sometimes solid quilt backs are my favorite! I love when they become almost as awesome as the quilt top!

Sundance - A Bernina Sampler Quilt

This fabulous quilt was made by my friends, over at Quiltique. This pattern is called Sundance and it was designed by Amanda Murphy exclusively for Bernina dealers. I think it's a pretty fantastic quilt and I'm flattered that I was able to custom machine quilt this version for Quitique.

The ladies at Quiltique liked the way the original version of this quilt was quilted so they asked me to machine quilt it like that one, but add my own twist! Just what I like! :)

The original version of this quilt had small dresdens quilted in the negative space, I quilted this fun little feather flower instead. I think it added a fun little element of interest.

And the eye-candy. Love lots of pictures of quilts. :)

Visit Quiltique for information about kits for this quilt.

Raw Edge Applique Quilt

This fabulous raw-edge applique quilt was made by Cheryl! It's such a fun and cheery quilt and I had so much fun custom machine quilting this quilt for her.

Cheryl told me I could quilt this quilt however I wanted, she loves feathers but left it up to me.

So, I quilted it as I felt like, and had so much fun. There are different background fillers in each of the blocks, including pebbles, swirls, feathers, clams and some of them have a few of these designs combined. 

Most of the machine quilting designs that I used on this quilt are taught in my book; Beginner's Guide to Free-Motion Quilting.

An now the eye-candy!

Thanks for letting me custom machine quilt your adorable quilt Cheryl!

Breaking the "Rules"

This fabulous quilt was made by Melissa. Melissa told me that she made this quilt about 15 years ago and it's just been hanging out as a UFO, I'm super honored that after all that time she chose to bring her quilt to me for the machine quilting. Melissa told me that I could machine quilt this quilt however I wanted, just have fun with it. I'm sure that traditionally this quilt was supposed to have some echo quilting around all of the applique and then probably cross-hatching in the body of the quilt. Well, I decided to break all of the traditional rules with this one!

I had a lot of fun machine quilting this quilt. I machine quilted swirls and clams in the borders. I love the way those two designs play together. Both of those designs are taught in my book, Beginner's Guide to Free-Motion Quilting. I machine quilted a feather flower and another block design in the body, I love how this quilt turned out!

Thanks so much Melissa for letting me machine quilt this fun quilt!

Star Quilt

I spent the first few days this week machine quilting this fabulous quilt that Melissa made. Her work on this quilt is superb!

Melissa is one of those dream customers, for me. She told me to do whatever I wanted, just no stippling. I'm sure you all know that I'm not the biggest fan of stippling either, so it's a great fit!

I custom machine quilted clams in the background, swirls in the outer border and feathers in all of the cool stars! I think it turned out pretty cool!

Every machine quilting pattern that I used in this quilt is taught in my book, Beginner's Guide to Free-Motion Quilting.

Hope you all are having a great week!

Year of Machine Quilting - July/August 2014

The newest issue of Quiltmaker Magazine is now available on newstands. I'm again excited about this issue because I have another article in there about machine quilting! YAY!

In this issue I'm chatting all about block designs, and batting. Be sure to pick up your copy and check it out. 

This series of articles are a great companion to my book, Beginner's Guide to Free-Motion Quilting, I've got signed copies of that available for purchase on our website.

E.K.G. - A Modern One-Block Quilt

E.K.G. is the next quilt in our newest book, Modern One-Block Quilts. This fun quilt was totally inspired by Kathleen's day job, she works full-time in a medical office. So naturally something in this book had to be inspired by that. :)

I love that E.K.G. is a play on the Chevron trend, but taking it to a whole new place.

I have so many thoughts and ideas going through my head with this quilt, and there are so many new fabrics out that I want to make this quilt in. If I had a billion more hours in a day, I'd totally be making this quilt again in one of my favorite new fabrics.

I took a few minutes the other day and sketched this quilt out using Sweetwater's new fabric line called Elementary, I really love the boyish version that the fabrics give this quilt.

After I drew that version I got the crazy idea to use April's new fabric, Best.Day.Ever. and switch it up! I LOVE the look of this one, super duper scrappy, which so isn't me, but I love it!

I've got a little stash of this Best.Day.Ever fabric, I'm thinking I really need to put this idea to use!

You can pick up a signed copy of our new book, Modern One-Block Quilts, on our website.

Medallion Quilt

I spent the first few days of this week custom machine quilting this fantastic medallion quilt made by Rita! Seriously, this is amazing! and it's huge!

Rita wanted custom machine quilting, something different in every border, so that's exactly what I did. It was fun, and exciting to come up with new ideas for each border, and I have to say, I love the final result!

Thanks for letting me machine quilt your awesome quilt Rita!

Wool Applique Quilt

This fun wool-applique quilt belongs to Bonnie. It's an adorable quilt and her hand applique is gorgeous!

 I custom machine quilted this quilt for Bonnie, she asked me to follow the plaid in the borders and then echo quilt around the applique. I love how it turned out! Thanks for letting me machine quilt your quilt Bonnie!

Sampler Quilt

This adorable sampler quilt belongs to Rene! I always have so much fun machine quilting sampler type quilts! I love being able to quilt something different in each block. So much fun!

 Lots of quilt eye-candy for you today!

Thanks for letting me machine quilt this adorable quilt for you Rene!

Eight O'Clock - A Modern One-Block Quilt

Eight O'Clock is a modern twist on a simple oval quilt block. This refreshing design is sophisticated enough to appeal to adults, but we also can imagine it in a smaller size for a toddler to place "racetrack" on with little trucks and cars. It would be the perfect gift for an 8-year old or an 88-year old! Try bold prints or pastels for completely different looks!

 This fun quilt pattern is from our new book, Modern One-Block Quilts and the pattern comes in three sizes, Baby 48"x54", Throw64"x72" or Coverlet 80"x90".

This quilt was made using Mod Basics by Birch Fabrics, and if you haven't tried the fabulous Birch Fabrics yet, Kathleen and I highly recommend you try them! They are awesome!

Pick up a signed copy of Modern One-Block Quilts on our website. :)

Auriful Machine Quilting Tip #6

Practice, practice, practice!

The very best was to improve your machine quilting is to practice.

Make sure to hop over to the Aurifil blog to read more tips and to check out the block of the month.