The weather has been different from hour to hour! Rain, grey clouds, sunshine, strong winds. Nothing dramatic, just a typical Dutch February. I have been able to do some cleaning up in the garden, that felt so good! I even managed to sow some Sweet Pea seeds.
This week’s free motion design is harder than it looks! Grab some paper and try it out.
The edge to edge design Splash creates Paint splashes or splatters by adding blobs in different sizes. When each set of blobs is completed, you travel to a new spot to add a new sequence ...
read moreBehind the scenes I have been working on something epic! I have created an online free motion quilting course about the designs Ribbon Candy and Wishbone. The course is called Basic to Epic because it explains the classic sashing designs and then lifts them up to something even more decorative and complex.
Even though these two design may be considered basic, they are anything but. Learning the core structure of these designs will help you identify the cause of your wonky lines. You will learn how to tweak the structures to create any other variation.
Even experienced quilters see their ...
read moreMost of the grid-based designs I have shared with you are stitched out horizontally. I have a vertical one for you today, which makes it more suitable for domestic machine quilters compared to longarm quilters. If you want to use this on a large project on a longarm, you would have to advance the quilt after stitching just a few hearts. That would take up way too much time. So, if you would like to use this design on a longarm, maybe consider turning your project 90 degrees and stitch it out on its side???
The Row of Hearts design ...
read moreWhat is the weather like where you live? We are having a windy week with a few drops of rain forcasted. Spring is slowly bringing forth flowers; the purple crocuses where the first to show up, with the white hellebores being a close second. It is still wise to bring an umbrella when going outside.
The free motion umbrella design is based on a clamshell grid. You can mark out a square grid or a series of semicircles. You could use a quilting ruler for the big semicircles if you want.
Before you go of and watch the YouTube video ...
read moreHow many hearts would you like on your quilt?
Double up on your hearts-quota with this weeks design which would work really well on any Valentine’s Day quilt.
If your border or sashing in your quilt is a bit higher, you have enough space to add an extra heart inside of your Ribbon Candy Hearts. Your design will spread out bit more because the design needs to be wider for the extra hearts to have enough room. The lines might not touch each other anymore. Try to keep an equal distance to your previous line by looking at the ...
read moreThe last email to the students of the Ribbon Candy workshop has just been sent out. The workshop has now closed. The online class was a huge success with more than 500 students participating. We had 4 days of short lessons on the free motion design Ribbon Candy. Lots of people left comments and shared photos of their practice pieces, especially on the lesson with the design variations.
This weeks free motion quilting design Ribbon Candy Hearts was part of the online lesson on variations. If you were in the class, you may recognize the video.
Ribbon Candy Hearts is ...
read moreA landscape and sky for my agenda cover
This design is a bit of a challenge!
The Wishbone variation Hearts Dance adds a bounce after each second teardrop / loop. This creates a row of dancing hearts. This design is more challenging because you have to ‘count and bounce’ and also because you have to keep the design upright.
This patterns is stitched out pretty narrow in this sample, but in the narrow red sample below, you can see that it looks gorgeous too in a less high border.
The teardrops don’t really have to touch to form a heart, you can space them wider apart.
Play around ...
read moreBefore we delve into the Clamshell Heart design, I wanted to let you know that the doors of the Ribbon Candy Workshop are closing soon. The first lesson will be released on this next Monday 22 January and the last lesson will be on Thursday 25 January 2024.
This course is free to attend, it won’t cost you anything!
Anyone who can free motion quilt is welcome! Even those who want to learn but haven’t started yet can draw along. I will teach you some basics of the Ribbon Candy design, a few variations and 3 ways to ...
read moreWhen does a fascination become a specialization?
Two years ago I started adding to my collection of Ribbon Candy variations. Coming up with new versions of the traditional design quickly became my favorite ‘puzzle’ to do. The fascination expanded to the other sashing classic, the Wishbone design. I have shared a few of the variations on these two traditional designs over the last couple of months.
Last week I shared the Swirl Point design which has gotten a lot of attention on Instagram since then. The sped up video was viewed over 31.000 times, which is magical and unbelievable ...
read moreLet’s add some hearts to our classic quilting designs!
I have selected several classic free motion quilting designs and I each week I will share a variation of that design where hearts are ‘onboarded’. So when Valentine’s day approaches you will have a set of patterns to choose from. Put that quilt together for your special person.
This hot pink Orange Peel Heart sample is stitched out on a 1″ grid that I premarked using a template and ‘iron off’ pounce powder. I love the fact that you can iron the chalk off and that it doesn’t ...
read moreAre you looking for an elegant free motion edge to edge design for your quilt project? Try Feather Flower!
The gorgeous Feather flower design moves in every direction and starts with a shape that you may have tried before: the feather with a pearl. I used this shape a couple of weeks ago in ‘Bubble Wave’.
After the feather with pearl, you stitch two more feathers and add a final leaf shape that can fill any area that needs to be filled. The leaf can go on either side of your stitched ‘branch’.
It looks really well on this red ...
read moreA new tutorial, ohhh what a great way to start off 2024!
The Swirl Point design is a variation on the classic Ribbon Candy design. Let’s look at the basic Ribbon Candy first.
The pattern moves up and down with slightly angled lines that curve at the top and bottom. This creates teardrop shapes.
The design variation Swirl Point uses the space inside of the teardrops and fills it with a pointy curl. An s-curve starts off the design. Then a curl is added. The line then moves towards the centre the fabric strip, there it bounces back down ...
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