Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Cheater quilts for quilting practice

I have so many unfinished quilt tops in my attic!! The truth is that I am always afraid to ruin them when I think about machine quilting them myself. Although I have done several over the past few years, and they came out pretty well, I still always get myself worked up with just the thought of putting that machine to my quilt tops! So, I got some "cheater" panels a while back and decided to try my hand at different quilting styles on them. They are printed panels, and even though they are beautiful, I had no part in making them, so if I ruin them, it was only about $10.00 instead of like 80-100 or more dollars in fabric, batting, etc. On the side border, I simply followed the lines of the flowers. On the outer border(the green one), I did a double loopy design that is free flowing. I just quilted in the ditch on the corner basket design.
Following the lines on each flower was easy and fun.




I outline-quilted the center picture of the girl and chickens and then I stippled all over. That was fun, but you have to keep moving pretty fast, or it gets too clunky and ugly. It looks like a million little puzzle pieces.


I love the panel and will use it as a wall-hanging somewhere in the house soon. Just need to bind it up now. I have at least 8 more panels to practice on. I have done feathers in the past, but really need to work on that. Maybe on the next one. Kenny got me two DVDs of quilting lessons, so will use them this week.