Silent Sunday
Lise Sewing
Open Line Friday – The Essential Quilting Skills
DEVELOPING OUR QUILTING SKILLS
One of the reasons most of us enjoy quilting so much is the never-ending challenge of new skills to learn and new techniques to try. A quilter can never master all the possible quilt techniques, but we can add skills with each quilt we make. As part of our ongoing series, The Quilt Notebook, we are discussing how to steadily improve as a quilter by using a “Skills Inventory”– a list of quilting skills we’ve mastered and a list of techniques we’d like to try.
THE ESSENTIAL SKILLS
While no one can learn all the possible quilt skills, there are a few “Essential Skills” that every quilter must learn. Today, on Open Line Friday, I would like your help creating the Essentials List. The “Essential Ten”-(more or less) should include all the skills necessary to create the most basic quilt, and include techniques that will save time and frustration later (like stitching a 1/4 inch seam accurately). We will use this list in our Quilt Notebooks as a starting point for our Skills Inventory and I hope to create a tutorial for each of the basic skills.
LET’S BEGIN
A few essential skills I would include on the list are:
- Stitch an accurate and consistent 1/4 inch seam.
- Use a rotary cutter properly to accurately cut straight lines.
- Memorize three crock pot meals for all-day quilt-a-thons.
LET’S BRAINSTORM
After we create our “Essentials” list, we will dive into the “The Next Ten” list–but we’ll save that for another day…For today…What do YOU think are the skills that every quilter must learn…I’d love to hear!
Lori
You might also like: The Quilt Notebook – The Skills Inventory
The Quilt Notebook – Setting Priorities
Sketch Book Idea
Do you ever work on a little FMQ practice and find one area or motif that looks great, but the rest isn’t worth saving?
Next time, try this little trick: Cut out the motif you like and stitch it into your sketchbook. Use an old needle, stitch right through your motif and the paper. I find this works much better than glue.
Then add a few more doodles and you have a nice record of your favorite FMQ!
What about YOU? Have you ever tried stitching fabric to paper? I’d love to hear any tips or tricks…
Happy FMQoodling,
Lori
PS… All tutorials, information and images are the property of Lori Kennedy at The Inbox Jaunt and are intended for personal use only. Feel free to re-blog, doodle, Pin, stitch with attribution to The Inbox Jaunt. For any other purpose, please contact me at lckennedy@hotmail.com. Gracias!
See Ya Later Alligator
Adding a little extra free motion in our quilting today!
After while,
Lori
All photos and MOVIES?! Copyright Lori Kennedy 2014. Pin and Re-blog with attribution to The Inbox Jaunt. Thank you!
The Irish Chain–A Lucky Free Motion Quilt Tutorial
Well you’re in for some good luck today! We have a lovely pattern to stitch and whether you are Irish or not, this motif looks great on any quilt. Stitched on green fabric, like this Kona cotton, it looks like a shamrock. Stitched on pink fabric, it will look like a flower.
THE IRISH CHAIN FREE MOTION QUILT TUTORIAL
Begin by drawing two lines 1-1/2 inch apart. These are our “rails” -drawn lines that help us keep our lines straight and will be erased when we are done stitching. Next draw a little “tick mark” every 1-1/2 inch along the bottom rail. This tick mark will help us center each of our shamrock leaves.
Begin stitching 3/4 inch ahead of the first tick mark. Stitch a sweeping upward curve. Stop. Stitch a side ways heart, leaving a small opening and Stop again.
Now stitch a sideways teardrop shape and head out of the small opening. Stop here.
Next, stitch a right-side-up heart, again leaving a small opening.
NOTE-try to avoid stitching over any previous line of stitching as you stitch the upright heart.
Stitch a teardrop within this heart.
Now stitch a sideways heart on the right side of the shamrock. Followed by another teardrop.
Sweep a curving line back to the bottom rail and up at your tick mark to begin the next shamrock.
This chain looks great all by itself…but if you want to do a little more…
Echo quilt the entire chain and add another mirror image row of shamrocks. Gorgeous!
NOTE-The above tutorial was stitched on Kona cotton with Aurifil 50 wt cotton thread in the bobbin and Sulky Rayon in the top with a Schmetz 80 Topstitch needle on my domestic sewing machine–a Bernina 820 without a BSR.
Now the Irish haven’t always been lucky, but once in awhile they found a Pot-of-Gold–or lucky clover…or an Irish chain!
More good luck–another Shamrock tutorial from 2013–The Spiral Shamrock–It’s lucky, too!
I’m off to chase a rainbow,
Leprechaun Lori
PS…All tutorials, photos and information are the property of Lori Kennedy at The Inbox Jaunt and are intended for personal use only. I’d consider myself lucky if you’d re-blog and Pin, but please do it with attribution to The Inbox Jaunt. For all other uses, please contact me at lckennedy@hotmail.com.
The Quilt Notebook: The Skills Inventory
THE QUILT NOTEBOOK: AN ORGANIZER AND MORE
Over the last several weeks of our Quilt Notebook series, we have concentrated on organization. We started a Quilt Notebook HERE to hold all of the information about our quilts. We made a complete list of all our ongoing projects HERE, and then we established priorities HERE. We are currently working on our Big Three quilts HERE and many of you have made great headway already–Congratulations!
GROWING AS A QUILTER
Today, we are going to change directions a bit and look at skill development. Over the next few weeks we are going to establish a system for continual improvement. In order to improve our quilting skills we must first make an honest assessment of where we are today and then decide what techniques are important for us to acquire.
Your assignment for this week: Look back at your last three to five completed quilts and ask yourself these things:
- What new techniques did I use in this quilt? If you are a beginner quilter, the new techniques may include accurate cutting and straight line piecing. If you are more advanced, the skills might include hand dyeing fabric and pattern design.
- Are there any techniques employed in this quilt that still require more practice?
- Does this quilt demonstrate mastery in any aspect of quilting? You might want to grade this on a scale of 1-5.
- Was there a technique that was difficult in the execution of this quilt–needs improvement?
- Was there some aspect of quilting I avoided in this quilt because I wasn’t sure how it was done? For example, did you use corner blocks because you don’t know how to miter a corner?
When you are doing this exercise, consider every step of the process, from pattern and fabric selection to binding and labeling.
THE QUILT NOTEBOOK
In your quilt notebook, create two lists: Mastered Skills and Techniques to Try.
On the Mastered Skills page, make a list of all the skills that you have acquired (A grade of 4 out of 5 or better). Include skills with which you are comfortable and look great in your quilt. (It doesn’t have to rise to the level of perfection, just quite good). Include the name of the quilt that demonstrates your mastery, and the date. It will be interesting to watch this list grow over months and years!
On the Techniques to Try page, create a list of skills that you are interested in learning. As you see new techniques, add to your list. Whenever you find a great example or tutorial of any of these skills, make notes on this page. Include websites, articles, books, etc for further reference. (You might consider a “Techniques to Try” board on Pinterest.) I’m going to add one today…
Now go back to your Big Three Works in Progress and write down the techniques and skills required in each of these quilts. If you are an advanced quilter, you don’t need to include the basic skills like accurate piecing- just include the skills that are somewhat challenging for you. The skill may be as simple as improved efficiency at chain piecing.
THE CHALLENGE
In order to constantly improve and develop our skills, we must try new techniques and be methodical in our efforts. The Techniques to Try page in your Quilt Notebook will help you think about and organize your skill development. It will also help you establish goals. To advance those goals:
- Try at least one new technique in every quilt.
- Try to improve your skill at one “old” technique in every quilt-better execution or improved efficiency.
- Choose quilts that challenge you a little.
- Use your quilting “free time” (when you aren’t working on The Big Three) to practice and experiment.
- Use your web-browsing and Pinterest time to research the techniques.
OPEN LINE FRIDAY
On Open Line Friday this week, I would like to have a discussion about The Essential Ten–skills every quilter must master and I would like YOUR input on choosing the most important basic quilt skills…
Tomorrow: It’s time for another Tuesday Tutorial and we’re going to rock a little green leaf..
Till next time…
Lori
NOTE-The Folk Art Quilt featured today is one of my very first quilts, circa 1998. Techniques used: Hand applique, Machine piecing, Hand quilting…
PS…All information, tutorials and images are property of Lori Kennedy at The Inbox Jaunt and are intended for personal use only. Feel free to re-blog and Pin with attribution to The Inbox Jaunt. For all other uses, please contact me at lckennedy@hotmail.com. Muchas Gracias!
Silent Sunday
