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Do you want feathers on your quilt, but they have to be a bit whimsical and modern? I have a great design option for you!

This edge to edge freemotion design lets you indulge in single feather shapes and curve them to the left or to the right. The design can be used on a quilt with a theme like: birds, water, waterfall, splashes, flowers, plants, leaves and the jungle.

Pattern Tutorial

The Feather Fan design is based on a series of single feather shapes placed next to each other, like the feather crest on a cockatoo’s head or ...

How many pies is too many?

The Dutch province I live in is famous for its fruit pies (vlaai), so with every party we bring out an assortment of pies. Apple and apricot are my favorite, and I love a slice of cherry pie too!

This background Pies filler design will help you ‘fill the table’. This design is very versatile. It resembles pies, certain types of breads, sea creatures, beads and maybe even gemstones. I can see it being used in quilts about vehicles and anything with gears or wheels too.

Pattern Tutorial

The Pies design is basically a ...

Last year I shared a Spider Web design based on marked circles which was a lot of fun to quilt in a larger block. But did you know you can add a spider web in a border too?

Take a look at this new Halloween Web border design!

I quilted this FMQ design in a 3.5 inch high border. You can choose any size border you like, just make sure you can still see where you are supposed to line up in the centre of the spider web. On my domestic machine the maximum border height is about 4 ...

Are you going to be spending more time on our sewing machines now that the weather is getting colder? I know I am! That means we have some time for a bit more in-depth learning with this week’s pattern. The pattern Twist will probably be familiar as it has been around for a while. It is basically an orange peel variation, but instead of an arch shape we are using a shape that resembles a gentle wave or a hill / slope.

The asymmetry in that shape adds so much movement in your quilt! I know that the design is ...

Fall weather has made its entrance and I have already grabbed my enormous fleece hoody to cocoon in in the evenings. I have started work on a Halloween quilt project which I will share in a separate blog post later this month and have taken the cinnamon tea out of the storage cupboard. Here comes sweater weather!

The Comtesse edge to edge design is airy and soft, like leaves falling off the trees in a gentle Autumn breeze. The word comtesse is French for countess, a female of a certain rank in nobility. The Comtesse design reminds me of gentle ...

Tumbleweed is a bully! This invasive species is classified as a noxious weed because of its detrimental effects to nature. Each plant has thousands of seeds that get spread due to the wind pushing the plant to tumble.

A tumbling spiky ball of sticks, now that is an inspiration for any free motion quilter, right?! read more

The Stipple design is a free motion staple! Such a versatile pattern: great as a chunky allover design, and gorgeous as a background filler.

For many of us this design is one of the first we have ever tried to learn, which has actually puzzled me over the years. Why would a beginner quilter be guided to a pattern that has no safe place to stop and start so they can think where to go next?

Stippling requires multiple skills; going in all directions and flipping the design (the inside shape can become the outside of the next shape), keeping ...

Before we delve into this week’s design, I would like to welcome the new subscribers! Some of you have joined through the Free Motion Quilting Summit that was held last week and some other quilters have found this blog through the links in YouTube. Could you please leave a comment and share, I would love to know how you have found this blog. Thank you!

It is time for an angular edge to edge design! The Mountain edge to edge is a random and dynamic design that would work well in any scale. You can use it as a ...

This design is named after a person I know who travels the world to discover its beauty and who creates meaningful connections where she goes. It flows from spot to spot with curved lines and adds sets of three loopy triangles.

This edge to edge pattern would work well on a coat or bag and table runners too. Think about projects with a theme like travelling, propellors / airplanes, connections, friendships and nature. Maybe this design looks more like a flower to you.

Pattern tutorial

This design is most dynamic when using curved lines to move around instead of straight lines ...

Get out your bright threads, especially the neon colors. I suspect you don’t use those very often. Here is your chance! This grid design Diamante is a fabulous one tot stitch out with a thread that really shows up on your fabric. Its whole purpose is to create a dazzling design.

Pattern Tutorial

The pattern is based on a diamond or triangular grid . You can use square grid instead. In general, they give the same result. The diamond grid is visually easier because you can’t get confused by the lines on your fabric.

The design is stitched out ...

To all the free motion lovers out there, have you already signed up for the Free Motion Quilting Summit that starts in 9 days? I am one of the 16 teachers who have created videos for this three days event. You can sign up for FREE, HERE. If you would like longer access to the videos and also get all the goodies, like my extra mini course, you can sign up for the All Access Pass. The Summit totally focusses on free motion which makes it unique in the quilting world. Don’t miss out!

On this blistering hot day ...

I see fireworks! The kind that are positioned on a pole and twirl around, throwing off sparks in all directions. You know the kind?

This pointy and dynamic edge to edge design would quickly fill your quilt. This is a beginner-friendly pattern because there are so many places where you can stop and think where you want to go next.  I wouldn’t recommend this for an absolute beginner. Creating even curls and echoes can be tricky. But if you have those down, try it out! 

Lines can be quilted closely together as in the sample, but you can quilt ...

Free motion quilting is like doing a puzzle where you have to create your own puzzle pieces to complete the image, don’t you agree? You work yourself into a corner or you end up with a weird empty spot. In many cases, traveling along already stitched lines is a great solution to get to the area you need to be at. But travelling isn’t a skill that comes easily. This week’s design will get you some more ‘training in traveling’. I will also explain my vision on how large your designs can be when using a domestic ...

In June I made two quilts for people who were becoming grandparents. I knew the grandparents but not the baby’s parents that well. It was a bit of a puzzle to come up with a color scheme for the baby quilts. Both sets of parents were so kind to sent me their preferred colors and photos of the baby’s room.

Baby #1’s parents really liked the Dutch baby brand ‘Little Dutch’ which had wall paint as part of their collection. I selected some colors from the range that would fit with the colors in the photo of ...

Are these ducks in a row, safety pins or tulips?

When I first shared this free motion border design in 2020 on Instagram, lots of people responded with what different things they saw in the design. I had originally intended it to look like the head of a duck, but many of you mentioned the shape resembled a safety pin. Some even thought it looked like a tulip.

Is there anybody who recognizes this shape as something different altogether?

This design is a variation on the Wishbone border design. The basic Wishbone is created by a series of loops that ...

Let’s travel to far away lands and visit mysterious gardens, meet exceptional creatures and inhale magical and exotic scents!

This curvy and lush edge to edge design resembles an exotic flower with round and pointy elements. It would look great on a quilt with a theme like nature, the renaissance, far away lands, fairy gardens or fantasy books.

This exotic flower edge to edge design is curvy and lush with round and pointy areas which makes it just that more interesting.

The spacing within the flower is wider than the spacing of the echoes around the flower, making the ...

The clematis plants in my garden are blooming their socks off! Big and bold blooms in lavender and magenta and tender bell-like shapes in yellow which also have fabulous seed heads. The white variety already started flowering in March and those flowers have long gone.

The clematis flowers always remind me of a grid quilting design that I shared in a blogpost from 2017. This quilting design Clem is based on the zentagle drawing tutorial from 2016 by the designer Erika Kehlet. You can find pictures of her fabulous work on her Instagram account and all over Pinterest.

Zentangle designs ...

Are you looking for a soft and wavy design that creates a lot of texture? Try this one out! This Sea Moss design can be quilted densely but also much wider apart. It would fill your quilt pretty quickly.

Sea moss is a type of sea weed that grows in tide pools and inlets. It is harvested and components of the moss are used as a gelling agent in various foods. It is alleged to have many health benefits. (source)

This design is based on wavy lines and gentle s-curves of the tendrils of this plant. The sequence of movements ...

Do you see many butterflies were you live? Many of us make a conscious decision to have an insect-friendly garden, but do we all welcome caterpillars who munch on the plants? Last year I discovered these stunning caterpillars in my front garden on the verbascum plants. These caterpillars are way more colorful than the adults sadly. They turn onto a chunky and hairy brown Mullein moth.

In this free motion Caterpillar edge to edge design, small caterpillars are placed in all directions. The design is based on a short sequence of movements that are echoed to move to a new ...

Did you see the Northern Lights two weeks ago?

I have to report there was nothing to see where I live, because dawn came too early for us. There was just too much light in the sky to be able to see the pretty colors. I live in a pretty densely populated area anyway, so even looking at the regular night’s sky to see the stars is a bit of a challenge. I can see some constellations with very bright stars, but that is about it.

I am making up for missing out on all the celestial events of ...