Showing posts with label Lori Kennedy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lori Kennedy. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 07, 2026

Back to FMQ and I Quilted This!

Allô and welcome 😊 My studio is a disaster after going away, but that hasn't stopped me from getting things done! I spent a few hours last evening adding more free motion quilting (FMQ) on the Square Dance baby quilt. It's getting there! Since my last baby quilt was given to the recipient just before his third birthday, I'm not too worried - but it would be nice to get it done sooner rather than later. I didn't make it for my September One Monthly Goal (OMG) but I'll be done in a week or two...and then on to the next one 😁 

FMQ Square Dance Blocks


So far I've shared three FMQ blocks. Here are more - the ones I quilted last night are shown first while the others were quilted a while back.

The centre square features dinosaurs. I tried drawing dinosaurs based on the images in the fabric but with no luck. Then I found a pieced stegosaurus on the internet. Adapting the image from a pieced quilt was much easier. There's a close-up below.

Dinosaur block with dot-to-dot quilting
and a dinosaur

Close up of the FMQ stegosaurus

The centre fabric on this block is adventuring in the jungle. I FMQ a fern à la Angela Walters and then added vines with leaves.

Adventure block filled with ferns and leaves

The fun red fabric has all kinds of fun motifs. I FMQ rainbows at the top of the block and then a car, sun, cloud and house. There are mostly Lorry Kennedy's quilting designs. I now have the rest of the block to finish. 

Rainbows, car, sun, cloud and house

There blocks were quilted after the last post on this quilt.

FMQ stars in the Star Wars block

FMQ flowers, a butterfly and squiggly lines


What I learned
  • Drawing a realistic dinosaur is beyond my abilities at this time but I was so happy to find a pieced stegosaurus. Since it was simplified to be pieced, it was simple enough for me to draw it. I'll have to remember that as a source of images to FMQ.
  • The hardest part about FMQ this quilt is coming up with the motifs. When possible, I like making it relevant to the centre block, although geometric designs can also be effective.
  • I'm going to publish this post early so that I can link up to the October OMG. This quilt needs to be finished soon since I can't wait to start designing the next baby quilt. I haven't let myself start until I finish this one!
Related links
Linking parties
I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties, including the October OMG. You may want to check some out after you've linked up below! Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2026,


I Quilted This!


Welcome to the I Quilted This! linking party that celebrates quilting on a domestic machine or custom quilting on a long-arm. Feel free to link up and share any recent project, even if you're not quilting it! 

Here are the posts that included FMQ, ruler work and walking foot quilting last week. Thanks for linking up 😊 and consider grabbing the button. 

Terry at Ongoing Projects is still FMQ her butterfly collage quilt. You'll want to check out her post for more details!

Terry FMQ her butterfly collage quilt

Vicki from Vicki's Crafts and Quilting is now working on her fall quilts. 

Vicki's Cinderella wall hanging (I just got the joke!)

Vicki finished this UFO fall table topper

Gail of Quilting Gail used to dislike appliqué - a lot! However, as she made some fun projects, she's now grown to like it! Here is one of her quilts. Check out her post for more!

Gail having fun with appliqué after making this tree skirt

It's now your turn 😍

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter
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Thursday, September 10, 2026

Playing and I Quilted This!

Bonjour and welcome 😃 I spent most of the day outside playing with hexies - that was nice 😍 I'm writing this ahead of time since I'll be in Toronto for my semi-annual eye exam. I used to be able to stitch in the car but not anymore. That means that not much will get done quilting wise, so I may as well prepare this post before I go. 

Playing with FMQ Designs


As you saw last week, I finally started quilting Square Dance, a baby quilt. Since then I've been FMQ one block per day. I'm so excited - it's pure play. Of course I said that I would keep it simple but you know me...a chance to practice and play with FMQ. I just can't help it. 😁

Since the first block I FMQ just had straight lines, I wanted to add some curves into the next one.

Straight lines with "C" curves

The next one, on the turquoise background was FMQ with Lori Kennedy's Swirling Stars. I drew the design on the fabric with a white chalk pen.

Swirling Stars

The maroon block has a pickle ball fabric in the middle, so I practiced drawing on paper and then on the fabric, pickle ball pallets and balls. The rest was FMQ with squiggly lines.

FMQ pickle ball pallets and squiggly lines

Summer Hexies Sew Along

As well as playing with FMQ, I also spent time doing EPP (English Paper Piecing), the wreath for the Summer Hexies Sew Along. 

This is what I have done so far.

Hexie Wreath so far

Another double flower

I now have 10 single hexie flowers and 4 double hexie flowers. Now I need to make one double hexie flower and 8 single hexie flowers and the leaves. It's coming along nicely 😊


Focus & Flow Course

I'm taking the Focus and Flow course offered by Fibre Arts Take Two. The course is taught by Karen Olson. It's a mindful eco-art program. Our first project was a teabag paper journal. I used inks for a few of the pages and then used a branch from my yard to put into the spine. The book is tied with sari yarn.


Teabag paper journal

It was a windy day - the pages wanted to dance

If you're wondering. teabag paper is a translucent paper that feels a lot like tissue paper. It's very durable and takes paint quite well. Apparently if you want to work with Japanese papers, this is an inexpensive way to get used to them.

What I learned
  • I made the teabag paper journal a while back and have finally returned to the course. I've missed making books so it's great to be back into it. This is definitely from an arts perspective.
  • Playing with hexies outside for most of the day was very relaxing. I'm motivated to finish the wreath since it's more than half done.
  • Choosing fabric that plays well with the initial fabrics I bought has been fun. A little variety is a very good thing!
  • FMQ the Square Dance quilt has been fun, from figuring out the designs to practicing them and then drawing them on the fabric. As I've said before, it's a good thing that I'm pretty good at following lines 😀 
Related links
Linking parties


I Quilted This!


Welcome to the I Quilted This! linking party that celebrates quilting on a domestic machine or custom quilting on a long-arm. Feel free to link up and share any recent project, even if you're not quilting it! 

Here are the posts that included FMQ, ruler work and walking foot quilting last week. Thanks for linking up 😊 and consider grabbing the button. 

Kat of Scrapbox Quilts made another lovely Lil Bear Hug quilt. This one is yellow and purple - the August and September colours.

Kat's yellow and purple Lil Bear Hug quilt

Terry from On Going Projects has been quilting her Butterfly collage project. Here's a peak.

Terry is FMQ her Butterfly collage project.

Diann at Little Penguin Quilts has finished her lovely Patchwork Hearts quilt. She quilted-as-you-go. If you're curious, read about the process on her post!

Diann's Patchwork Hearts quilt

Preeti at Sew Preeti Quilts quilted a lovely quilt that she called Jeni's Colorado. You'll want to read all about it.

Preeti's latest quilt, Jeni's Colorado

Vicki from Vicki's Crafts and Quilting has been busy. You'll want to check out her post. Here are a couple of fall quilts that she finished.

Vicki's fall wall hanging - check it out!

Vicki's sunflower table runner

Gail of Quilting Gail made the cutest baby quilt. You'll want to read the story behind it. She quilted it with the Rocket Ruler by Silly Moon.

There's a dog on my quilt by Gail

Details of the ruler quilting by Gail

It's now your turn 😍


You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter
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Thursday, May 18, 2023

FMQ Wild Hexies is done!

Hi! Welcome to week 431 of Free Motion Mavericks. I hope that you are doing well! I had a burst of creative energy after my Out of the Box Fibre Artists meeting this week and finished free motion quilting (FMQ) Wild Hexies. Yeah!

Adding Flowers and a Border


The first thing I did when I started to work on Wild Hexies again was to see if I had to re-do the cute cars and trucks, since that's where I was having so much trouble with my stitches. It turned out that it wasn't that bad, so I just stitched over the skipped or loose stitched and all is well. 😊

Since the fabric is so busy, there aren't many photos of the FMQ. 

Adding flowers among the animals

This is my favourite - I was able to add a small flower under the nose of the elephant so that he's watering it! 

Baby elephant watering the flower

Finally, here is the border. I used Lori Kennedy's Leaves and Circles. It needed to be something easy and forgiving. I think that I chose well.

Lori Kennedy's design of Leaves and Circles

Of course it was only after I finished that I realised that I could have used a matching colour thread. Oh well, on the whole, it looks fine 😊.

Wild Hexies - sideways!

Wild Hexies - all quilted!

Since this is my May One Monthly Goal, I'll be squaring it up, binding it and making a special label within the next week. I'm looking forward to giving it, and meeting the new owner! 

What I learned
  • I'm glad that I didn't have to undo any of my stitching - although I had psyched myself up for it. It is a baby quilt, it will be greatly used and there are only a few areas where there is extra stitching. It really doesn't show!
  • I was so used to stitching the whole quilt with the same thread that it never crossed my mind to change threads for the border. At least some of the FMQ is visible!

Related links

Linking parties
I'll be linking up this post to many fun linking parties. Why not check them out after you link up below? Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Midweek Makers, Put your foot down, 

Free Motion Mavericks


We have some budding free motion quilters joining us. I'm so thrilled! 

Donna Lee FMQ her latest appliqué project with wavy lines - it really looks great!

Donna Lee's latest appliqué project

Gail of Quilting Gail had her lovely Baby Stars quilt in the Prairie Spirit Alpacas booth at the Central Alberta Quilt Show in Red Deer. I hope that this gorgeous quilt with the FMQ swirls resulted in lots of pattern sales! 

Baby Stars quilt by Quilting Gail

Frédérique finished her Village de Provence quilt for a house themed quilt-along! To learn more about how Frédérique made and quilted Village de Provence, as well as interesting facts about the region, link up to her post!

Frédérique of Quilting Patchwork Appliqué's lovely Village de Provence

It's now your turn!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter
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Thursday, February 16, 2023

FMQ Wild Hexies and Making Flying Geese

Hi, welcome to week 420 of Free Motion Mavericks. I have a free motion quilting (FMQ) project to share as well as the flying geese for Round 4 of the SAHRR. I'm glad that you can join me today.

FMQ Wild Hexies, a Mystery UFO


I called this a mystery UFO in my July 2021 post because when I wrote the post, I had a partially made quilt on my design wall with extra fabric in a project box, but no pattern! Since I had been inspired to make the quilt by seeing a finished version on someone's blog, I asked if any of my readers could help me. Wendy of Pieceful Wendy found the post for me - Nancy of Grace and Peace Quilting had made the quilt. I couldn't find the pattern because it was in one of my digital quilting books! Thank you Wendy and Nancy 😊

Mystery UFO is finally getting FMQ

The pattern is called Strip Lash from Stripology 2 by GE Quilt Designs. You can read about my making adventures in my previous post (see Related links).

I stitched-in-the-ditch around the hexies and then each row of hexies. Then I started FMQ the top and bottom partial hexies with some of my favourites - elongated loops (I call them cursive l's), twist (j's and l's) and then some triangle dot-to-dot patterns.

FMQ the top and bottom triangles or partial hexies


FMQ elongated loops (cursive l's), twist (j's and l's) 
and triangle dot-to-dot patterns

This is not a great picture but you can see my Swirling Stars in the top row. The next row of hexies contain a sun, clouds, and snowflakes.

FMQ the partial hexies and the first 2 rows

You can see glimpses of the sun, clouds and snowflakes in the image below.

Glimpses of the sun, clouds and
snowflakes designs

Next came a row of trees.

FMQ a row of trees

Finally some houses.

A row of houses

If these look familiar it's because I FMQ them in the Places and Communities section of my son's Version 2.0 quilt. The designs are from Lori Kennedy's book, Free Motion Machine Quilting 1-2-3.

Round 4 of SAHRR


This week we got to add flying geese to our quilt. I wasn't sure what method to use, but I was inspired by Denise of The Quiltery - For the love of geese, to make some foundation paper pieced flying geese. I checked out one of her patterns and drafted my own pattern.

Round 4 - a top row of flying geese was added

Here is a close up of the 5 flying geese that I made using my own foundation paper piecing pattern. 

Close-up of flying geese and wonky stars

You may notice that my pattern below is for 6 flying geese. Let's just say that I made every mistake possible, which included cutting my pattern while trimming. I'm very lucky that it happened on the 5th goose! I took it as a sign that 5 was plenty 😊

My foundation paper piecing pattern

Extra flying geese blocks

After I finished the top row and attached it to the quilt, I decided to see how else I could make these blocks. I vaguely remember that they weren't that difficult to make. I found a post in Simply Handmade Everyday by Kristin Esser with a tutorial on making flying geese blocks 5 ways. Her 5 ways didn't include foundation paper piecing! 

I ended up using the Oversized Stitch and Flip method since I'm accuracy challenged! They worked out very well. I now have 5 extra flying geese on the design wall and have fabric to make a few more. I'm going to see what Round 6 brings before I add them to the quilt.



What I learned
  • For my FMQ, I should have spent more time practicing my Swirling Stars design. The fabric is so busy that looks fine.
  • I love Lori Kennedy's pictural designs and am looking forward to making cars, pencils, apples, etc.
  • I actually know who the baby quilt is going to, so I'm going to have to figure out how to quilt a teddy bear!
  • I considered using the No Waste method that makes 4 flying geese blocks at a time, but those blocks all have the same middle piece. I wanted them to be different, so that method was out.
  • For my SAHRR quilt, I ended up re-doing the bottom row. I had added fabric to make it fit, but I ended up not really liking what I had done. I was also surprised that the hourglasses in the bottom row really didn't show up. The fabric with the multi-coloured dots just faded away. I added two bright hourglass blocks and then re-did the corner blocks. I like it much better.
  • I'm not sure if I have enough fabric to make a much larger quilt. I would rather incorporate the extra flying geese blocks into the next row if it makes sense. I guess I'll figure that out on Monday!
Related links

Linking parties
I'll be linking up the SAHRR quilt at Anja Quilts. Let's go see how everyone is doing on their quilt! Put your foot down, Sew & Tell, Midweek Makers, Needle & Thread Thursday, Finished (or Not) Friday, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?, Peacock Party, Patchwork & Quilts, 

Free Motion Mavericks


We've had some lovely FMQ last time! 
Chris from Chrisknitssews made this lovely Carpenter Star baby quilt. She quilted it with gentle curves and lines. What a lucky baby!
Carpenter Star baby quilt by Chris

Melva is carefully quilting a quilt for a client. It needed some work, but she's doing a great job (I peaked to a later post!)

Melva carefully quilting a quilt

Gail made a second fabulous Lone Star quilt in some beautiful Island Batik pre-cuts and dark green. She FMQ it with small arcs in the diamonds and fake feathers on the grey. 

Gail's fabulous Lone Star quilt

Frédérique of Quilting Patchwork Appliqué made a baby quilt for the neonatal care unit. She FMQ the centre diamond densely and then added light curves for a soft and smooth quilt.

A baby quilt for the neonatal care unit by Frédérique

It's now your turn 😊

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter
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