A Finished Flimsy, FMQ, slow stitching and I Quilted This!

Hello and welcome 😊 Another week has whizzed by. We're back to more seasonal weather and lots of rain. Yesterday the rain drops were so big that my patio umbrella was vibrating 😮 Let's get to the good stuff!

A Finished Baby Quilt Flimsy

The first baby quilt (of three) is now a finished top. It's actually one row less than the pattern but it's a baby quilt and didn't need to be that long. It measures 43" x 47". I just want baby to be wrapped up in it when it's cold and they're going out in the car or to play on the quilt on the floor. 

As I mentioned, this is the first of three baby quilts. Three of JJ's friends had babies this winter. JJ helped me plan the quilt and chose the novelty fabrics based on her friends' hobbies. This one has fabric featuring Star Wars, pickleball, smoothies, and cute animals, including dinosaurs. I have three more blocks that I'll be adding to the back (hockey, trucks and mittens) and JJ will design and prepare the label.

A baby quilt flimsy from the Square Dance pattern

FMQ Two More Houses

I had fun FMQ two more Rainbow Neighbourhood houses. 

Yellow house now FMQ

The brown house at night is also FMQ

My process is to take out some thread and then do all of the FMQ that I can with that colour. I started with white, since I was piecing the baby quilt before this. I did all of the insides of the blocks on the side walls. I then went on to yellow and then brown since I could use the same bobbin thread for both. So far it's worked very well.

I haven't quilted the yards or the actual rooves since they're another colour. The quilt has 8 houses and a park. I've FMQ 3 of the houses, so 5 more left! I'm also looking forward to playing in the park!

Slow Stitching

While watching video tutorials and catching up in the TextileArtist.org's Stitch Club, I've continued stitching my grandmother's placemat. I wanted to stitch something different in the pink sections and happened to watch Mirjam Gielen as she demonstrated how to do an organic honeycomb stitch. It's not a great stitch to quilt with since it's difficult to keep the tension even but after ironing the placemat, it wasn't too bad - at least not worth un-stitching😁

Honeycomb stitch on the placemat - a little wabbly but fine

I'll be using the honeycomb stich for only these two sections

This afternoon it was cool enough to stitch outside. It's my favourite retirement activity. There seems to be new baby grackles and squirrels around. They really don't like each other but they mostly behave 😃 Today I took out my floral watercolour concertina book and stitched away while watching the live nature show.

I started using "W" shapes - they stitch easily

Adding a lot more stitches to the pages

The concertina book - many more hours of stitching left 😍

What I learned

• After finishing the last two rows of the baby quilt, I wasn't in the mood to make another two rows (the squares and then the triangles). I looked at the quilt and decided that it was big enough. It is for a baby, and would be fine for a toddler.
• I do have three more novelty blocks to add, so I'll make a fun pieced backing since the quilt is wider than 42" (of course). 
• I do want to quilt the baby quilt but the Rainbow Neighbourhood quilt is a priority. However, if I can FMQ a couple of houses per week, in a month, I could have most of it finished. I was thinking that this gave me tons of time but July is just two weeks away, 😳 so I'll be focusing on the Rainbow Neighbourhood quilt.
• I'm happy to report that I've only had issues with my white thread when FMQ. I have no idea what that's all about but the tension at the back just wasn't quite right. However with the other coloured thread, everything was fine. I was using a piecing thread, so next time I'll use something a little better for the FMQ.
• The slow stitching on my grandmother's placemat wasn't as great as I hoped but it's still fine. I'll finish the last of the yellow perle cotton and then do something else for the other pink blocks.
• I had a lot of fun stitching on paper on the concertina book. The first page is the easiest, after that it gets a little clumsy but it's all good.
• I want to explore what other very simple stitches I can use on the paper. I have done some French knots. The vases on the collages are card stock, so I'll be able to try something different on those. 

Related links

• Flitting from Project to Project and I Quilted This! June 11, 2026
• Baby Quilt
• Baby Quilt, Upcoming Retreat and I Quilted This! May 21, 2026
• Rainbow Neighbourhood
• A finish, June's OMG and I Quilted This!, June 04, 2026
• Slow Stitching
• Projects in Progress and I Quilted This!, May 27, 2026
• Playing with watercolour and stitch, January 07, 2026

Linking parties

I'll be linking to many fun linking parties that you may want to check out!

Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2026, Patchwork & Quilts, Put your foot down, Beauties Pageant, Slow Sunday Stitching, 

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. 

Gretchen from Gretchen's Little Corner, has finished quilting her two final compassion quilts for the year. Awareness & Butterfly Beauty are both lovely quilts. Gretchen did some straight line quilting in both and added a piano key border and diagonal quilting in the border corners of Butterfly Beauty. You'll want to check them out!

Awareness, made and quilted by Gretchen

Butterfly Beauty, Gretchen's own design

Kat from Scrapbox Quilts finished quilting her Peaches quilt for the Quilts 4 Kids Program. It's quilted in a straight lines pattern in a zig zag style.

Kat's quilted Peaches quilt

Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts participated in a blog hop to showcase a new collection of fabrics, Sunflower Spice. They are gorgeous! Preeti created a wonderful queen sized quilt, Phagun, which she quilted on her domestic machine. You won't want to miss reading more about it and seeing more eye candy! Also, you'll want to check out her very cool pouches made with a recycled Nepal napkin. 

Preeti's Phagun quilt

Diann of Little Penguin Quilts participated in Sandra's Lyra QAL and made a runner/wall hanging. It is really lovely. Here are both views.

Diann's version of Lyra as a runner

Diann's version of a wall hanging

It's now your turn 😍

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Flitting from Project to Project and I Quilted This!

Hi and welcome ☔ We're getting rain after a couple of wonderful sunny days. It was time for the rain to come since it got very hot and muggy. It was hard not spending my morning in the back yard, but I'm sure the sun will be back 🌞eventually! Let's see what I've been playing with.

FMQ an Orange House

I haven't done much stitch-in-the-ditch on the Rainbow Neighbourhood quilt since last week. I got bored and so started free motion quilting (FMQ). 

I was a little nervous because the last time I FMQ I had serious problems going left! I'm not sure if I got better results because I doing less swirls or if going slowly helped but the FMQ with cotton and polyester thread worked well. Yay!!!!!

FMQ the front of the house and the yellow star

You can see some of the stitching

When I change thread and start FMQ the grass, I'll see if I get the same great results 😊

Back on Track with the Baby Quilt

The last time I posted about the baby quilt, I noticed that I had an oops at the bottom of the second row. It took me a while to get to it, and to figure out what I had done wrong but I did it. 

Square Dance quilt is now fixed and ready for two more rows

I've got all of the Kona solids fabric picked out and planned. The pieces are all cut out for the next row. It's now a matter of getting it done!

Slow Stitching Mémère's Placemat

This week I had the chance to keep stitching my grandmother's placemat while watching the Fast-N-Easy Quilters Paradise Summit. It's a virtual summit with many fun. simple projects to quilt. It features many teachers and techniques. So far I haven't succumbed to the temptation of trying anything out. I did take detailed notes on a couple of the projects that I'd like to try eventually. Even if I don't make the projects, I learned something from each presentation that I watched. It was also the perfect time to stitch.

Stitching each large square using different designs

By the fourth block I needed something different - circles!

At this time, the plan is to stitch the whole placemat except for the small tulip squares.

What I learned

• I seem to be restless these days. I spent some time in my studio but didn't feel like making much. It's all good - this is meant to be a fun hobby, not a job! I'm happy that I got a little further on three of my projects.
• I'm really happy with the FMQ on the orange house. I had originally thought of only using my walking foot but with a big quilt, that's a lot of shifting the quilt around. I'm glad that I tried the FMQ - and even happier that it worked. 
• I took full advantage of the nice weather last week to hang out in the back yard watching the critters. One of the squirrels just cracks me up and the grackles have had their baby. It's really noisy when it's hungry 😀

  
  

  Feeding time for baby grackle

Squirrel antics

• I really hope to make some lovely art quilts one day, based on these visitors.

Related links

• A finish, June's OMG and I Quilted This!, June 04, 2026 (Rainbow Neighbourhood)
• Baby Quilt, Upcoming Retreat and I Quilted This! May 21, 2026 (baby quilt)
• Projects in Progress and I Quilted This!, May 27, 2026 (slow stitching)

Linking party

I'm linking up to many fun linking parties. You may want to check some out 😍

Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2026, Slow Sunday Stitching, 

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. 

This week Melva of Melva Loves Scraps, finished two versions of her Little House Sew Along 2026. She hosted this very successful Sew Along. I love the blocks within the log cabin. You'll want to check out the participants' quilts.

Melva's Little House Sew Along quilt

Melva's second Little House Sew Along quilt

Chris from Chris Knits Sews quilted a baby quilt and a birthday banner for her latest grandchild.

Details of a baby quilt

Birthday Banner by Chris

It's now your turn 😍

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Hand-stitching and Appliqué

Hi and welcome 😊 I hope that everyone in Canada had a good Thanksgiving. The weather has gotten quite cooler - still cool but darn close to cold! It's difficult to predict the weather at this time of year, but I'm very happy that it's mostly sunny while I walk Poppy! 🐕

Hand-stitching Ode to the Goose

I've been working on this piece for a few months. It's been sitting on the side of the dining room table, waiting for me to have a few minutes to stitch. This is what it looked like this afternoon. 

Ode to the Goose as of this afternoon

Ode to the Goose - so far

Last month I thought I had finished stitching the Canada goose. I showed it to JJ and they said that I probably didn't want to just fill in the head and the feet. They were right - so I've started filling in the body. That doesn't really bring me joy, so I'm working on everything else first!

The background of the piece is a vintage handkerchief with a narrow lace band. I added neutral scraps and started moving things around. Here was my first attempt. I take pictures because they seem to be more objective than looking at the piece.

Throwing a few things at the piece

It's at this point that I thought about the focus of the piece, which is the Canada goose. I removed what wasn't relevant and then using the tracing of a picture I took this summer, I stitched over the paper. It's not my favourite way of transferring an image but it was the best one since I was stitching over several different fabrics.

This August the Out-of-the-Box (OOTB) fibre artists met at a local park. I took many photos of the geese - I have never been that close to so many of them! There are other photos (see Related links) but this is the one who is the star of my Ode!

Star of Ode to the Goose

Stitching the goose following the image on the tracing paper

Starting to get there

This is what it looked like before my holidays. 

Figuring out what to keep and what to stitch

This is the evolution of the piece so far. Until it's finished, anything can happen! 😁 On the bottom right, I've added the stems of bullrushes. I want them to be fluffy - so I'll have to figure that out. These are the kinds are challenges that I love!

The evolution of the piece - so far!

I'm still working on the Pink Turtlehead flower piece. It's almost done but I'll wait until it's finished to post it. You'll be seeing it next week, just before the Fall Fling Show. I'm also hoping to have Ode to the Goose done for the show. The handkerchief is 8" x 8" so I plan to hand quilt it a little and then mount it on a canvas. In theory it should work!🤞

A Fourth Bloomers Block

I'm following Denise's Bloomers Sew Along. I'm on my fourth block - I love it! I sort of made this one up from two different blocks. 

Fourth block of Bloomers SAL

What I learned

• I always find it daunting to start a new piece, especially if I'm not sure where I want to go with it.
• As you saw, I went through my odds and ends and started playing around. I knew that it would be mostly neutral but I did want a bit of colour.
• Once I started stitching the goose, it was easier to see where the piece should go. It wanted a pond, a path, and a sky with a cloud. From there, it was mostly playing with stiches.
• There will be a lot of background stitching but I have to ensure that I don't overwhelm the goose - it's the star of the show!
• After adding my photo to a linking party, I realized how much I need to stitch in the Canada Goose. Right now it's disappearing into the background (except for the black!) That should help motivate me 😉 
• I'm happy with my latest Bloomers block. I think that I'll need at least a couple more to make something interesting. I also want to experiment with EPP hexies soon!

Related links

• Another Border on the Cowboy Panel (and pictures of Canada Geese), August 20, 2025
• Three Finished Bloomers Blocks, September 03, 2025
• Bloomers SAL and Hexies, July 28, 2025
• Bloomers Sew Along with Denise @Quiltery

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties. You may want to check some out, after you've linked up below! Bloomers Update,  Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Slow Sunday Stitching, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Oh Scrap!, Design Wall Monday, 

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 553 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was a very productive week! Thanks so much for joining the party! Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Donnalee is in the Fall spirit and making a lovely falling leaves runner. What great fabric! Now we know why she wanted to keep the black pumpkins - that runner is really great!

Donnalee is finishing up a falling leaves runner

Donnalee's lovely pumpkins in black

Gwyned will be showing her Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2022, How Does Your Garden Grow?, during her upcoming Cohasset Open Studios. 

How Does Your Garden Grow? by Gwyned

Kat from Scrapbox Quilts is making more Lil Bear Hug Quilts. She's quilting them using a mix of FMQ and walking foot. Here are a few - you'll want to check out her post to see them all!

Lovely Lil Bear Hug quilts, quilted by Kat

Walking foot work by Kat

Love that FMQ by Kat

Quilted by Kat - almost orange peels!

Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts has a lovely new quilt on the cover of Quilter's World! Milo is a layer cake friendly quilt that was quilted with squiggly lines using the walking foot.

Details of Preeti's Milo quilt

Preeti's latest finish - Milo!

Gail from Quilting Gail made this amazing Switchback bag using a ByAnnie pattern. Gail quilted the fabric using the walking foot. 

Gail's new Switchback bag

Brenda from Songbird Designs gave us a peek at the quilt she's making for her next blog hop project. Have a look at the pumpkin that she FMQ. We're looking forward to seeing this project soon!

Pumpkin FMQ by Brenda for an upcoming blog hop

Brenda also made a bag designed ByAnnie. It's the On the Go 2.0 Bag. She quilted it using a serpentine cross hatch using the walking foot. What a gorgeous and useful bag! You'll want to see the details of her bag on her post.

Brenda's On the Go 2.0 Bag 

What eye candy! It's now your turn to share😊

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

More Zen Stitching and Free Motion Mavericks

Hi and welcome! I did some hand-stitching on a sampler that I started in Karen Turner's class last week. We had lots to do!  I finally found the fabric to bind the Floral Fusion wall hanging that I started last September with Denise of the Quiltery. There's going to be a finish in the near future!😍 

Slow-stitching Sampler

In her Making Zen class, Karen also showed us how she makes lovely hand-stitched samplers which she incorporates into a journal. I haven't worked on a meditative stitching piece in ages, so it was great to get  back to it. Karen uses fusible interfacing as the base and then irons on scraps, covered by a transparent fabric like tulle or organza to keep everything together. I did the same thing but added a piece of flannel at the back to make the sampler sturdier and easier to stitch.

Stitched sampler based on Karen Turner's workshop

I used mostly hand-dyed scraps for this sampler as well as many different types of thread, perle cotton and yarn. As long as it fits in the needle, it can be used 😁. In the end, the piece reminds me a little bit of a landscape, with the spiral sun at the top, many vines and even rain drops! 

My son's latest hobby is 3D printing. He made a box to place at the back of the printer to collect the scraps of plastic (we call it plastic poop! That's what happens when you have a dog 🐕) So I used three of these in the piece. One is black, the other black and white and the last one a gray, which happens when the black and white plastic fuse together. All of the plastic pieces have some kind of hole, so they're perfect for stitching. Apparently he now has many colours of plastic so I will get more colourful poop for my art making.

In the closeup, you can also see scraps of yarn and perle cotton placed under the tulle. 

A closeup of the plastic pieces and scraps of yarn

I've now placed it in my Mindful Meditation Journal.

Sampler placed in my Mindful Stitching Journal

This side - bottom!

I was Poppy sitting earlier this week. What a cutie! 

Waiting for the squirrels - in the jungle that is my 
backyard right now!

What I learned

• I was happy to have something simple and fun to stitch as my energy waned. 
• Poppy was a great distraction and I'm thankful that it was cool out for all of those walks!
• Poppy is gone and the heat is here, but the evenings will be cool, so all is good!
• I spent some quality time in my studio looking for the fabric to make the binding for the Floral Fusion wall hanging. When you use scraps, it's not always easy to find enough binding fabric.
• I took the opportunity to clean up in the studio. It's not great but it's less chaotic. 
• I'm linking up to the June One Monthly Goal and will finish this piece, hopefully sooner than the end of the month! I did finish FMQ the empty blocks a while back, so it really is all about the binding.

Floral Fusion ready to be bound

Related links

• Making Zen and Free Motion Mavericks, May 30, 2025
• Floral Update and a Finished Piece on Free Motion Mavericks, October 16, 2024
• Floral Fusion and hand-stitching on Free Motion Mavericks, September 05, 2024
• Floral Fusion Sew Along (finished) with Denise at The Quiltery

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties, including the One Monthly Goal. Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday, Beauties Pageant, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, TGIFF, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Oh Scrap!, Slow Sunday Stitching, 

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 534 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was a productive week! Thanks for linking up. This week there were lots of quilts in progress. Here is the project from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. 

Kat of Scrapbox Quilts free motion quilted this lovely pink and brown quilt following one of Angela Walter's video. 

Kat's FMQ pink and brown quilt

Here's a look at the back where you can see the FMQ better. 

Kat's FMQ as seen from the back

It's now your turn!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter