Besides the baby quilts, I have been working on two other projects:
1. Quilty Fun
The Quilty Fun quilt has been such a joy to work on. Lori's enthusiasm for sewing is contagious and it really shines through in her writing. The above picture is the left side of the quilt. My favorite block grouping is the quarter square triangle set in the middle. I would love a whole quilt with that block in those exact same colors. I'd probably make the blocks a tad bigger though!
I felt like the little jumping gnome in the blue house when I saw that it was "Neighborhood Houses" week! The house blocks are so adorable. You can see everyone else's blocks at the sew along's Flickr group.
2. Free Motion Quilting
I have also been practicing FMQ. I am loosely following along with the Free Motion Quilting a Sampler class on Craftsy. I won't ugly up your feed with my unphotogenic practice sandwiches, but I uploaded them to Flickr. In a few years, I hope that I will be able look back at those pictures and see how far my quilting has come. It is really addictive. I intended to just quilt one practice sandwich to see how went, but I ended up going until I ran out of solid fabric!
Like I've told a few of you before, my experience with FMQing is much like my experience driving in Mario Kart: I can't stay on the path and I have no idea where I am going! My stitching flows better when I am thinking about anything except quilting. I guess that is where the recommendations to drink wine come in!
The picture above is last thing I quilted. I am starting to get the hang of it and I feel a little more comfortable about trying it on an actual quilt now. My plan is to do a few more practice sandwiches and then I am going to quilt a Jelly Roll Jam quilt. The Jelly Roll Jam quilt is small and print-heavy. It was such a quick make that I won't be too upset about any mistakes!
I am also reading First Steps to Free-Motion Quilting by Christina Cameli. In addition to FMQ instructions and advice, the book features non-fussy projects to practice your quilting on. The Wiggle Bottom cushion is the first project in the book. It is fun project, because you can practice different designs on each strip. I'm looking forward to doing more projects from the book as my skills improve.
I'll be continuing the Quilty Fun and FMQ projects this coming week. I also hope to make some progress on the Zig Zag Love quilt top.