Thursday Crafts: Freestyle Quilting!

My latest and greatest crafting love is freestyle quilting! When one quilts, there are TONS of techniques out there. You can quilt "in the ditch" which is next to the seam line that you have sewn. You can do grid patterns and curve patterns. You can use a template, make it up yourself etc. But, my favorite way to quilt on projects that I do is doing the freestyle method.

What I love about this is that it makes ordinary pieces look expensive and like you have put a lot of time into it! Lately, I have been making some casserole covers/carriers for both friends and myself. I started with the tutorial that I found HERE. I changed it up a bit including the quilting portion of it and have been seriously enjoying myself WAY too much with freestyle quilting :) Here's 2 covers I have made. The first was made from leftover material from some couch cushions that I made years ago. The second I bought the material for my friend who asked for purple, green and paisley!

Quilting can be intimidating. It surely was for me. But, I am here to tell you that the way that I freestyle quilt is so EASY and so fun too! I am such a nerd about it. Haha!

I will show you a couple pictures on this material because it is fairly good contrast to see the stitches.

If you are working with a fairly small material piece, you will not need to pin all the layers together. In my case the 2 pieces to the casserole carrier were already sewn on the edges with a top-stitch, so I did not need to pin the rest of the pieces together. If you are working with a larger piece like a blanket or wall-hanging, however, you will want to place pins approximately every 2 inches in a grid over the entire work so that it will not buckle as you sew.

Turn your piece to the side that has the most contrast with your thread so you can see your stitches clearly. In my case, that was the back of the piece. Once your piece is pinned (if applicable), begin on one side and begin to sew with the machine set to small stitches (I have mine at a "2"). Work slowly and begin slowly rotating the piece of material so that you are making even, curved lines over the entire piece. Try to guide the material evenly as you work. I have found that if I stop the machine to readjust the material, the lines will not have an even curve. So, it is best to not stop the machine. Using "S" patterns and squiggly lines over the entire piece, it begins to come together! Begin to cross lines and continue rotating the work until you have stitches over the entire piece.

This best thing about this technique is that it looks better and better the more sewing you do. I don't know if you can sew "too much" in freestyle quilting! It can be a bit time-consuming, but I promise that in the end, you will be very satisfied with your work! It can look something like this when you are finished.....or it can look very different. There is much freedom.....and I LOVE that!

If you have never tried this technique, try it! It may take a bit for you to feel comfortable with machine quilting, but if you like to sew at all, I think you will like it! Let me know if you give it a try!