Granny Square Quilt

I finished quilting this Granny Square quilt this week and I'm in LOVE with it! My mom pieced this quilt probably a year ago when the Granny Square Quilt Along was happening.  Google Granny Square quilt and you can find all sorts of different tutorials.  I wanted to share some photos of the quilt and all of the quilting I did.  I chose to FMQ very densely and create all sorts of texture. 

I love that she did a pieced border on this quilt, it ties in the quilt beautifully!!

I quilted straight lines in between the granny square blocks to create a secondary pattern.

I quilted flower petals inside of the granny square blocks.

I quilted tear drop shapes to fill in everything in between.

I just love how this turned out and how bright and cheery it is! Hopefully it will bring some warmth throughout the country with ALL of this cold weather everyone is having!!!

If you're interested in my quilting services, feel free to email me at Jamie@sunflower-quilts.com

Robyn's Quilt

Here are a bunch of photos of a quilt I quilted for Robyn.  She sent me this lovely top and told me to go for it.  I love this pattern and it left a lot of room for creative quilting.  I quilted feathers in the border and loops in the inner border. On the insides I did three different designs.  What do ya'll think? I LOVE how this turned out!

If you're interested in my quilting services feel free to email me at Jamie@sunflower-quilts.com! Have a great weekend!

Customer Quilting

WOW, it's been too long since I've blogged!!! I am going to try and do better, but I am constantly posting on Instagram and Facebook, so find me on there!

INSTAGRAM: jamiemueller0522

FACEBOOK: Sunflower Quilts 

My newest news is that in December I bought a longarm!!! I am so excited to begin this journey! I've been quilting on my domestic machine for years and feel as though I've been able to master FMQ on it. It was getting harder to quilt big quilts and didn't allow me to quilt them effectively and timely.  I spoke with my husband and he agreed that the longarm was the way to go! WOO HOO (that was the hardest part).  I was talking with my good friend Angela, and she joked that I should buy her old machine since she got a fancy new one.  One month later I'm driving across the state in a UHaul to pick up her machine!  

Angela and I, her first machine is now my first machine! 

Here she is all set up in my sewing room! In case ya'll are wondering, it's a Gammill Premier.

I have been quilting like CRAZY since I set her up!  Between the old shop and my mother and I, we had a lot of quilt tops laying around for me to practice on! 

I thought I'd show you some photos of a few quilts I've quilted for customers.  The first two quilts are quilts that I made 100% for customer gifts for Christmas, I will post more photos of these later in a new post, but I'll show you the quilting for now.

Next, this is a quilt I quilted for RJR Fabrics, my mother designed and pieced it and then I quilted it. I'll also do a new post for this quilt with more photos later this week!

Finally, for now, I just finished quilting this quilt for Robyn. Again, I'll post later this week about Robyn's gorgeous quilt with more photos.

Like I said before, make sure you follow me on Instagram because I post daily on there and I'm always sharing what I'm working on!

If you're interested in my quilting services, please email me at jamie@sunflower-quilts.com

Pathway Through The Stars and a Craftsy Class

A few months ago my guild, the STLMQG, issued a new challenge called The Ohio Star Challenge. The rules were to Make a Modern Quilt by using the Traditional Block "Ohio Star" and you can read more of the details here. Our meeting is tomorrow but I wanted to post about my quilt(s) today because tomorrow is going to be super busy/long and Sunday I probably won't have the energy to blog about it either.

This is what I came up with and my Dad named it Pathway Through The Stars! I loved how the first one turned out so much that I made a second one!

 

One of the reasons why Saturday is going to be so busy is that our best friend Matt is getting married to his beautiful bride Shannon. Their wedding colors are peacock colors so I pulled these solids to make a quilt for them! This was the second challenge quilt I made and I'm glad I did, because the Ohio Star stands out better using the solids than the prints. BUT I love them both equally and if it wasn't our best friends wedding I might keep this one! :) Love ya'll and can't wait to celebrate God's joining of two awesome people tomorrow!

Here is the back of the quilt and close up of the straight line quilting.

 

The second Pathway Through The Stars uses all prints! I have been hoarding some of these fabrics for YEARS and let me tell ya, it felt good (and a little scary) to cut into them!

I used a new Free Motion Quilting technique to quilt this and it was so fun with gorgeous results.

The awesome Angela Walters has a new class over on Craftsy called Dot to Dot Quilting. In the class she teaches how to FMQ these simple line designs with stunning outcomes! The class was really informative and fun. I found these designs to be simple and kinda relaxing! I also mixed in some other FMQ designs like pebbles and swirls.  I HIGHLY recommend this class and thanks Angela for another fun one! (Plus, it's on sale right now! So, hop on over and check it out!)

Below are photos of the quilting:

This will be a new pattern soon....let me get through this weekend first! I hope ya'll like it and thanks for the awesome challenge STLMQG!

Brick Road Sew Along Week 6: Machine Quilting

Today we are going to focus on machine quilting. Let me begin by saying that I am by no means an expert, I've been machine quilting for a few years and these are just some tips and tricks that help me along the way.  I am just going to give some basic machine quilting advice.

Two websites that I love are Angela Walter's and Natalia Bonner's.  They are both longarm machine quilters and have beginners FMQ books with lots of cool designs to try. Check out their books and websites and learn from them, they know a lot more than me! :)

 

 

One BIG trick on becoming better at machine quilting is PRACTICE!!  Practice, practice, practice....the more you do it, the better you'll be!  I like to take larger scraps or FQs that I have laying around and make quilt sandwiches with them (backing/batting/top) and practice machine quilting on them.  Practicing on smaller pieces allow me to learn with ease instead of pulling a huge quilt through my machine.

 

Some tools I like for machine quilting:
Machingers Gloves

These gloves are soft, light and have fingertip grips to help grip the fabric as you quilt. I'm sure there are many places online where you can buy them, and I know JoAnn's carries them (so grab your coupon and go pick up a pair!)

 

Walking Foot

I love using my walking foot when I'm straight line quilting.  A walking foot has feed dogs along the bottom, so that there are two sets of feed dogs pulling your quilt through for an ease while quilting.  If you don't have one already, I highly recommend getting one!

 

Free Motion Quilting Foot

A free motion quilting foot has a wider/open foot to allow for better vision while quilting.

 

 

 

Straight Line Quilting:

 

Straight line quilting is exactly what it says, it's quilting in straight lines. Straight line quilting is how I started machine quilting. It's one of the best (easier) forms of machine quilting for beginners.

Depending on the quilt, you can decide how far apart you want to space your straight lines.
Some tips:
-I like to adjust my stitch length to either 3 or 3.5, I find that these to lengths make quilting much easier and I'm not having to pull on my quilt.
-Use painter's tape, chalk, or water soluble pencils to mark lines to follow. If you use painters tape you can follow the edge of it with your foot or needle.
-use a walking foot (for reasons above)

Please ignore my dorky self on the videos....this was my first video so I say "um" a bit at the beginning....I'm sorry, it gets better! Don't you just hate seeing yourself on camera?

 

This video is about straight line quilting and can be found HERE on our YouTube channel. I was going to upload the videos on this post but it was taking forever and there are three separate videos.

So, please check out our YouTube channel to find all of these videos plus more!

Free Motion Quilting FMQ:

Free motion quilting is when you quilt freely. You are the one controlling your machine, design and stitches.  FMQ can be any design you wish.
Some tips:
-Before I start any new quilting design, I like to practice drawing it on paper first. This allows me to feel where the design is going and learn where to go so when I'm quilting on my actual quilt I can freely quilt around it. 
-use your FMQ foot
-feed dogs down
-stitch length at 0, this allows you to control your stitches
-start in the center of your quilt and go outwards. This allows you to smooth out your quilt as you go.
-Start out slow when you first start FMQ. Your pedal (foot) and hands should be going at similar speeds, this will insure your stitches will be equal.

The next video is pebble quilting and can be found HERE on our YouTube channel.

The last video is swirl quilting and can be found HERE on our YouTube channel.

So, hopefully you're still with me after those videos!

Try one or all of these machine quilting techniques (or something completely different) on your Brick Road quilt and don't forget to upload photos to the Flickr Group! Just remember to relax and have fun!!!
I will post a binding tutorial tomorrow; this post already seemed long enough!

Next week, winners will be announced! Remember, you can only win if you've uploaded photos to the Flickr Group!
Up for grabs, RJR fabric and SunFlower Quilts Patterns!

http://youtu.be/bXh9aebXn2w

Brick Road Sew Along: Week 5

Sorry for not having this post ready this morning....long, fun sewing weekend=tired Jamie!

 Let's get started! This week is backing/basting!

 

 

Backing:

1. Get your 4 yards of backing fabric and cut in half so you have 2-2 yard cuts (44" X 72") and cut the selvedges off.

*NOTE: If you want a scrappier/pieced backing look, you could use 4 different 1 yard cuts!

 

2. Then, take the 2-2 yard cuts and sew them together along one 72" side.  You will have one long 72" seam sewn where the selvedges used to be and have an approximately 72" X 82" piece. Press seam.
*I pieced my backing to show you more colors of the RJR Crazy for Dots and Stripes fabrics, but as long as you have a backing piece at least 72" X 82" you'll be fine! Here is a photo of the RJR Crazy for Dots and Stripes fabrics I used: I LOVE THESE DOTS!

 

 

Basting:

1. Find a big open hard floor area to baste your quilt; you might need to move some furniture around.  I usually move my kitchen table to use the big hardwood floor space!

2. With your backing fabric wrong side up, spread out on hard floor and smooth out wrinkles. 

3. Using painter's tape, tape around the edges pulling the backing fabric tightly and making sure there are not any wrinkles or puckers.

(Sorry, it was hard for me to get an entire backing picture because it's large and I'm short)

(Ozzie wanted to show you where to tape to the floor)

 

4. Then, spread batting out on top of backing fabric, smooth out any wrinkles and tape around edges.

 

5. Next, spread quilt top on top of batting and smooth out any wrinkles.

I don't tape my quilt top, because then I can adjust it while pinning if needed.

 

 

Pinning your quilt:

*There are many different ways to in your quilt, this is my method!

What I use:

I like to use curved safety pins with Paula Jean Creations covers on them, these covers make gripping the safety pins so much easier.

 

 

I also like to use a Kwik Klip, this bad boy saves my finger tips from being sore while closing the safety pins and makes basting so much faster in my opinion. You can find more information about these products on Paula Jean Creations website!

 

1. Using curved safety pins, baste your quilt together every few inches making sure to catch all layers (backing, batting and top).
*I like to pin more rather than less to make sure I don't have any puckering while quilting. But it's your call on how much you pin.

 

 

Ok, that's it on backing and basting! Come back next Monday for a machine quilting tutorial!!  Any requests on designs? 

And make sure you add photos to the Flickr Group!