I first heard about machine quilting back in the late 80s from Harriet Hargrave. She was one of the pioneers of machine quilting, and she'd come to QuiltNebraska to share her techniques. I remember a lot of things from those lectures but the main thing I took away was that quilting could finally be fast. [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador I've been watching machine quilting videos, and a lot of them. I bought them as classes over the past dozen years or so. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I haven't taken time to view many of them before now. I'm watching now because recently, a popular [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador The HQ Capri stationary longarm with the Insight table comes as a set, and together they're proving to be a great team. I've been quilting a lot on the Capri to get my feet wet, but sometimes it's as if I've fallen headlong into the lake! And I [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador I quilted another UFO and for the first time I do not feel like I totally messed it up. I think I have turned a corner. This is a crib-size quilt I made from two sets of UFO blocks. The flowers are from a pattern called Daisiez by [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador and Mary Beth Krapil, Handi Quilter National Educator I started machine quilting an old UFO this week, and because I'm not experienced, I had questions right away. Mary Beth is a seasoned longarm quilting pro and is always just a text away. I sent my questions to her! [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador I finished piecing a project on May 7, just 16 days after I started. It was a challenging project for a couple of reasons but now that it's finished, I quite like it. My Gypsy Wife quilt top, a design by Jen Kingwell I am not much of [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador I'm astonished at the new thoughts I'm having in the wake of my excitement about machine quilting. 1. "I can't wait to quilt this!" 🤗 In the past, I was a piecer and only a piecer. I made patchwork endlessly and the quilt tops just kept piling up. [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador No, not the morning TV show. I'm talking about your view of the machine quilting as you're doing it. In my last post, I talked about some lessons I took from quilting my Wild Garden. Lessons in Machine Quilting When you’re machine quilting, you’re so close to the [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador Eight years ago I started an improvisational quilt project during a retreat with Mary Lou Weidman. Mary Lou was doing improv long before anyone called it that. She makes amazing story quilts and she is full of ideas. A day spent with her is like slurping creativity from [...]
By Diane Harris, HQ Stitch Brand Ambassador There are good learning opportunities during the Cyber Quilt Show created by Handi Quilter. I've been watching and rewatching a workshop called "Variations" with HQ National Educator Debby Brown. I'm spending a lot of time learning all about free-motion machine quilting these days, so Debby's friendly video class [...]
