Machine Quilting 101

My story started yesterday with our tour of the 12 + Quilt shops we visited in Ohio Amish country. It was a delight to visit the various shops and see all the different quilts and samples that were made up.

BUT I also went to machine quilting school :-) Last April my BFF attended the Quilting Symposium in North Carolina, and took two classes on Machine Quilting. One was with the machine quilting icon Harriet Hargrave, and the other class was with Sue Nichels. I was not able to attend the symposium, so I asked my friend if she would teach me what she learned in her class.

For years I have checked this book out of our local library -

I would try to read through it, but was always a little frustrated. It seems that I am more of a visual hands on learner. So of course when my BFF attended Sue's class, I was very interested in knowing what she learned. When it worked out for me to travel to her home in Ohio, I went ahead and purchased the book.

One of the very first things my BFF stated, was that going through this book was like taking Sue Nickels basic machine quilting class.

Step one, making a grid -

Step two, more practice grids, this time with different size stippling -

Step three, trying new stitch designs -


Step four, another option -

Step five, practicing cables -

Step six, woo-hoo! open feathers -

And finally, graduation -

Now these are all pretty crude, and I was not sewing on my own sewing machine, so that has yet to be proven, but I felt that I was able to get some of the basics to machine quilting on a home sewing machine. That has always been one of my goals in quilting.

More next time......

Happy quilting!