January Lesson: Beginners Guide to Free Motion Quilting & Giveaway results

First for the results. Julie's comment from Better than I deserve! was selected by the ever faithful random number selector. 

Julie said: I like doing free motion but need more ideas and practice!!. 

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Congratulations Julie - I hope that this book helps you with ideas and pushes you to practice, practice, practice!!!!

I loved all your comments from the January Lesson & Giveaway post - I wanted to answer some of the comments/questions.

January Lesson (& Giveaway): Beginners Guide to Free-Motion Quilting

During 2015 I hope to push myself further along the free motion quilting path and also perhaps teach a few people some little things (I keep being asked - eeek!) Teaching sort of terrifies me - because I'm pretty shy and I often worry I'm not qualified enough to impart useful pieces of information. So to warm myself up to the idea I'll be putting a little lesson out once a month accompanied by a little giveaway.

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Years ago I took a lesson on free motion quilting way before I could do anything (even try anything) that resembled free motion quilting on a quilt. The lesson terrified me and I never did a drop of free motion quilting again for over a year. I then completed a very very small project (a small zippered pouch) that somehow gave me the confidence to do more quilting. It has been a long journey with many doubts and dips but over all there is only one thing that has helped me improve and that is the really boring word of 'practice'. I know I have said this over and over again.

And so to encourage someone to take the same leap as I did and push through those doubts I want to start a series of lessons and little giveaways in 2015 - that will be focused on giving you that extra little push to drop those feed dogs on your machine and get quilting.

My tips for beginning free motion quilting are:

Children's I SPY QUILTs Auction & Giveaway

I have finished all three I Spy Quilts. Two of them are now up for auction. The smaller one will be a giveaway. (Please note this giveaway is for shipping within the US only.)

Each quilt comes with a list of lots of fun things you can try and spot in the quilts. My children are totally enchanted with these quilts. I will post more about how I quilted them again soon.


PROCEEDS:
All funds from the auctions will be donated to 'Quilting A Memory'. This is a charitable organization that provides free quilting services to the families of fallen service men & women - using their clothes/uniforms to make beautiful & detailed quilts that can be treasured for ever. Materials for a Queen sized quilt typically come to approximately $130. It would be wonderful to raise something around this amount by selling these two quilts.


Please bid on the quilts - these links will take you to their listings on eBay. Auctions & Giveaway will end Sunday December 15th and I will mail the quilts on Monday 16th.

I SPY Quilt - Red Border & blue binding
Measures 47.5"w x 54"h
165 squares of different fabric with hundreds of items to spot. 
Click for eBay Listing is here.

I SPY Quilt - Pink border & binding
Measures 46"w x 53"h
168 squares of different fabric with hundreds of items to spot. 
Click for eBay Listing is here.

I SPY Quilt - Green border & orange binding
Measures 46"w x 46"h
144 squares of different fabric with hundreds of items to spot. 
To win this giveaway quilt (green border with orange binding) please leave a comment on the blog below - ensure you leave a way that I can contact you - e-mail, blog or website. 

BIGGEST THANKS TO ......
Practically all the materials for these quilts was donated. I would again like to deeply thank all those who contributed to these super cute & fun quilts:
Anita, MD
Mary-Etta, MD
Candice, OH
Anne from Bunny Hill Designs
Cathy from Blueberry Patch 
Corey from Little Miss Shabby
Pat, MD
Mike from The Amateur Quilter
Angela from Sewing with Squeak
Toni from Hoosier Toni 
Elke, ME
Leanne, NY
Chris Lang, OH

Giveaway & Tutorial: Santa Gift Sack

Reading A Spoonful of Sugar's Christmas Fabric Gift Pouches made me remember I too had holiday gift bags to make. No precise sewing or much time is needed to make these cute Santa Sacks. Perfect to use as a gift bag, holiday decoration or substitute for a stocking (the girls will be getting these instead of stockings this year.)

Materials:
- a square of hemp, quilt batting and a holiday cotton print - all the same size (I have used 36" squares - but smaller or large squares would also work)
- elastic
- ribbon

• Layer the three squares - batting, hessian and cotton print wrong side up.

• Pin layers together and sew around the edge leaving enough of a gap on one side for turning. I used a 1/4" seam. (Tip: A walking foot makes it easy to sew multiple layers together.)
  
• Trim seams and turn - sew remaining hole shut.

• Pin layers together and sew a circle (approx 2.5" from edges) and then another circle 1/2 “ inside first circle.

• On the cotton print side make small incision between the two sewn circles. Thread elastic through. Pull the elastic as tight as possible. Secure elastic and close incision.

• Tie bow on front. Add gift tag and any other decorative items as desired.

AND because I have made too many for my needs this year - I am giving away one of these Santa sacks. I'll pick a number at random on 6th of December. Just leave a comment telling me what was the best holiday present you ever received as a child!