CRAFTY | FEEL THE MOTION

I dream big. I always have and I hope I always will. It’s the big dreaming that has seen me get some pretty fabulous opportunities in my life and I believe it’s the reason we now have this amazing little man in our lives.

I believe that you’ve got to dream big if you want to get anywhere worth getting. The second part to dreaming big is you’ve got to actually get off your behind and get out there and give it a go.

Sometimes you’re going to succeed and sometimes you’re going to not-quite-succeed. The key it to try and keep on trying.

Now that all sounds peachy but sometimes actually starting something is the hardest part of the whole process.

For a good year now I’ve been lusting after all these amazing quilts I see on the internet.  I don’t lust after them in the sense that I want to own them all (although I wouldn’t mind that!) I lust after them because I want to be able to make them.  I want to be able to do what these amazing quilters do.

This year I’ve been working my way through my list of quilt tops and I’ve been enjoying making them (I’m still really enjoying making them) – I enjoy the process of selecting a pattern, picking the fabrics and seeing whether the pattern and fabrics work the way I thought they would. But all of the quilt tops I’ve finished this year I’ve sent to someone else to do the quilting on them.

It’s been great because it’s allowed me to work on getting my piecing skills in order (although these still need a lot of work!) and it’s given me the confidence to try new techniques and branch out.

But the whole time there’s been this white whale riding my shoulder; free motion quilting.

I’ve half watched a Craftsy online class about it, I’ve purchased the FMQ foot for my machine, I’ve talked a lot about it (a lot!), but for some reason I’ve put off having a go.

The last few days we’ve been having some pretty serious talks about dropping some serious cash on a serious upgrade to the quilting aspect of the house.

It’s a heady thought and it’s made me really think about what I’m doing and the direction I want my life to go and how I’m going to get there.

So with all those thoughts whirling around in my head I read this post by the ever wonderful and amazing Jo.

I love Jo’s work. I admire Jo’s work. I aspire to be in the same league as Jo one day, so to see where she started and where she is now was just the prompt I needed to try.

I read the post late on Thursday evening and when I awoke at 5am on Friday morning it was all I could think about.

I just needed to try.

So I snuck out of bed and went to the sewing room, set the machine up and tried.

This is what 30 minutes of play looks like and I’m so damn happy about it.

Getting a feel for how to move the fabric and get the stitches to flow smoothly was interesting. Seeing the thread move across the fabric another marvel. I have a heap of bobbins and half used spools of thread so I just picked a random combination in an attempt to use up the thread.

This is the back and I’m pretty happy with the tension (for someone who knows nothing about what to look for).

I’m pretty stoked. It was good fun and I found myself just falling into a rhythm. Now I just have to do some research, find some more online tutorials to help with it and practice, practice, practice.