I am moving right along on my French Rose Buds quilt. This week I practiced some free-motion quilting designs which I will finalize shortly. I decided to enter the quilt top into the weekly Quilting Gallery contest so I’d love for you to vote for it!

Vote here and you can be entered to win the Quilting Gallery’s weekly giveaway!

French Rose Buds Quilt Top 36″ x 43.5″

Before I jump right into quilting this puppy, I decided to take some time and plan out my quilting. Since this quilt is for my brand new niece, I want to make it extra special. I also think it’s a great quilt to show off some fun free-motion quilting texture.

I started by drawing out some quilting designs on paper and then making up a few practice sandwiches to test it out. I’ve always wanted to try swirls ever since taking Angela Walters’ quilting negative space class at QuiltCon and on Craftsy. (Even though she quilts on a long-arm I was able to adapt her techniques to my domestic machine.)

Next I tried starting sketching out possible designs directly onto the quilt top.

That didn’t give me enough of an idea so I pinned my quilted practice piece onto the quilt top for a better perspective. So far so good. Now I want to try swirls and pebbles.

I really like this! I think combining two designs makes it more fun and whimsical. I stitched out a couple more practice sandwiches, cut them to size and pinned them to the top so I could see how they would really work in the quilt.

My plan is to quilt each section in matching thread so all you see is the quilting texture, not the thread. Hopefully I will have time to baste and start quilting this weekend. I will post more of my progress next week.

By slowing down and only working on this quilt a little each week, I am able to get all of my other projects accomplished without feeling overwhelmed!

You can read about my previous Baby French Roses progress here.