It’s the final week of the Royal Star Quilt Along 2020. We’re quilting Royal Star, announcing the January giveaway winner, and previewing February’s quilt!
For 2020, we’ve collected 12 of our most popular quilt patterns. We’ll make a quilt a month and cover the creative process from selecting colors and fabrics, piecing and assembly tips, and quilting ideas to help you finish your quilt. Click Here
The Royal Star Schedule
Over the next few weeks, we’ll make our Royal Star quilts. Check out the schedule below.
And you can click here
Next month’s Quilt Along starts February 1st , so mark your calendars now!
Making a Quilt Sandwich
Lay the backing down on a flat surface, wrong side up. Place the batting in the center of the backing. Center the quilt on top of the batting right side up. Baste with spray, pins, large stitches, or any other method you prefer.
Check out this video on how to spray baste a quilt!
VIDEO
Select a Quilting Design
As you select or create a quilting design, it’s important to keep your machine in mind. Straight lines and gentle curves lend themselves to a walking foot.
Quilting designs with dramatic curves and fluid lines lend themselves to freemotion quilting. If your machine can drop its feed dogs and you have a hopping foot, you can freemotion quilt on your home machine.
Here’s a video on setting up your home machine for freemotion quilting.
VIDEO
And of course, hand quilting goes great with quilt as you go. Traditional hand quilting brings elegance to every design, and more modern big stitching brings a lot of whimsy and playfulness.
Big stitch quilting by Sarah Fielke
Factor these options into your creative choices for your quilting designs. Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s take a look at some ideas for quilting Royal Star.
Quilting Royal Star Ideas
Simple vertical lines are one of the easiest designs to quilt and great for quick finishes. Use a walking foot and be sure to change directions from line to line, so if you start top to bottom, quilt the next row bottom to top. Try marking the quilt with painter’s tape, following the tape’s edge for your straight line while quilting.
Grids, on-point grids and wreaths are all beautiful traditional options that can be produced on the sewing machine or with hand quilting. Try different design combinations for beautiful results.
Looking at the quilt itself, there is an X shape to the design, so try emphasizing that shape with quilting. This is another great, simple straight line quilting design that’s fairly easy to create on a home sewing machine with a walking foot.
Orange Peel
This design uses all straight lines. Several of the lines extend from edge-to-edge while others are self contained squares or triangles. Click on the thumbnail for a picture of the design that highlights the edge-to-edge lines in red for easier visualization. This would be a really fun design to big stitch quilt.
Vertical wavy lines are a fun, easy all-over design for quilting Royal Star. Depending on the height of the waves, it’s totally possible to quilt the design with a walking foot.
Mirrored vertical waves are a slightly mod variation and still fairly easy.
Large overlapping circles are a fantastic option for big stitch quilting, creating dynamic curves in counterpoint to the design of the quilt.
This quilt also has fun opportunities to establish a quilting layout in the center star and then repeat the design at double the scale in the outer star.
The Pattern
Click Here for the FREE Royal Star pattern.
In addition to the free pattern, we’ve written a special Royal Star pattern you can purchase: Ombré Royal Star
The Ombré Royal Star ePattern Ombré Royal Star ePattern
And while you’re at ShopAQS
January’s Giveaway
Each month you have the opportunity to enter to win a fun quilting prize.
This month winner’s is receiving this beautiful fat quarter bundle from P&B Textiles.
And the winner is Eva M . Congratulations, Eva!
Keep an eye out for February’s Quilt Along 2020 giveaway for the next chance to win.
February’s Quilt is… Gathering!
Gathering is 80″ x 80″ finished and just a real beauty. Check out the schedule below.
Fabric Pull & Cutting Instructions – February 1
Unit Construction – February 8
Quilt Assembly – February 15
Quilting & Monthly Giveaway – February 22
You can check out the free pattern here buy the pattern here
Join the fun!
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American Quilter Magazine January 2014 Digital