Quilt Challenge of the Month: Hand Quilting

Welcome to our challenge for this month of June! If you are hopping over from Candi's blog, thank you for visiting. My name is Katie and in addition to sewing/quilting, I am studying art and textiles at a local university (just one year left!) and I also love to knit, crochet, and embroider, among a few other things. Basically, I love to work with all sorts of fibers and am transitioning the skills I have been learning into my artwork.

The challenge that I chose is hand quilting. I have been wanting to try this for some time and figure that this summer is the perfect time to give it a go. There are a couple tutorials that I will be following once I get to the quilting portion of this challenge:

Anna Maria Horner
Threads Magazine

I'm sure there are many others out there, and if you know of a good one, feel free to leave a link in the comments.

But, before I start hand quilting, I first need a completed top. I decided with Independence Day coming up soon that I would use this fat quarter stack of fabric to make a patriotic quilt. I'm not sure yet how big it will be (I'm waffling between 25" square to using up all the fabric to make a throw size quilt), but do know I will be doing a simple log cabin design.

The materials that I have set aside for the challenge besides fabric are:

• quilting frame (mine is by Dritz)


• assorted perle cotton thread (mine is DMC in size 8, but I may buy some size 5)


• hand quilting needles


• a thimble

My goal for this challenge is to get this top done by next Friday so I can then start with the quilting. If you have a completed quilt top already, feel free to jump right in. I will be updating my progress in a week, as well as mid-month and then at the end of the month. On June 30th there will be a linky party (if I can figure it out that is).

I hope you decide to join in with me this month! Remember, your project can be small, like a pot holder, or a large quilt. These challenges are about stretching your skills and having fun.