Machine Quilting a Baby Quilt with Beginner Flame Key Design
I’m machine quilting a baby quilt with Flame Key, an oldie goldie design from the Free Motion Quilting Project! This design is so easy to machine quilt. It’s definitely a beginner free motion quilting design and therefore a great choice if you’re just getting started machine quilting.
Jump Ahead in this quilting tutorial:
Machine Quilting a Baby Quilt Video
I’m machine quilting on a baby quilt using my home machine on the Cutie Frame. But understand quilting this design will work the same if you’re quilting on a stationary home machine or longarm (set in a table) or a longarm too. Watch this video to see how to quilt Flame Key on my baby quilt:
Drawing Flame Key to Get Practice Quilting
Drawing, doodling, or sketching is an essential part of learning machine quilting. I’m incorporating drawing into my quilting videos so you can clearly see the rules of the design. Quilting a real quilt, and particularly this Baby Onesie T-Shirt Quilt is very busy and it can be hard to see the design against all the busy fabrics.
Flame Key is a beginner design with very simple rules: quilt a line of flame shapes, then echo to repeat the texture across your quilt. Try drawing this just for fun and see if just a bit of practice with a pencil and paper doesn’t make machine quilting that much easier!
Machine Quilting a Baby Quilt on a Frame
Even with this simple set of rules, quilting Flame Key on a Cutie Frame required a small modification of the design. Had I quilted all the way across the quilt with flames in one pass, I would have had to stop and advance the quilt through the frame. That takes more time and isn’t very efficient.
To make the best use of my quilting space, I machine quilted three rows of Flame Key into one area. As a result, this maximized the quilting space I had available, secured over 5 inches of the baby quilt. Then I advanced the quilt over and quilted the remaining rows of Flame Key in that space.
Be Willing to Modify Your Machine Quilting Design
This is a great example of how we must be willing to modify a quilting design based on our machine and setup. On a home machine in a table, I could have quilted Flame Key right across the quilt with no issue and therefore no need to change the design.
On a Hoop Frame like the Cutie Frame, the best choice was to modify the design slightly to maximize my quilting space within the hoop of the frame. As a result, I was able to quilt more of my quilt with less effort and in less time!
I hope you enjoyed this fun quilting tutorial on machine quilting a baby quilt with this beginner design Flame Key. Click Here to find the original quilting tutorial for Flame Key.
Let’s go quilt,
Leah Day
