FMQA - Lines and Angles

I spent some time this evening practicing lines and angles as part of the free motion quilt along (FMQA) led by Christina at A Few Scraps.

I practiced making the various shapes on paper first, pretty much copying what she did.  I liked her suggestions.

There's a rhythm to drawing these out, a "beat" to the repetitive pen strokes on paper.  Sometimes a song would pop into my head from that.  I also thought of names for most of the designs, which sometimes related to whatever song I heard in my head, as well as the overall look of a design.

For example, here's what I came up with on this page, from left to right:

• Name:  Frankenstein.  Song:  "Frankenstein" by Edgar Winter Group
• Name:  Snore
• Name:  Gap Tooth
• [Nothing came to mind]
• Name:  Pueblo
• [Yuck. Had trouble drawing this one.]
• Name:  T-Square.  Song:  "Green Onions" by Booker T & the MGs.
• Name:  Elf Ears

And on this page, left to right:

• Name:  Telephone Line.  Song:  "Telephone Line" by ELO, and "Telephone Song" by Stevie Ray Vaughan.
• Name: [Nothing came to mind].  Song:  "I Know What I Am" by Band of Skulls.
• Name:  Kite Tails (Christina's very apt description).
• Name:  Yard Sale Signs
• Name:  Stringed Peas
• Name:  Spiral Sixes
• Name:  P's, G's & Q's (I felt like I was writing those letters).

When it came to quilting these shapes, it was a whole 'nother story.  I put on some music but not what you might expect:  Classical music on public radio.  Classical music doesn't distract me when I'm concentrating, and believe me, I was about to be concentrating.

I'm still all over the map with my machine speed, stitch length, etc.  That's just going to take some time and more practice.

What I learned was that it helped to pause a bit at the point of an angle or else it'd be rounded.  And doing plain zig-zaggy stitching was harder than it looked.

Also?  Those kite tails were freakin' ridiculous to stitch!  I gave up and went on to some funky looking stars instead.  I kind of like how they turned out.

My favorite is—gee, wouldn't you know I didn't name that one, but it looks like Post-It Notes on alternating sides of a string (far right in the pic below).  I also like the retro look of Telephone Line (third from right below), although it was a little tricky to get the hang of at first.

So that's the second week's report.  I wish, for your sakes, my practice quilt wasn't quite so fugly, but for me it's what I needed—no pressure to make anything pretty, just to get on with it.