I have been working on this post for the last two days. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get this blog out. Apple season has officially started two weeks earlier than normal. With our crazy spring weather (warm March, cold April) we lost a bit of our apple crop. I do think I’ll be a better craft blogger during this apple season but there may be a few weeks of some sparse posting. Thanks for understanding and if you want to see what I’m up to instead of quilting be sure to head over to my orchard blog: www.lapackesorchard.blogspot.com.
Seasons Quilt
The middle portion of this convergence quilt sat up on my for years. Literally years. I initially put it together at the 2010 Quilts by by Barb Quilt Retreat and then it sat. Don’t get me wrong. I LOVED it. I was so happy with how the converging of two different tree printed batiks and some really rich hand-dyed fabrics worked together and created the ‘seasons’ effect that I had hoped for. But, I knew it needed more. This was not all it was to make it a ‘great’ quilt. 
What it needed was some appliquéd trees. I love how these trees added perfecting to the effect that I was going for. Just three trees was all it needed to add that bit of extra *bam*. 
This was the fourth piece I loaded onto my long arm machine and my *first* pieced piece that I actually cared about. It was a bit nerve wracking as I really wanted it to turn out great. I decided to use a turquoise/blue/brown/white variegated thread for the quilting. I’m really happy with that decision. It blended and contrasted at the same time which worked really well with the ‘convergence’ style of this piece.
The first thing I quilted was a little free motion quilt. I figured that all my trees didn’t have to be with fabric…I could ‘paint’ a few on with thread too.
I went to the ‘Free Motion Quilting Project’ blog to get some ideas for design in this piece. If you’re into free motion quilting at all I HIGHLY recommend this blog! There are 365 ideas for designs along with short ‘how to’ youtube video’s to go with them. I have a feeling this is going to become my ‘Free Motion Quilting Bible’ as far as patterns go!
Anyway – after a quick browse I determined that I was going to use this Abstract Leaf design for the ‘sky’ portion of the piece. It was fun, tree-ish and different – LOVE!
I did a pebble-esque quilting effect on the lower portion near the ‘ground’ of the quilt as well as ‘painted’ a few more trees in there.
I haven’t taken photo’s for selling this piece yet so here’s a cropped image from my RAW show in June. I’ll update this post with better pictures soon but over all I’m really happy with this piece!
The size of this piece is exactly why I purchased my long arm. I don’t really want to do bigger quilts…but you’ll hear in my next free motion quilting post why that isn’t always possible. And I have a lot more to learn!
You asked for thread recommendations – I love Superior Threads and just about always use their BottomLine in my bobbin and their King Tut, SoFine, Rainbows, Lava, Razzle Dazzle, and metallics. I usually use King Tut on top – love the one-inch varigation, but I really haven't found any of their thread that wasn't wonderful! Have a blast dancing with your machine!!
Awesome! thanks for the recommendations!