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The Beginner Building Blocks Quilt

Josh here today, and I invite you back in time with me to 2014 as we take a look at one of our best beginner quilting projects, the Building Blocks Quilt Along.

Josh and Leah Day Free Motion quilting

If you want to significantly improve your free motion quilting, the Building Blocks Quilt is your ticket. With 12 unique blocks, you'll get more than enough practice free motion quilting each three to four times to make 42 blocks for the finished quilt.

The best part is you can't get more beginner than I was with free motion quilting! Forget free motion -- I had never operated a foot pedal to make as much as one machine stitch. In fact, the only physical contact I had with sewing machines was carrying them for Leah to classes and workshops.

Take a look at my beginner free motion quilting in the blocks below:

Building Blocks quilt panel

 

And here's Leah with her finished quilt:

Leah Day's Building Blocks quilt


If you've been wanting to stitch along with a raw beginner, I've put together a youtube playlist with hours of my beginner stitching in free motion. Sometimes Leah is beside me as I quilt, offering tips and advice, and sometimes I'm on my own. Learn with me as I struggle through circles, which was extremely difficult at first, and laugh with us as I yank off the knee lifter and experience almost immediate improvement in stitching!

Click Here to purchase and download your Building Blocks quilt pattern. We assembled all written instructions from our monthly quilt along into one convenient PDF pattern, totaling 94 pages!

I quilted my blocks on printed Spoonflower Fabric. You can find this fabric available in three colorways:

Building Blocks in Blue and Gray Building Blocks Colorful on White Building Blocks Colorful on Purple 

If you purchase the Spoonflower Fabric, make sure to select 3 yards so you'll receive all 42 quilt blocks for the Building Blocks Quilt.

If you're committed to daily practice your free motion quilting skills, Building Blocks is for you. And if you put in as little as an hour of quilting a day as I did, I guarantee you'll see improvement in no more than a week's time.

1 comment

Hi Josh & Leah! I want to quilt along with you but I’m from South Africa and your time is about 8-10 hours ahead of ours. Would it be possible for me to download the lessons? I bought a long arm quilting machine about two moths ago and did a free motion quilting cource but I’m not half way where I want to be!! I did free motion quilting on my sit down machine but the long arm is a little bit tricky for me at this stage!! Thank you for all your wonderful video’s!! Love from sunny South Africa Elna.

Elna,

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