Quilting with a Ruler Foot

I've been having so much fun checking out the entries for the Blogger's Quilt Festival, I can't resist adding another one! I love making all kinds of quilts, but baby quilts are my favorite to create and gift. They are the perfect size to make (big enough to be a satisfying project, yet small enough that they actually get finished!) and it is just plain fun to make something for a new little person.

This one is on its way to the new little girl of a wonderful friend from college. It's constructed entirely from half square triangles (I have a bit of a thing for HSTs...) in a herringbone pattern and made in Gooseberry fabric by Vanessa Goertzen of Lella Boutique.

This is the first time I quilted a quilt using my ruler foot. There is a learning curve on this technique, to be sure. I'm still learning to love it, but I think we'll be friends with time. I like the design possibilities that it opens up, as I am not one of those people who can free motion beautiful designs. For this design, I used the large curve on Piece 'N Quilt's 4-N-1 Machine Quilting Ruler. I'm still trying out different rulers and seeing what I like best, but I certainly like the flexibility of this one!

Some tips for ruler work:

Practice! Spend some time playing around with samples and getting a feel for the technique.

Though it never seems to make a difference for me with free motion quilting, dropping the feed dogs on my machine helped a lot with ruler work.

I needed to put more pressure on the ruler than I initially thought. Simply resting one hand on the ruler resulted in a lot of slippage. Really get a good grip on that ruler!

Happy sewing, everyone!