Why I Created the Free Motion Quilting Masterclass

In this episode, I share the story behind my Free Motion Quilting Masterclass, explaining how I discovered my passion for longarm quilting and developed techniques to help others master freehand quilting without patterns or templates.

Resources Mentioned:

• Free Motion Quilting Masterclass: Available at stitchedbysusan.com under the "Learn" tab
• YouTube Channel: "Stitched by Susan" featuring live quilting demonstrations on select Fridays
• Pinterest: "Stitched by Susan" with a board called "My Gallery, Edge to Edge" showcasing quilting designs

Special Offers:

• Cozy Earth bamboo sheets: 40% off with code "MEASURE" at cozyearth.com
• Registration for the Free Motion Quilting Masterclass opens twice yearly (currently May 2025)
• Six weeks of bonus live sessions with Susan for new class participants

About the Free Motion Quilting Masterclass:

• Comprehensive training for domestic and longarm machines
• Teaches over 25 specific quilting designs
• Focuses on practice methods to advance skills
• Teaches thought processes to create original designs
• Especially helpful for quilters intimidated by freehand work
• Emphasizes affordable "edge-to-edge" designs for everyday quilts

Upcoming Events:

• Live, informal sessions on YouTube throughout May 2025
• New "KNOT of Freehand Quilters" group launching soon

Connect with Susan:

• Website: stitchedbysusan.com
• YouTube: Stitched by Susan
• Pinterest: Stitched by Susan

Want to try free motion quilting but don't know where to start? Here's 3 simple steps to get going.

Transcript

0:47

Welcome to season five of Measure Twice. Cut. Once this entire season has been an exploration into behind the scenes of not just quilting, but building a creative business that truly lights you up as someone who's navigated the exciting and sometimes quite bumpy world of turning a passion into a profession, I'm excited to pull back the curtain and share my own experiences. Some episodes will be just me diving deep into my own personal journey. While other episodes will feature guests who are also navigating the world of creative entrepreneurship, we'll explore the nitty gritty of building a creative business, the lessons learned and the unexpected challenges that come with transforming your craft. Into a thriving enterprise, and don't worry, I'm not leaving storytelling behind. Instead, I'll be weaving them into the conversations about what it takes to grow a business while staying true to your creative spirit. So whether you are dreaming of starting your own business, or you just love hearing about creative entrepreneurship, this season is for you. This episode is sponsored by my free Motion Quilting Masterclass. This online on-demand course is a comprehensive training for mastering freehand quilting skills and navigating design decisions. It not only teaches over 25 specific quilting designs. But they're demonstrated at both a long arm and a domestic sewing machine. But in addition, and this is what sets it apart from other courses, is that I also teach the practice methods that advance your skill and your thought processes that enable you to create your own designs, your own original quilting designs with confidence. For more information on this class, I've provided a link in the show notes, or you can simply head to my website stitched by susan.com, and from there, click on the learn tab. Registration opens twice a year, but you're welcome to join the wait list at any time, and then you'll be the first to know when the doors open. So once again, the link is in the show notes or the learn tab on my website. Let's talk a minute about the idea of quilting machine quilting absolutely freehand with no pattern at all. No repeats, no lineups, no scaling. Let me tell you, it is incredibly freeing and it's immensely satisfying, but really I'm getting ahead of myself. How did I come to that conclusion? Well, it's all Mary's fault. You might remember Mary from episode 10 called Quilting Offers New Beginnings. My friend Mary is an extremely accomplished quilt maker. She does beautiful hand work of all kinds, embroidery, quilting, knitting, and she's also the first Longarm quilter that I got to know. One afternoon, she invited me to come to her quilting room, bring a baby quilt and play on her long arm. Of course, I did. And I knew that afternoon that this was what I wanted to do. The rest, as they say, is history. I searched out a used long arm, bought it and named her Lucy, and I've since changed long arms a couple of times, but I dived in and I've quilted over 1400 quilts since. Since then. No one. Was more surprised than me, believe me, when people began telling me I was an artist who knew, I certainly didn't. I mean, never in my life have I shown an inclination for sketching or painting or what I perceived as any artistic pursuits, but I met my medium in a motorized needle and thread. To this day, I can honestly say that I quilt better than I draw. Ask any client for whom I've tried to doodle my quilting ideas, and that's really true, but artistry. Drawing is just part of the picture. So my freehand quilting masterclass was developed directly from the need. I felt as a novice quilter myself for some practical training. I can vividly recall feeling absolutely overwhelmed with the choices to float the quilt top. Not to based or not, and do I have to use the same thread in the needle, in the bobbin? Or how in the world do I choose the right quilting design? And how does one avoid getting quilted into a corner? And oh, yes. Why do my circles look like they've been sat on? And the questions could go on and on. So this masterclass is what I wish I'd had. At my fingertips. I don't know how many of you recall handwriting classes, but they were a foundation and eventually a springboard to developing a personal handwriting style. Free hand quilting is just like that. Really. Each quilter stitching is as original as their handwriting. And just like handwriting, if some basic shapes are mastered and practiced. With focus and intention, they become second nature, and then they become a springboard for your own creative work. When you can quilt a beautiful shapely S-curve, you have a multitude of curvy designs at your fingertips. You know how I'm always raving about bamboo batting in my quilts while I found something that brings that same incredible softness to your entire sleep experience. Cozy earth's bamboo sheet set as a quilter. I'm pretty picky about the feel of fabric, and these are honestly the most luxurious sheets I've ever slept on. They're breathable, silky, smooth, and they feel amazing against your skin, and they get softer and softer with every wash. Great days. After all. Start with better nights and better nights. Start with cozy Earth sleep essentials. Not sure if you'll love them. Take a hundred nights to decide with a sleep trial and a 10 year warranty, visit cozy earth.com and use my exclusive code measure. That's M-E-A-S-U-R-E for 40% off your entire order. Prioritize your sleep, prioritize you, your creativity will. Thank you tomorrow. One more story that really illustrates, a specific. Impetus that propelled me into creating this freehand quilting masterclass. It happened a few years back. I'm a member of a local machine quilting guild, and that guild does an annual challenge around vintage quilts. So different years that has looked different ways, but this particular year, particular each person who entered the contest, it is indeed a contest. Received a little box with some vintage. Quilt blocks in it. So not a completed top. Not a whole quilts worth, just some, and you never know what you're getting. You have to cast your lot in, buy your competition ticket, and then you receive these surprise blocks. So the ones that I received were, let's see if I can describe them for you visually, they were kind of like. Elongated diamonds. So they had parallel sides and then a point at each end, and they were about seven inches by three and a half or four, and I got 26 of these blocks. So not nearly enough for a whole quilt, but as part of this competition or challenge, I'm able to add any fabric that I want to create my own original design. And then the requirement is. 10 months later at our local quilt show, I've got to bring the finished project, all quilted, heavy emphasis on quilting because we're a machine quilting guild, plus a storyboard that shows the progress of this project from these rather dirty little hand pieced blocks that I received to finished quilt. What I had in my favor was. Nine months to work on it, right before I had to deliver it to the quilt show. So at the very early part of this year, I was sitting, looking at these blocks. I literally had them spread out all over my sewing room floor, arranging them this way, arranging them that way, auditioning different fabrics with them. What in the world am I going to do and. The idea that came to me was to make this swath of blocks, so to arrange them kind of geometrically and then have this diagonal swath of them across a solid kind of iris colored background. And there was some of that color in the blocks and it just spoke to me and it said fifties so much to me. So that kind of, um, sleek. Fifties clean lines is what I was after. Well, when I envisioned that layout for the quilt top, I also had this vision in my head of quilting that would really play up, emphasize that diagonal swath. And so I wanted all my quilting to literally travel diagonally on the quilt too. And I had a very vivid idea in my mind of what I'd like that quilting to be. But here's where the catch was. I didn't feel like I had the skill to do the kind of intricate eye-catching quilting that I envisioned. It needed real control, real, um, intricacy, real precision, and I didn't feel like I had it. Like I said earlier, I had this nine months, so I actually spent a period of that time. You know, piecing the quilt was honestly the easy part, but I spent a period of those months. Researching how people learn, and I don't just mean quilting. How do people learn academic things? How do people memorize poems? How does a golfer improve his game? How does a musician learn an instrument? Or maybe even someone who's not a musician, but wants to learn to competently play one instrument? How do people approach that and are there shortcuts to make that learning process quicker rather than spending. Years and years and years. You've heard the quote, I'm sure that says that mastery of something requires 10,000 hours of repetition. I mean, 10,000 hours certainly will make you better, but I only had nine months. I did not have 10,000 hours. Can I get significantly better at my quilting control at my Longarm machine in just a few months of time? So long story short. I made the quilt. I was happy with my quilting. I handed it in and it got second place, which was lovely. And out of it came this thought process of, Hey, if I can do that, if I can find ways to shorten the learning curve, I. To provide quicker results to see change in quilting. I can show others how to do this. So that is literally where the Free Motion Quilting Masterclass was born. The next year, I started pulling together a class outline, my own original designs, and then teaching my process with them of how to learn these foundational shapes and movements and really ramp up quilting. Um, control and, um, competency in a hurry. It was so, so fun. The finished result now is. This masterclass really emphasizes, edge to edge quilting, which is my personal favorite. My personal love. Edge to edge just means the same quilting design is over the entire quilt top rather than specific things in blocks and areas. And I love this edge to edge style of quilting because most of the quilts I do are for family use, right? So they're not hyper fussy. My clients are not looking for expensive heirloom quilting. They're just looking for pretty serviceable quilting at an affordable price. So this method. Really lines up all those things together. So my intention in the class then is to kind of take away a bunch of the mystery and the intimidation of just getting started quilting without a pattern. That's a big scary thing for many quilters, stitching without a computer driving or a pantograph to guide your every line. Well, it feels a little like letting go of your training wheels. I mean, your heart kind of races. You start sweating a little and get a bit wobbly. Or you stand and stare at the quilt and never get started. Does that sound familiar? If it does, this class is the perfect place for you. So in the next few weeks I'm going to be launching another knot, A-K-N-O-T of Freehand, quilters, and walking alongside them through the masterclass. So all the lessons are prerecorded. You can absolutely watch them at your leisure. They're yours for forever. You can watch them as fast or as slow, or press rewind as often as you want to. But for a period of six weeks, I'll walk alongside and have. Bonus live sessions each week where you can ask me any questions. I can do some drawings for you, that sort of thing. So if you'd like to explore the syllabus, like what's in each lesson some more, just head to my website stitched by susan.com, And click on the learn tab. Look for the free motion quilting masterclass. you'll also find lots of frequently asked questions there, that might answer some of your questions about it. And also as I'm recording this, it is in the month of May, 2025, and I'll be doing lots of live, impromptu or informal live sessions on YouTube this month. So it's a great place to come with your questions. I'll do my best to answer them. I'll be talking about many things machine quilting related, not only long arm. And just sharing some of my insights and the things that I've learned, and it's an opportunity for us to get to know each other a little bit My mission, my heartfelt mission is to help as many quilters as I can get past the starting. Position, the starting line where I wanna help you feel comfortable loading up a quilt, starting out with a design, not having to buy a pattern that someone else has designed, not having to figure out repeats and line matching and all those things, but to get comfortable at your quilting machine and confident. That you can do these freehand quilting designs. So in support of the masterclass, which teaches the specific designs and practice methods, I also go live on YouTube on Fridays, and I generally do it one or two Fridays a month, and I livestream the actual quilting of a project. So I'm welcoming you into my studio to kind of look over my shoulder as I'm working on usually a client quilt. And so. Because they're often prints and florals and so forth. It's not so much about the quilting design as an opportunity for you to see the big picture, how I do load that quilt up, how I deal with wavy borders or not so straight seam lines or bulky seam intersections, or whatever the case may be in that particular quilt. I'll be a hundred percent honest with you. Things do not always go perfectly smoothly on the show, and that's why I've called it Quiltings first reality show. I do not edit out things like thread breaks or tension issues, or perhaps even things that I forget to do because I'm so busy talking. The truth is I'm still learning, learning all the time, and I love those informal livestream sessions because conversations take place. I get tips from viewers. We all get to learn together and you know, things run amuck in my studio just like they do in yours. So I choose not to edit those things out, but to let it show and show you what work truly looks like at my quilting machine. My YouTube channel is also called. Stitched by Susan. And then one last place you can find some visual ideas of what's in the masterclass is on my Pinterest account. Again, it's called Stitched by Susan, but there's a specific board called My Gallery, edge to Edge, All the designs on that board are edge to edge or all over ones, and I teach them either in my free motion quilting masterclass or in my advance monthly membership. So you're able to see them at work, at play, if you will, on actual quilts, and that can help you really visualize how those designs would look on your own quilts. Okay, summing things up. If you would like to see free motion quilting edge to edge style in action, do check out my YouTube channel. One or two Fridays a month, I go live. Just literally letting you come into my studio and watching me work through a project and chat while I do it. So I'd love to have you join there. You can ask questions and I'll answer them. And if you want to learn how to quilt some of these designs and put them on your actual projects and have walkthroughs step by step by step, check out my free motion quilting masterclass. Again, it's on my website stitched by susan.com. Until next time, my friend, may your sorrows be patched and your joys be quilted.