Doodle Your Way to Better Quilting

January 5, 2022
Quilt doodles, Lori Kennedy

Today’s Topic: Doodle Your Way to Better Quilting

Happy New Year, Quilters and Doodlers!

Let’s start the quilting year by getting back to basics–doodling!

You CAN doodle YOUR way to better machine quilting!

In my humble opinion, doodling is the fastest way to improve your quilting.  It improves your hand-eye coordination and helps you plan your quilting design.

I guarantee–if you doodle every day for 15 minutes, within two weeks your quilting will improve!

With that in mind, let’s begin January 2022 with a series of doodling exercises.

Today, we will doodle spirals.

Spirals-A Basic Letter in the Quilting Alphabet

If free motion quilting had an alphabet, spirals would be the letter A.  It is the alpha in my quilting repertoire.  Spirals can stand alone or be the center of a flower.  Spirals can be a background fill or a central motif.  I’m pretty sure there are spirals in every quilt I’ve ever made!

So let’s doodle spirals!

Get out your favorite pen and a notebook (For this series of exercises it will be best to keep everything together in a notebook.)

Begin by doodling rows and rows of spirals.  Practice the spirals three ways:

First, create the spiral by starting on the outer edge and rotating inward.

Next, doodle spirals by starting in the center and rotating outward–see how big you can make your spiral.

Finally, start on the outside and in one continuous line, spiral in and then back out again.

Spirals Large, Spirals Small

Continue doodling spirals by making big spirals, then small spirals.

Then try patterns of big and small spirals.

And be sure to practice both clockwise and counterclockwise spirals!

Pencils and Pens Make a Difference!

Try a variety of writing tools for doodling.  Some pen/paper combinations are easier than others.

For example, I usually love to doodle with a fountain pen, but this paper was too smooth and I found it difficult to control.  The crayon and pencil worked much better.

More Doodling All Month

I plan to dedicate a lot of time to doodling this month.

We will add a new motif tomorrow.

So get your crayons sharpened!

And of course, if a doodle makes you feel like quilting–jump right in and try it!

This Made Me Laugh Today

I saw this on Instagram today and had to share!  Living in MN, I can relate!

What about YOU?

What made YOU laugh today?

Are YOU ready to doodle and quilt your way through winter/2022?

Do YOU have any quilting related resolutions for 2022?

YOUR Doodlicious Quilter,

Loodle Lori

PS…All tutorials, images and information are the property of Lori Kennedy Quilts and are intended for personal use only.  Feel free to re-blog, pin or share with attribution to LKQ.  For all other purposes, please contact me at Lori@LoriKennedyQuilts.com!

Check out my books on Etsy:  LoriKennedyShop

 

 

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