Quilting Stencils

I have had "quilter's block". It's kind of like writer's block, but since I'm a quilter and not a writer, it's my quilts, and not my books, that aren't getting finished. I have been unable to move forward from this point. It has everything to do with inspiration and nothing to do with skill. I am perfectly capable of quilting but, I have hit a wall. And I have been standing in front of that wall too long. It's time to climb over it or blast through it. 

I have LOTS of quilt tops that need quilting. Nothing special-just a nice all over pattern to get them finished will be fine. But you can't meander every single quilt in your stash~that's just plain boring! I needed inspiration. Like a lot of my solutions, this one started with my friends. And they don't even know it. :-)  Anne has been finishing one UFO after another this year. She sends her quilts out to be quilted, and sends me pictures of them when she gets them back. Her quilter has been doing beautiful overall patterns with swirls or flowers or whatever suits the quilt. I love them and thought to myself that maybe I should have bought a long arm with a frame so that I could do pantographs. (I'm not confident enough yet to attempt this free style!)

Fast forward to two weeks ago. My friend, Judy and I were shopping together at our favorite quilt shop, A Scarlet Thread, and I spied a rack with some quilting stencils on it. I was hit with inspiration, like I had been hit with a lightning bolt! One of the stencils was a continuous line design with dragonflies. Judy was so encouraging. She said that she has used stencils and "pounce" with great results and that I could do it too. So, I bought it. 

When I got home I decided that I needed more stencils like this.....so I went online to The Stencil Company and found five more stencils that I could use for an overall quilting pattern. They arrived in just a few days and now I am ready to start quilting! Wish me luck! I'll let you know how it goes :)

Happy Quilting!

Grammy