Stippling

I did it! I overcame my fear of free motion quilting and actually stipped (is that a word?) Little Man's quilt last week. It pretty much took me all day (counting all breaks I had to take for caring for little guys and my sore, aching arms), but I was thrilled by the results. I found Larissa's free motion quilting tips very helpful. This tutorial was really good too and has a lot of good photos.

I skipped the practice step of working with simple sandwiches of fabric and batting because I was afraid that if it didn't go well I would give up. Instead, I dove right in and learned on Little Man's quilt (because once I had it started, I wasn't going to be able to chicken out and stop). My first attempts were ugly.

And along the way there was some unattractive pulling on the back (By the way, does anyone know what caused it? It isn't really looping, it's just that the bottom thread is pulling the top thread through more than it should in some places.)
By the end, though, this is what the top looked like, and the overall effect is wonderful. I'm so happy that I conquered my intimidation and tried something new.

I'll definitely be doing more free motion quilting in the future!