Dara Tomasson - Doodle School: A Daily Design Challenge to Up Your Free-Motion Quilting Game

PUBLISHER: Amy Barrett-Daffin

CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Gailen Runge

ACQUISITIONS EDITOR: Roxane Cerda

MANAGING EDITOR: Liz Aneloski

EDITOR: Beth Baumgartel

TECHNICAL EDITOR: Susan Allen

COVER/BOOK DESIGNER: April Mostek

PRODUCTION COORDINATOR: Zinnia Heinzmann

PRODUCTION EDITOR: Alice Mace Nakanishi

ILLUSTRATORS: Dara Tomasson, Amy Colleen Robertson, and Mary E. Flynn

PHOTOGRAPHY: As listed here, unless otherwise noted

Front cover: Vanessa Lust

Front and back cover details, Dedication/Acknowledgments, Contents: Estefany Gonzalez of C&T Publishing, Inc.

Vanessa Lust

Amy Colleen Robertson

Vanessa Lust

Published by Stash Books, an imprint of C&T Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 1456, Lafayette, CA 94549

Dedication

To my four sons and daughter for teaching me patience, love, and how to be more Christlike. To my husband for being my best friend, my biggest supporter, and the love of my life.

Dara

To my mother, Carin Snyder, who has a head full of horse stories that have never been published. Thank you for believing in me and loving me unconditionally and for sharing so many of your talents.

Amy

Acknowledgments

So grateful for Amy, who jumped in with both feet to create this book with me. I also want to thank Deena Rutter for inspiring me to really dream bigger than I ever imagined by teaching me the tools that have literally changed my life beyond everything I thought was possible.

Dara

Thank you, Dara, for inviting me to create this book with you. It has been an honor and an incredible opportunity. Thanks to my husband, Tim, and my kids for their patience when I was completely unavailable during the final days before my first deadlines. Thank you to everyone at Nuttalls and the long list of teachers, in person and online, who have trained me in longarm quilting. Thank you to my fabulous customers who trust me with their precious quilts. Finally, thank you to Beth, Roxane, Liz, Susan, Zinnia, and everyone at C&T Publishing/Stash Books for bringing this book into the world.

Amy

INTRODUCTION TO DOODLING

Welcome to Doodle School! Were so excited youve decided to join us. Doodling is one of the best ways to boost your free-motion quilting confidence and jumpstart your free-motion skills. How do we know? Because were both continuous-line doodlers. Weve seen the difference doodling has made in our free-motion quilting.

What do we mean when we say were continuous-line doodlers? When we doodle for free
motion practice, we draw our entire doodle without lifting our pens from the paper. This is important because when you are free-motion quilting, you nearly always create your designs with a continuous line of stitching. If you want to truly simulate the experience of free-motion quilting when you doodle, youve got to doodle with a continuous line.

Why Doodle?

You may be wondering, Why doodle? Why not just practice free-motion quilting on my machine? There are so many great reasons to doodle. Thats why were so enthusiastic about it.

Doodle to Save Money

Lets start with cost savings. Doodling on paper is much less expensive than practicing on your machine. When you practice on your machine, you use thread, fabric, and batting every time. You also use your machine, which means more wear and tear on your most expensive quilting tool.

You also run the risk of ruining precious quilt tops if you decide to quilt them before youve had some practice. Even seasoned quilters doodle out ideas before they start quilting on the machine.

Experienced quilters also want to know how their design will look before they start stitching. It makes sense, doesnt it? Havent we all had experience with envisioning things a certain way in our heads only to find that they dont look nearly as good in reality? When in doubt, doodle it out. In fact, doodle it out even if you are certain.

Doodle to Save Yourself Stress

Traveling around the quilt, entering and exiting designs, and traveling within a design are all things that can be quite stressful if you havent thought them out before you started quilting. Doodling your designs beforehand takes so much of this stress away.

Doodle for Convenience

You cant take your machine with you when you pick your kids up from school. While youre waiting in the car, however, you can always pull out your notebook and get some doodling practice. And what about doodling before bed? Wed like to see you take your machine to bed with you!

Doodle to Get Inspired

Doodling also gives you more opportunity to experiment and be creative. You can play as much as you like in your notebook. If something doesnt work out, well, its not a big loss. What youll find, however, is that when you play with your doodles, you come up with ideas that surprise you. When youre quilting, you usually dont want to take risks. But if youre not taking risks, youre also not going to try anything new. Taking risks and discovering new designs is so much easier when you doodle.

Doodle to Keep a Record

Another wonderful thing about doodles is that theyre easy to save. Doodles fit neatly into your notebooks, on thin sheets of paper. They are much easier to save than quilt sandwiches! Why should you save your doodles? You might be surprised if we told you how many times weve referred back to our doodles for ideas and inspiration. Even the doodles that didnt look very good when we drew them have sparked new ideas when weve looked at them later. Any doodle can be a great jumping-off point for a new idea.

While youre doodling, use that as a time to take notes. Write down things that come to mind that you dont want to forget. Circle areas in your doodles that you want to improve. Scribble in the margins or anywhere you find a space. This way, your doodle journal becomes a place where you can observe and reflect.

Doodle to Decide

Doodling helps you see what a design will look like on a quilt. Another advantage of doodling is that you can try out multiple plans for a quilt. You can draft out your quilt, make some copies, and try a few different quilting plans. Doodling a few designs on paper provides the opportunity to compare and contrast ideas.

Doodle to Increase Your Skills

Doodling is also a wonderful way to build muscle memory. When you practice designs repeatedly, your body and your mind work together so that you can quilt your designs nearly effortlessly. Your curves become smoother and your lines straighter. Your aim becomes nearly perfect. Time spent doodling increases your confidence when you bring your designs to the machine.

Doodle to Save Your Body

Doodling your designs over and over (with breaks, might we mention) puts much less strain on your body than quilting them over and over. We wont lie, you probably will experience some hand cramping when you doodle. The right types of pens tend to lessen cramping (see Pens).

Doodle to See Your Progress

Weve already talked about doodling as a convenient way to keep a record. One reason you might want to keep a record is so that you can see how far youve come. Sometime in the future, you may feel like youre not getting anywhere. We all hit walls and we all get discouraged sometimes. Your doodle notebooks can be a wonderful remedy for discouragement. When you look through your doodles, recognize your hard work and give yourself the praise you deserve.