design – Quilt for Joy

Patchwork baby quilt

Published on April 15, 2026April 24, 2026 by Kathryn Strasser1 Comment

This afternoon I finished long-arm machine quilting a baby quilt that my younger sister pieced. It is a fun mix of blues, golds, and peach fabrics in a variety of patterns.

My sister left it up to me to choose the over-all quilting design and I chose double loops, one of my favorite designs for baby quilts, especially quilts that have a lot of pattern and color in the fabrics.

As part of the design I also stitched the name of the baby one to the quilt in a square that wasn’t too patterned. Adding a name to a quilt is a fun way to add personalization and can be done in various ways.

For this quilt, I transitioned from the over-all double loops into cursive lettering and then continued the double loops. I went back after finishing the over-all design to dot the “I” and cross the ‘T.”

I really enjoy long-arm quilting baby quilts. They have some of the cutest fabrics, and helping my clients finish a sweet baby gift brings me so much joy! I hope the mom-to-be and the baby that this quilt are going to feel joy when they use this precious little quilt!

Do you have a quilt top ready for machine quilting? Get in touch with me to discuss my long-arm quilting services!

Using loops as an over-all quilting design

Published on April 14, 2026April 14, 2026 by Kathryn Strasser1 Comment

Loops are an excellent choice as an over-all quilting design! They are simple enough to avoid distracting from the quilt piecing, but they add movement and texture to the finished quilt.

Using loops is one of my go-to long-arm machine quilting designs to use on baby quilts because of the playfulness this design adds to the quilt.

The picture below is of a baby quilt I machine quilted for my grandma several years ago. She embroidered the cross stitch blocks and my mom helped her piece them together with the colored boarders. On the long-arm machine I outlined the embroidered animals and blocks and then filled in the rest of the quilt with loops.

Variations of over-all loops

In addition to single loops used in an over-all pattern, I sometimes use variations of loops to create different looks. Below is an example of a double loop. This variation gives more texture and visual interest than a basic loop and is a fun way to add more dimension to the quilting design.

Another variation on over-all loops is the quilt a loop and then stich in a circular pattern around the loops one or more times to create a spiral look. This design works well on quilts that have a lot of straight edges or angles in the piecing as it gives softness and motion to the finished quilt.

Do you have a quilt top you have had finished with a loop design, or one you are piecing that loops would be a good choice as an over-all quilting design for? I would love to hear about your project in the comments below!

Squares and Swirls!

Published on February 18, 2017 by Kathryn Strasser1 Comment

One of my favorite parts about doing custom long-arm machine quilting is the opportunity to see what so many different people do with their fabrics and piecing patterns for their quilts. This quilt that I worked with over my Thanksgiving break last November is one that really caught my eye. The design is so unique, and I love the color combination!

My client left it up to me to decide what design to stitch onto this quilt. Because of all the straight lines in the piecing thanks to the square pattern, I chose a swirl pattern to add some texture and motion with the curved stitching. The piecing was very straightforward, so I wanted to keep the custom machine quilting simple to avoid having too much going on.

I hope you enjoyed these squares and swirls as much as I did! Thanks for stopping by the blog today, and I hope you come again soon!

~ By Kathryn

T-Shirt Quilts 2.0

Published on November 29, 2016December 8, 2016 by Kathryn StrasserLeave a comment

The T-shirt quilt pictured here, and the T-shirt quilt I posted about here were made by sisters with the help of their grandma. Even though they both used the same sashing fabric and layout design, I love how their individual personalities came through in the different T-shirts they used.

When I asked what type of long-arm quilting design the customer wanted, she told me to do an over-all design similar to what I have done for her in the past. She likes a little variety in the quilting.

To go along with the fun colors, I decided to do loops and add in some echoed loops to mix things up a bit. I made sure to do some of the echoed loops in areas of plain fabric so that they would show up more.

This quilt had this fun, flannel fabric for a backing which will make it a wonderful quilt to have on hand a winter approaches!

~ By Kathryn

Squares!

Published on November 21, 2016November 22, 2016 by Kathryn StrasserLeave a comment

This quilt was pieced by my mom and custom long-arm quilted by me a few months ago as an apartment warming gift for my older brother. We chose browns and blacks for a color scheme to match the furniture that my brother has in his new place.

To stay with the rectangle theme, I used the long-arm machine to custom quilt squares all over the quilt. This was great practice for me in free-handing straight lines, and my brother was quite impressed when he saw the finished quilting!

This quilt looks great in the living area of my brother’s apartment, and it is super comfy to curl up with while watching a football game on the TV… (I know because I’ve done it)!

Thanks for reading!

~ By Kathryn

T-Shirts Quilts 1.0

Published on November 17, 2016 by Kathryn Strasser1 Comment

T-shirt quilts are so special and unique! I love getting to spend time thinking about the stories behind each of the shirt squares as I add my custom, long-arm machine quilting.

The varity of T-shirts in the quilt had enough in common color wise to create a really neat color scheme of grays, reds, and blacks.

I added a combination of loops, swirls, and feathers with some echoing to this quilt with the long-arm machine.

The gray flannel backing fabric shows off the custom quilting very well, and makes the finished quilt so cozy! This was a fabulous quilt to work with, and having the privilege of adding my custom quilting to it made me so happy!

Thanks for visiting the blog today!

~By Kathryn

Kirstin’s Quilt

Published on September 26, 2016September 26, 2016 by Kathryn StrasserLeave a comment

My younger sister made her first quilt this summer! I’m a little late in posting these photos to my blog, but here they finally are 🙂

Kirstin has helped me out in the past by assisting with cutting the fabric for some of the quilts I have made, and with that practice she was ready to make a quilt by herself this summer.

Kirstin loves the pink and zebra color scheme, so for this quilt she asked me to do long-arm quilting that looked like zebra stripes in the pink chevrons. Since the multi-colored fabrics had busy patterns that would hide most of the long-arm quilting, I chose to do fun bubbles as a filler.

The finished quilt looks great in Kirstin’s pink and zebra bedroom!

~ By Kathryn

Sampler Snapshot

Published on September 17, 2016September 18, 2016 by Kathryn Strasser2 Comments

I’m excited to share some photos today of a sampler quilt that I made a few years ago.

My mom had gifted me the fabric which sat unused in my project box for several months. I absolutely loved the colors and patterns, but I was waiting until I came across just the right project to use the fabric for. As I was scrolling through Pinterest one day I saw a chevron quilt pattern and I knew that this was the pattern that I’d been looking for to go with these fabrics. Once I settled on a project idea I jumped right in, and in this case I was especially excited to get to the machine quilting stage! That provided plenty of motivation to finish piecing the quilt top in a relatively short amount of time.

Most of the fabrics have patterns which hide the custom machine quilting to some extent. Because of this I saved some of my favorite quilting patterns for the solid chevrons. I had so much fun long-arm quilting on a smaller scale then I usually do, as well as quilting a different pattern in each chevron stripe.

The photos of the back of this quilt are a little crazy to look at because I chose a polka-dot fabric, but these two photos allow you to see some of the different designs that I did in each of the chevrons. (Note: if you want the custom long-arm quilting that you have done on your quilt to show up well on the back, choose a solid fabric for your backing).

I was so happy with how this quilt turned out, and it perfectly matches the chair that I have in my room (now in my college dorm room)! It’s the perfect spot to curl up with a textbook to do some studying, or with a good book to enjoy a few lazy afternoon hours!

~By Kathryn

Baby Blocks

Published on September 10, 2016September 15, 2016 by Kathryn Strasser1 Comment

There are few things cuter than baby quilts, and this one was no exception! My grandma hand embroidered the blocks for this quilt which was a shower gift for my cousin and her husband who are expecting their first baby very soon!

When choosing a quilting design I wanted to be sure that the embroidered blocks were highlighted by the long-arm quilting. I used the long-arm machine to echo each of the embroidered animals and blocks.

To fill in the rest of the quilt, I long-arm quilted larger loops to look like bubbles for a playful look. The bubbles also matched the backing fabric that this quilt had.

This was a fun quilt to add custom quilting to on the long-arm machine and I can’t wait to hold the new baby when he or she arrives!

~ By Kathryn

Basketball & Bridges

Published on August 19, 2016September 15, 2016 by Kathryn StrasserLeave a comment

My little brother (who’s only little cause he is younger than me… Height wise he has me beat) moved into his first apartment earlier this summer, so my mom and I teamed up to make him this quilt as an apartment warming gift. He is a big fan of the Golden State Warriors pro-basketball team, so we used their team colors in this quilt.

When deciding how to custom quilt this throw sized quilt, mom and I realized that the piecing design created spaces that looked similar to the Golden Gate Bridge which is the logo for the Warriors basketball team.

This custom quilting definitely gave me lots of extra practice in free-hand quilting straight lines both vertically in the blue spaces, and horizontally in the yellow pieces. My brother was pleased with the result, and the quilt adds lots of fun color to his living room!

By Kathryn