During all of our longarm rentals, we provide renters with their choice of Omni thread and paper pantographs. For the majority of our renters that's exactly what they want to finish their quilts. But there are some folks who want to do a little more with their quilting. For some, the pantographs are too constricting and they want to play more with the quilting. Here's a few renters who gave their quilts the custom treatment. Isn't Pat's quilt striking? The colors and the pattern really grab your attention. Pat could have easily quilted this with a simple edge to edge design in a thread that blends well across those reds, but that doesn't bring Pat joy. So instead she used a light grey thread and had some fun! In the red strips around the grey "x's" Pat quilted ribbon candy (here's a video on how to quilt ribbon candy). In the grey strips, where her thread won't show as much, she quilted straight lines about a quarter inch from the ditch. In the red squares she quilted continuous curves that create a flower petal feel. And in the sashing around those squares she quilted branching curls (here's a video on how to quilt those curls). Her quilting looks like so much fun! Aren't One Block Wonder quilts just amazing? It still blows me away that you can create so many different variations with one floral fabric. I think I might need to add this to my Quilts Bucket List… Usually I would recommend a simple edge to edge design for a quilt like this. There is so much movement in Pam's quilt that you won't be able to see the quilting. But being the overachiever she is, Pam added these fun prairie points to her inner border. She needed to take special care with her points so that she didn't accidentally stitch them down. In that inner border she echoed the prairie points with straight lines and she used a melon shaped template to quilt arches in the outer border. In the hexies she quilted continuous curves that are fast and fun once you've figured out the path. Can you see how her quilting gets a little lost in the fabric? It's a little easier to see in the back than from the front. Doesn't all the texture in the center of the quilt look awesome? This fun Dizzy Daisy quilt is by Sue and she made it for a lucky baby girl. Like Pat, Sue is a free motion quilting kind of girl. She wanted to play with the daisy theme, so she quilted daisies in the sashings and at the center of each flower. In the flower petals she added big curls that mimic the motion in the block. For a little more interest, Sue used a light variegated thread called Affinity Grain. Her quilt looks amazing! Those daisies are actually really fun and super fast to quilt. Her quilting looks very impressive and she finished this whole quilt in just a couple of hours. Custom quilting can really change the look and feel of your quilt, you just need to jump in and give it a try!