Originally Posted by JoyVoltenburg

Thank you!! No, I had never used a longarm before getting this one in March. I had done free motion on my regular sewing machine - which just always felt awkward and I usually wound up with at least one pucker on the backing. I did some fairly nice things on that setup, but nothing like what I can do with the longarm. I started out practicing on the longarm by just doing doodles - loops, feathers, stippling - everything I knew I wanted to do. Then I practiced ruler work doing crosshatch and eggs and darts on some placemats. I watched all the You Tube videos I could find on the subject and paid attention to the movement of the longarm. Then it was a matter of really studying the tension and getting to understand how the machine liked the thread and settings. The first couple of things I quilted, I was constantly diving under the frame to check the tension on the backing, but now, I 'm fairly confident of what's going on and only check now and then or when I change threads.