JANNY

I like to do my quilts completely myself. Have not sent any out to long armers yet. I do well with straight line designs and fmq large random or stippling. I also do a lot of hand quilting. How well do the ruler systems that I see advertised work for more complex designs? Worth the money or not? I would like to be able to do overall designs on some quilts.

rryder

Like any kind of FMQ, there is a learning curve to using the rulers. I have been using rulers and a ruler foot on my domestic machines for several years now and find them to be very useful in helping to reduce the amount of marking I have to do when doing certain kinds of designs. I tend to use a combination of ruler work and regular FMQ on most of my quilts.

You can combine very simple shaped rulers to create more complex designs, or you can get rulers that spin and are good for doing a specific kind of design. It just depends on what you want to do.

Rob

Tartan

Do you mean the rulers and ruler foot for regular sewing machine? You might like to watch the YouTube videos by Gina Perkes on using her rulers. There are also videos by the Westalee company on YouTube. As for how they work, Amy at freemotionquiltingadventures.blogspot.com/ has used some on her site and Craftsy classes.

Watson

Rulers are great for making some really cool designs, but like with anything, they take work and being shown how to get the most out of them. I'm currently taking the Westalee ruler class that makes the sampler quilt and it has really opened my eyes as to what you can do with the different shapes.
I must confess though that I do sometimes get the itch to just do it freehand...some of it would be faster that way! (Shhh...don't tell my instructor that my homework isn't strictly done with the rulers.)

Watson

quilterpurpledog

I am anxious to try them after some of your comments. I think the use of rulers requires a whole new skill set. I keep hanging back because the ruler foot for my BERNINA machine is about $100 and the rulers in addition to that. Kind of expensive.

Jingle

So far I am just haappy doing FMQ. I really like it and like doing it. Not interested in having particular designs on my quilts.

jmoore

I agree with Rob...there is definitely a learning curve but once you get the hang of them they can add some great designs to your quilting with some consistency.

quiltedsunshine

The Bernina ruler foot #72 is $80.49, and is a very nice foot. The Westalee ruler foot will work fine on your Bernina (that's what I use), and is $55 (comes with the arc ruler), but you have to buy the adapter shank #77 that is about $14. Bernina just had a 25% off sale. If you sign up for the email, you can catch the sale next time it comes around.

Westalee's starter set is $75 and comes with 6 templates. I've got a set for my Bernina 230 and one for my HQ Avante. I've sure had a lot of fun with ruler work. You can lay a foundation with the rulers, then add FMQ.

Sewnoma

I have just gotten into ruler work on my sit-down LA - I know you can do the same on a domestic machine but for whatever reason I didn't get into it until I had my LA.

I have to tell ya - I love ruler work! I wish I would have realized how much fun I'd have with it years ago! I love how precise it can be, and (for me, anyway) I can go much faster than if I'm trying to free-hand the designs. Even SITD is easier with a ruler. And I can make circles that are actually round now!

It's so easy it feels like cheating. I'm doing so much more quilting on my quilts now - I don't want to stop!

I've just picked up the feather template set this past weekend and am looking forward to trying that out. My hand-done feathers are just awful; I'm hoping this template set will open up some design options for me.

Now the hard part...not buying every template/ruler I see! I want all of them.

osewme

I recently purchased the Westalee ruler foot & received the arc ruler with it. I haven't had time to try it out much yet but really want to get into using rulers. Like Sewnoma, I want lots of rulers but will probably only have basic ones since they are so expensive. I think you can do a lot with a few rulers.