Today I have thee most darling bee quilt to share with you!! Angie makes the sweetest baby quilts for her grandbabies.

The darling quilt pattern is called Busy Little Bees and is designed by my client and her daughter, Angie Peterson and Nichole Needham.

Angie requested custom quilting, which was so fun to do. Creating beautiful quilty textures is one of my favorite things. Not every quilt should be custom quilted, but then there are quilts like this one that turn out amazing.

I knew when I saw the quilt for the first time, that I wanted to quilt my Overlapping Circles in the background. It’s one of my favorite background fillers. I actually teach it along with other freemotion designs in my Quilting It Freemotion video course. Check it out on my website. Go to: https://www.quiltingit.com/quilting-it-freemotion-course

In the bees I quilted ribbon candy, curved lines, diagonal lines, and swirls in the bottom wings. Making each piece pop.

I love how the quilting in the star blocks beautifully connect and frame the bees so perfectly. That might be one of my most favorite parts of the quilting.

The lines in the star blocks came quickly to me, all quilted with 1/2” spacing, but the arcs in the four corners was a idea that kept coming back to me, and I’m grateful I took the chance and tried it out. Those curves add interest to the simple star block, while softening all the hard lines, and the point kind of reminds me of a bee stinger.

If I remember right I used my 10” Circle2 ruler to quilt the curves with a 1/2” spacing between the lines. My Circle2 rulers are available in my shop, and come in a set of 6, ranging in size from 2”-13” because there are two sizes per ruler, like the 4”/10” below. Head over to my shop, to get a set. Go to: https://www.quiltingit.com/shop

Here’s a close-up on the bee block. Isn’t it darling!!!

I did a triple pinstripe with a 3/4th of an inch spacing between the pinstripes and simple X’s in groups of two squares around the quilt. I used Edge rulers from Linda at The Quilted Pineapple to quilt all the lines on the quilt. Go to: https://www.thequiltedpineapple.com/shop/

In the picture below, you can see how I quilted the corners.

You’ll also notice I quilted a row of circles or pebbles in the thin inner border. I also teach pebbles in my Quilting It Freemotion course. Go to: https://www.quiltingit.com/quilting-it-freemotion-course/p/gn8izw5h2m5otf2xkq7zs7fax4vb6p-jbfy3

The blend of all of the soft and hard textures together harmonize so well. I could not be more thrilled!

If fun to see all the quilting in the minky.

I used Cream Omni thread from Superior Threads to quilt the whole quilt. And don’t forget to use my non-affiliate code ASTLEISHA at checkout to get 15% off your next order. Go to: https://www.superiorthreads.com/omni-3004-cream-neutral/p/134-02-3004?show=Cones

I used my favorite 8020 cotton poly blend batting from Winline Textiles, it’s called the comfort blend for a reason, it’s so good. Go to: https://www.winlinetextiles.com/blended-battings-winline-comfort-blend-s/127.htm