Free Motion Quilting?

I want to try free motion quilting on my machine but I just can't get the tension correct for it to look good.
Any suggestion on learning to free motion machine quilt?
What is the best stitch length to use?

I really want to master this as I am making this http://www.mccallsquilting.com/golden/mg10_pattern/ in king size for my bed.

You might was to check this thread:  http://sewmamasew.com/forum/index.php?topic=145.0

You can also try a search on the subject since I know that this has been a popular thread topic.

Thanks, the thread was very informative.  I guess the key is practice practice!

The advice in the other thread is great. In addition, there's a book about Machine Quilting by Sue Nickels that is really great. It's a short book, but it teaches the principles really well. There are a lot of illustrations in it, plus suggestions for exercises to do. I've turned to it over and over as I've been learning.

For the free motion foot that I use (I have a Bernina 140 PE machine), it says to set the stitch length to medium. With the feed dogs down, you do control the length, but I find that a medium stitch works out better than something longer or shorter.

I find, as Sue Nickels explains in her book, that I get the best results when not moving my hands too often--each time you pick a hand up off the surface of the quilt, you lose a little control over where it goes, especially in tight curved shapes such as stippling. To help grip the quilt, I bought a pair of thick yellow dishwashing gloves and cut the fingers off. That way my hands don't get hot but I have more traction to hold the quilt.

A good way to start out is to do projects where the back isn't visible, such as quilted oven mitts (you quilt the two pieces before stitching them together). Often in free motion quilting, if there are tension problems, you'll see the top thread on the back, as little (or not so little) loops. On oven mitts, this isn't as visible--so you can practice without having to rip anything out.

My machine is just an old Brother and I've been having a hard time with the tension, also.  I'm honestly not positive I know how to even adjust for that.  I get all sorts of lops on the back and it's driving me mad.  I've given up for awhile.

Loops on the back mean that your bobbin thread tension is tighter than the top thread tension (and so it's pulling the top thread through to the back more than it should be). Usually there's a way to adjust the top thread tension to make it tighter. When I quilt, I usually have to make the top thread tighter. (Better than messing with the bobbin thread tension because then it's hard to put the bobbin thread tension back to normal.)