Thread Waggle Quilting

Mom's Christmas Quilt

2012-01-17T08:00:00.000-05:00

I quilted most of this quilt for my Mom last fall. Actually all of it except for the 1/2 inch piano keys on one side that I somehow neglected to quilt before I took it off my machine. I hate when I realized that I missed something after the quilt is off the frame. While you can see the quilting in person, I just could not get it to show in the pictures from the front.

I used a gold color of Glide Thread. I know I have said it before but I LOVE Glide Thread. It runs through the machine so wonderfully. And I love that I can use the gold instead of running metallic and still get that shiny gold look.

Yep, the back is beautiful. You can see all that fancy quilting in the borders. Swags and close piano keys. My sister (also a quilter) and my Mom both really liked the back of the quilt. It is so wonderful having 2 quilters in my family that appreciate my work.

Cathy's Ruby Slippers Quilt

2012-01-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

I got to quilt Cathy's beautiful quilt that she made out Moda's Sugar Pop. The pattern is Ruby Slipper by Miss Rosie's Quilt Co.

I really like the way Cathy used the fabric in this quilt. It has a very clean, crisp look. I did double piano keys on the outer board, alternating c's for the skinny inter border and my swirls border to border in the main part of the quilt.

Halloween Table Runner

2012-01-13T19:18:00.000-05:00

This is a table runner for me. I actually got it quilted before Halloween, but did not finish binding it until some time in November.

It is made from a charm pack by Moda that I purchased while I was visiting my Mom in September. The purple is a fabric from my Mom's stash. The black border is Kona Cotton. I decided that the black border was a little too stark for me. But look I have poison green Glide Thread. I made up a way to quilt bats while I was quilting. After all, it's my quilt why should I actually plan out what I was going to do. It is a lot more fun to just load it and have fun.

I may just have to use this one upside down.

If it wasn't for the bats this could have been a two sided quilts. But look at that shiny green glide thread... I love, love, love that thread! I am really happy with my new table runner, now if I just remember I have it when Halloween 2012 comes around.

Fern Fill

2011-11-22T13:08:00.000-05:00

I have been trying to email this pictures to Mame for several days and they just won't go. So I decided to post them to my blog so that she could see pictures of her quilt. The batik quilt she pieced is beautiful, but then I am a known batik freak. I decided to do a border treatment of undulating ferns. Kind of like an undulating feather, but more organic. For some reason I like ferns better on batiks then feathers.

I treated all of the borders as one border.

Here is a picture of the body of the quilt while it was still on my frame. I really like the texture of the all over fern fill.

One more picture that really shows the ferns.

I really like how the quilt turned out and had a blast doing the ferns on this quilt.

APQS Beginner's Class In Raleigh, NC!

2011-11-22T12:37:00.001-05:00

I still have one opening left in the APQS Beginner's Class on December 8th. If you have been thinking about coming, now is the time to contact me.

I had a couple people that were not able to join us on December 8th, so I have scheduled another APQS Beginner's Class on January 9, 2012. Space is filling up in this class as well.

If you are still interested and neither of these dates works, contact me and I will work with you to get a date that works for you! 919-576-9897

APQS Beginner's Class In Raleigh, NC!

2011-11-14T10:01:00.000-05:00

We will cover specific topics during each class, however, each class is unique and based on the needs of the students. We encourage questions and active participation -- you're here to learn!

Bring all your questions about operating the machine, business practices, thread, tension and anything else you can think of. This is a demonstration/lecture class. No hands on time will be available. Information we will cover includes:

Starting a business
Thread, tension, batting
Deciding how to quilt a quilt
Dealing with problem quilts
Different methods for loading quilts
Pantographs
Borders
Stitching a block
Marking quilt designs
Ruler work

*Free to qualified new APQS owners or $200

When:

Thursday, December 8th

9:30AM- 4PM

Lunch will be provided

Where:

Thread Waggle Quilting

Space is limited so, call Angela to reserve your space. 919-576-9897

If this is not a good date, call me so that we can arrange a future date for you to attend.

APQS Road Show

2011-10-31T16:04:00.000-04:00

APQS is bringing machines to Raleigh for a Road Show!

Date: Saturday, November 12, 2011

Time: Noon to 3PM

Place: Holiday Inn Crabtree Valley Hotel
4100 Glenwood Ave.

Raleigh, NC 27612

To register contact Jen Schlie at 800-426-7233 or jen@apqs.com

They are loading up the APQS truck with machines for you to try on the Bliss Drive system. Plus George will be making his Raleigh debut.

Here is just a sample of what you'll learn:

Machine Features - Find the right machine for your quilting style as you explore each machine model including standard and optional features, table & frame designs, etc.
Basic Machine Maintenance - See how easy it is to oil, clean, and service your machine to provide years of quilting fun!
Supplier Information - Discover resources for templates, batting, patterns, freehand instruction manuals, thread, and education.
Business Ideas - Learn business philosophies, products and services, pricing, wholesale resources, marketing and income forecasting. You'll even get a Sample Business Plan to get you up and running right away.

Plus there will be time for you to get your hands on the machines and have some longarm fun!

For more information check out APQS.com

Thimbleberries Hometown Christmas - Part 2

2011-08-13T13:09:00.000-04:00

As promised in Part 1, I have close up pictures! Most of these were taking while the quilt was on the frame. Check out those swags in the outer border. I bought a new template set for doing swags while at MQS in May. I love the way they look and I just can't believe how easy they were. I used Mindy Wylie's Angel Swags to quilt the border.

I quilted every house on the quilt differently. It became a mission to think up how I could make them all look like they could live in the same neighborhood, but still have their own personality.

I love the way I quilted the trunk on the trees.

I had fun trying to figure out ways that I could get all they way across the body of the quilt without breaking thread. I think that this is the mission of most longarmers. And that included the Stitch in the Ditch.

I bought a couple more new templates at MQS. I bought 2 different rope templates. I have used them both and I have to say that I am really impressed with Deloa Jones' Rope-A-Dope!

I love when I find new tools that really work for me. Both the Angel Swags and the Rope-A-Dope where terrific finds that I will use often!

Thimbleberries Hometown Christmas - Part 1

2011-08-13T00:06:00.001-04:00

OK, so if you have seen the Thimbleberries Hometown Christmas quilt in person, you know it is HUGE! So huge that blogging about it will be done in several posts.

A good friend, Barb trusted me with her Hometown Christmas Quilt. My Mom and her got their kits at the same time and work on them on and off at their local quilt store's Thimbleberries Camp. (Read that as I have another one of these to quilt...)

There was a debate in my house over where we could get a picture of the entire quilt. Matt is actually holding the top of it and hiding behind it. It is hanging off of my back porch, which is about 9 feet off the ground. This took me a long time to custom quilt, but I wanted it to be special. Barb is a very special person and I wanted her to love her quilt!

I love how the back shows off the quilting. It makes all the work worth it! In Part 2 I will show you some close ups of the some of the blocks and talk about the new longarm templates that I used.

Where have I been for the last 2 months?

2011-08-04T14:04:00.000-04:00

I can't believe that it is has been 2 months since I last posted. NC Quilt Symposium was in full swing and I was having a lot of fun letting everyone play on my APQS Millennium. I really enjoyed getting to share my love of longarm quilting with so many people.

On the Sunday that Symposium closed I loaded up my longarm, and dropped it back off at my Studio. I then loaded my car again and left that day for 5 weeks with my parents. It was great to be able to go down and help out and I got to see my nephew for 2 weeks which is a very rare treat. Lincoln, the newest member of our family, got to go out on my parents boat. It was only the second time he has been on a boat and he seemed to have a good time.

After my return, I needed to get ready for Shannon, aka Doodlebug. She was here for 5 days to do classes for the Carolina Longarm Association. Her classes were awesome and it was wonderful to actually meet her in person. We have been planning this for the last 9 months and it just does not seem possible that I had never actually meet here until she showed up for stay. My house is very quiet now that classes are over. And Lincoln is having Shannon withdrawal.

I have learned that when you take a long break from blogging that it is very hard to get back to it. I have been meaning to post since mid July.

NC Quilt Symposium!

2011-06-03T21:46:00.000-04:00

If you are not at the NC Quilt Symposium, you are missing all the fun! The quilts are beautiful! We are having a blast and the vendors are great!!!

Susan's Quilt

2011-05-22T18:56:00.000-04:00

Mom pieced this quilt for a friend that was starting Chemo. She brought it up when she came to visit in March and I quilted it while she was here. While I can see several ways to custom quilt this pattern, we just did not have the time with this one. I quilted it with my all over swirl meander. I really like the way it turned out.

Joyce's Africa Quilts

2011-05-01T12:19:00.000-04:00

Last fall I quilted a Hoffman beauty for my friend Joyce. She has been busy piecing and here are two more quilts that we have worked on.

This quilt is made from beautiful African fabrics that Joyce has collected. The machine appliqued circles really feature the fabrics.

It is all over quilted with 3&Es which add texture and movement int he background

The second quilt is also made with African fabrics, all of which had shiny gold paint on them. I am not sure if it is really paint, but it was stiffer then a dye. She used a solid black to set off the bright fabric and appliqued huts on the bottom border

For this one I did a "straight line" meander. It does not show well in the pictures but looks awesome in person. Thanks to my friend, Shannon aka Doodlebug, for the suggestion! I can see myself using this fill often! I thought I had taken a picture of the back of the quilt, but can't find it. She pieced the back of the quilt, it is a HUGE house. If I can find it I will post it later because it was really a neat back.

Phone service down due to internet outage.

2011-04-05T10:18:00.000-04:00

Is it really already April? Yikes!

2011-04-01T10:40:00.000-04:00

I have been working away. I have also been being a very bad blogger. The quilts have been quilted, pictures have been taken but I just never seem to post anything. So, I have put a week day reminder in my phone to post. Not that I really think it will make me do it, but I am going to at least going to pretend to make the attempt.

Here is a picture of a quilt that I recently finished for Beth.

It is a very sweet kissing 9 patch. I love the fabrics that she chose. I did swirls and line dancing in the body of the quilt. In the setting triangles I did curved crosshatching and formal feathers.

I had so much fun doing the setting triangles on the is quilt.

Covey of Witches

2010-12-09T09:00:00.002-05:00

Ann brought me this adorable witches quilt. She does beautiful work, she even matched the plaid in the piecing on the witches hats.

I quilted swirls in the background and did lots of stitch in the ditch.

Water Colored Baby Quilt

2010-12-06T08:00:00.001-05:00

Barbara brought me this cute baby quilt. She said that she wanted it to look like water.

I did water meander in the center section and quilted waves on the border.

Floral Cube

2010-12-02T23:11:00.000-05:00

Renate made this cool top out of a bunch of fabric that she had left over from a different quilt. They are all florals. She did an amazing job at sorting the fabrics into dark, medium and light. You can really see the 3D effect of the cube, even with the busy floral prints. I had an absolute blast quilting this quilt after I decided what I was going to do.

I did A LOT of gridwork in the background of the quilt. I have fun thinking up different ways that I could use my crosshatching template to change the background as I worked my way around the quilt.

When you see it in person it gives the cube motion. It makes it look like it is coming towards you. Renate does beautiful piecing. I love the ribbon border that she did. I used Fil-Tec Glide thread through out the quilt so it has a shine to it. I love their gold because it give you a slightly metallic look without the headache of using metallic thread

I like the way the back ended up looking with the color change. I matched the bottom and top thread. The ribbon even shows up since it was done with the gold.

Thanks for letting me work on the quilt, Renate! I really did have fun quilting it and I love the way it turned out!

Yes, I am still here...

2010-11-19T20:02:00.000-05:00

Wow, is it really almost Thanksgiving? Where has November gone. When I woke up this morning I realized that guild was last night, oops! I really wanted to go this month as I will not be able to go next month. Looks like I need to set a reminder for the January meeting so that I don't miss that one as well. Just in case you wonder what my November has been like, here is a picture of the quilts that are currently waiting to go back to their homes. I thought it was bad last month, but now I have a second row... Yikes!

Luckily, I am meeting a couple of customers this afternoon so I will be back down to one row by this evening. Since I am delivering quilts, I will hopefully have get to post a couple of pictures on my blog this weekend. So stay tuned for some quilter's eye candy coming soon!

The Witch Is In

2010-10-26T19:34:00.000-04:00

I have seen this pattern a couple of times and have wanted to make one for a while. The pattern is by Joined at the Hip and is called The Witch Is In. I chose not piece my background and used batiks.

I had a blast quilting this wall hanging. I did different fills in all the sections and cross hatched the poison green legs to make it look like fishnet stockings.

Brenda's Homespun Alaska Star

2010-10-25T21:19:00.000-04:00

Brenda brought me this homespun Alaska Star when she picked up her Blue and White Alaska Star. She is also the same person that pieced the Lover's Knot that I quilted this summer. She wanted this quilt to be a snuggly quilt. So we used Hobb's Tuscany Wool is this one and I did not quilt it as densely.

This quilt turned out really snuggly! You just want to curl up with it when you see it in person. I like the texture that wool batting gave the quilting. Brenda left saying that she was going to look through her UFOs to see what else she can finish up and get quilted. I can't wait to see what she comes by with next. It is great to see someone who has taken a break from quilting fall back in love with it!

Joyce's Hoffman Beauty!

2010-10-23T09:00:00.000-04:00

I used to be in a bee that meet in Henderson, NC. It was a long drive for me to get there, but the ladies in the bee were worth the drive! Joyce is one of the ladies that I meet while I was a member. She is an extremely talented quilter.

Joyce saw this quilt in a magazine and feel in love. The Hoffman fabric is stunning and the pattern is unique and eye catching. The pattern has the piecer use A LOT of fusible. Think multiple layers of fusible! The football shaped pieces are basted to the top, but are actually attached during the quilting, at times through several layers of fusible.

All the dense background fill was done through fusible. I was nervous quilting it because any mistake and the holes would remain. Luckily, I got through the sections with the fusible without my thread even breaking.

Always happy when I take off a quilt and turn it over, but oh, my do I wish they all looked as great as this one.

Lots of texture from all the custom quilting. And it case you are wondering how it looks on the back where the fusible is....

Now I am in love with this quilt too!

Happy end of the week!

2010-10-22T09:00:00.001-04:00

Happiness is quilts lined up ready for pickup.

My favorite part of my job is delivering the completed quilts.

Rose of Sharon

2010-10-21T11:38:00.000-04:00

Wish Upon A Quilt is participating in Island Batik's Roses of Remembrance block on the month for 2011

I got to quilt the sample table runner for Wish Upon A Quilt. I had a blast quilting this sample. I dense background files. I even used two different fills in each block. I love how this turned out. I even signed up for the block of the month and am planning to needle turn applique my quilt. It may take me the rest of my life, but I really want that quilt!

The block of the months is based on Sharon Pederson's The Rose of Sharon Block Book.

Jumping Up and Down!!!!

2010-10-19T15:58:00.000-04:00

Can you see me? I am so happy, I am jumping up and down! First off I got to quilt this round robin of Janice Pope's.

Just being asked to quilt this beauty was a true honor. Then in July, Janice called to tell me that she was going to the Sister's quilt show in Oregon and that the quilt would be hanging in the show. Just when I thought I had gotten used to these calls from Janice, she calls today to tell me that she entered it in the NC State Fair and that she went yesterday and it is hanging in the winners area with a blue ribbon and a white ribbon on it. It was entered in the Division for Group quilts with more than 2 people working on it. Then she dropped the bombshell that it won BEST MACHINE QUILTING! I am stunned! So, now can you see me jumping up and down! Matt and I are going to the fair to see the quilt! :)

CLA Member Quilts

2010-09-21T08:10:00.001-04:00

One of the neat things about going to quilt shows is all the ideas you get while you are there. At the CLA show the member were sitting around showing each other how the actually did their quilting. It is really neat to be in a group where although we are all in competition with each other, we still share our knowledge freely with one another. For instance, Theresa Dewalt of Belews Creek, NC quilted the following quilt.

Note the awesome trellis fill that she did in the beige background of the appliqued border. That trellis is all quilting texture! She actually brought the template she used and a photo copy of it that she could draw on and demonstrated how she was able to quilt the trellis continuously.

Can you believe she does not even have a stitch regulator on her Gammill! Her quilting is just breathtaking!

Kim Buterbaugh of Mockville, NC did the same type of backfill on her quilt, only smaller.

We were cleaning the floor in front of the quilts in this category due to drooling.

Then we have Jan Struble and her gorgeous feathers.

Just in case you can't see them here is a close up...

See what I mean about competition being stiff! In the Custom Quilting more then 2 years, Kim won 1st, Jan won 2nd, and Theresa won 3rd. But wait, here is another of Jan's quilt from the same category...

Yep, that girl can quilt feathers!

The Viewers Choice for this category was one that was also quilted by Theresa Dewalt.

Don't know about you, but I am so glad that it was not me judging this show. There were 26 quilts in this category and they were all drop dead gorgeous!

My Quilts at the CLA show

2010-09-20T10:57:00.000-04:00

I was really nervous about entering quilts into a show. I have never done it before. I was the person that keep standing up and telling our membership we all need to enter 2 quilts, but I almost chickened out.

Actually, I did have one customer quilt that I know was entered and she showed me the judges form, so that I would see what they said, but I had only been quiting for a couple of months at that point. For that one just seeing it hanging was a thrill. This time, I really wanted to see what the judges had to say because it will give me a good barometer on what I need to improve.

Both of my quilts were entered into the same category - Custom Quilting - less then 2 years

I won 2nd place for Hopeful Homes

And here is Whirlygigs for May, which won 3rd

Whirlygigs for May is the first time my sister has ever had any of her work entered in a show. OK, so she may have told me that she didn't want it entered, but she is over that now. When I called to tell her about the ribbon she actually told me that I had called the wrong person. I realized that I may have neglected to tell her I had actually entered the quilt so I had to fess up at that point.

While I am thrilled with the outcome, I really did not enter the quilts thinking that they would win awards. The information that they judges gave is much more important then the ribbons. And getting over the fear of entering the quilts in the first place.

The beautiful ribbons for our show were created by the talented Sandy Zucker. Luckily, she won one as well, because she was a little sad to see them go.

Why yes, you can fit a 7 foot frame in a minivan

2010-09-20T10:02:00.000-04:00

I even had left over room to haul some of my vendor buddy's batting. I am shocked that I can fit a 7 foot frame and my machine head into the back of my van. But everything for my space and 12 boards of batting are back there too. And just when I had decided to sell the van...

2010 CLA Challenge Quilts

2010-09-20T08:36:00.001-04:00

We had 18 Challenge Quilts entered into the CLA Show Challenge. While this is a much better turn out then the previous show, it only represents a fraction of our total membership. We even had an industrious member that entered two quilts.

It was a great way to show off the diverse styles of our membership. Thanks goes to all the members that took the time to enter a quilt. It was wonderful to see all the different ideas we came up with to quilt our one block quilts!

Fun At the CLA Show!!!

2010-09-19T20:35:00.000-04:00

I know that I have been quite lately. There are some really big reasons. Some of which I can't share yet, but here is one that I can. Last week I was in Clemmons, NC at the Carolina Longarm Association Quilt Show. I left my house last Tuesday morning and got home last night around 9PM. I am so very glad that I joined this talented and sharing group! I can't think of anything that could be better then a week of talking longarming and making new friends!

The CLA is a professional longarming group, so as you can imagine the competition was stiff. The quilts are absolutely gorgeous! We did challenge quilts to show off our styles, or in my case just to say that I did one. I left mine to the absolute last minute, but I felt it was really important to contribute. It took me longer to load the quilt then it did to actually quilt it. Next time I will plan mine out earlier, but at least I had one hanging.

My Millie got a lot of attention. It was fun to show the attendees what a longarm is and how we use them to quilt their quilts. My next couple of blog posts will have some pictures of the vendors, show quilts and challenge quilts.

Thank you Thimble Pleasures!

2010-09-04T07:55:00.001-04:00

Thimble Pleasure in Chapel Hill is a beautiful quilt store. They let the Carolina Longarm Association invade their classroom in July for our quarterly meeting. We had a really great turn out!

A couple weeks later I was there to meet a customer in their parking lot. They graciously let me meet the customer in the store! Which is great because I was really nervous about opening up Cindy's Baltimore Album Quilt in the parking lot. They also told me that they would let me meet customers there to pick up and drop off quilts. Aren't they awesome!

I love our local quilt stores!

Shirley's Applique Quilt

2010-09-03T19:54:00.000-04:00

This beautiful applique quilt is from a new customer named Shirley. I love the scrappy patchwork with with the applique border. I stitched around all of the applique, but actually did no stitch in the ditch. I know, it's shocking, but I can quilt without doing stitch in the ditch!

Since the applique does a full ring around the border I did Piano Keys on the outside of the border and my leaf background file on the inside. So it is like Border to Border, but in this case it is Applique to Applique. I also stitched around the applique in the center of the quilt. I love the shape of the star that is made by the piecing in the center.

I love the way the borders look on this quilt.

Thanks for letting me work on your quilt, Shirley!

I finally finished Mom's quilt!

2010-08-25T15:15:00.000-04:00

My Mom went to Houston with me when I purchased my longarm. When I took her home she gave me a stack of quilts to do. I did get several of them done, but there was one that she really wanted to put on her bed. I had a vision for the quilt, but the every time I got ready to load the quilt, it would tell me that it did not like my vision. I'm serious! I would just freeze and look at the quilt and it would go back in the closet. Mom stopped dropping hints that she would really like the quilt and it has been happily living in my studio closet. Mom was here for three weeks in August. While she was here I talked to her about the original vision and that I really thought that I wanted to do something different. She said she didn't care, she just wants the quilt. So, I loaded the quilt that I have been going to feather for years and here is how it turned out...

Anyone notice that there is not a feather anywhere on the quilt. It really did not want them! I am so happy with how this quilt turned out. The quilt is 102 inches square. I did bead board in the outer border. And I SID all the boards and between the color changes. There are hours of SID in this quilt. Everything else is free hand.

The white fabric is solid white. So it needed some life. I did my leaf fill in all of the white areas.

I made up a swirly pattern to file the cactus flowers.

The back of this quilt is spectacular!

Here is what the center of the quilt looks like on the back.

I am so happy that I did not go through with my original plan. It would have been OK, but this is so much better. I have learned that I need to listen to my gut more.

Cindy's Applique Beauty!

2010-08-23T08:00:00.002-04:00

I was so excited when Cindy showed me this quilt. I love applique quilts! They are a lot of work, but I really love how they look when they come off the frame. This one was done by Cindy's mother. She remember her working on it after 2000, but is not sure when she started it. Her mother's work is beautiful! It was an honor to get to work on this quilt.

I did bead board in the outer part of the border. It turned out wonderful, but some of the lines are over 28 inches, so my motorized fabric advance got a work out. Have I told you how much I love, love, love my motorized fabric advance!

I quilted curved swags in to the appliqued swags. Then did a curly Q design between the sashing and the swags. The sashing has a spaced ribbon candy in it. The star of the quilting is the swirly meander in the applique blocks. We had first thought about doing cross hatching, but I am so glad that we changed the plan.

Yes, I did stitch around all the applique! Yes, even the dimensional pieces! I also stitched in any of the applique that was larger then 4 inches. I love the way the pineapple and vase turned out.

I even stitched on both sides of the needle work tendrils.

We used Tuscany Wool batting by Hobbs. It was the perfect choice as it caused the applique to pop up without doing any trupunto work. The back is just as spectacular.

For thread I used cream Fil Tec Magna Glide bobbins and So Fine 402 on the top. I started a brand new cone of So Fine when I loaded the quilt. I have about 4 yards left on the cone, and I was a nervous wreck toward the end of the quilt because I was really worried I was going to run out and have to wait for my thread order to be able to finish the quilt. Next time I am going to make sure that I have 2 cones before I start a big project.

Hopeful Homes

2010-08-22T08:00:00.001-04:00

In the Studio Elves post, you may have noticed a house quilt hanging on my new gridwall. It is for my realtor, who has been working with us for about three years. First looking for our new house and then helping us sell the old one. Since closing on the old house was on August 16th and she now knows about the quilt I can post it on my blog.

Lorraine had mentioned that she wanted a house quilt to hang in her office. My Mom and I found the pattern for this quilt in Quilts! Quilts! Quilts!!! by Diana McClun and Laura Nownes. We started piecing the quilt right after I moved into the new house. Toward the end of May, I decided that I need to finish it so that it would be ready when the old house sold. I finished quilted the quilt in in the middle of June and we had a offer on the house soon afterward.

Since I knew this was going to be a wallhanging, I got to heavily quilt it. There is lots of detail on the houses, very heavy background fills and leaves and tendrils in the borders. I used Superior's So Fine thread and Fil Tec's Glide thread on top. And Fil Tec's Magna Glides in bobbin. I feel kind of guilty, but after I showed Lorraine the quilt, I explained that it is going in a show in September and she will not get it until after then. So we gave a cheesecake made by Matt that she could enjoy right away.

There have been elves in my studio!!!

2010-08-21T08:00:00.001-04:00

I think I may be the luckiest girl alive! Over the last couple of weeks there have been elves busy working in my studio. My parents were here for 3 weeks! My Mom was busy piecing 4 lone star blocks. My Dad was busy installing things in my studio. My poor husband did not enjoy the time quite as much because he had to have emergency surgery to remove his appendix. He is doing great now, but has been given orders to never scare me like that again!

So, what are my happy elves install? Why want every longarm studio needs, of course. A new TV on a positionable arm.

But wait, there's more! We also to a trip to the local fixture store and I purchase 4 gridwall panels. And a trip to a home improvement store netted hortizontal blinds and a cover for the TV cords.

I love my Studio Elves! I am a very spoiled quilter!

Kissing Nine Patch

2010-08-20T11:19:00.000-04:00

I had a blast quilting this one! This Kissing Nine Patch is hanging at Wish Upon A Quilt. It's another wonderful pattern by Janice at Anything But Boring.

I did line dancing in the nine patch blocks. Large flowers with leaves in alternating blocks and outer border and leaves in the yellow inner border.

The quilting added lots of texture to the quilt. The thread is from Signature and is actually a soft pink. We used Quilters Dream Cotton Request as the batting.

Christmas in July

2010-07-10T10:00:00.043-04:00

I have been waiting to post this until the Christmas in July reveal party at Wish Upon a Quilt. I got quilt one of the store samples for this event. I is a really whimsical quilt. I believe that the pattern is Urban Cabin by Terry Atkinson. I apologize for the strange picture of the whole quilt. I was taking the picture at the last minute before I dropped the quilt off. I will take a picture of it hanging in the store and post that on Saturday when I get back from the reveal.

You can kind of see the texture in the picture, but you really can't see the designs themselves. Cathy mentioned trees and snowflakes when we were talking about the quilting for this quilt. I did a meander with loops and snowflakes in the blue background. I love that Cathy chose such a not traditional color for the background of the quilt. It really makes the quilt so much more fun!

In the large rectangle I did a tree with a star on top and then did a couple small border fills in the 2 L shaped spaces.

Here is a pictures of the trees that I quilted around the boarder of the quilt. I purposely made them all different sizes. I really like how the quilt turned out.

APQS Beginner's Class In Raleigh, NC!

2010-07-09T08:00:00.017-04:00

With the beginner class offered at APQS, our goal is to teach you the skills you'll need to accomplish a typical quilting project on your new longarm machine. This class is designed to be an introduction to machine quilting after you have made yourself familiar with your machine controls. Whether you intend to start a business or just want to get your quilts done faster, you'll learn valuable techniques to accomplish your projects creatively and efficiently. This class is mostly "demonstration" so we can squeeze in as much information as possible.

We will cover specific topics during each class, however, each class is unique and based on the needs of the students. We encourage questions and active participation -- you're here to learn!

Bring all your questions about operating the machine, business practices, thread, tension and anything else you can think of. This is a demonstration/lecture class. No hands on time will be available. Information we will cover includes:

Starting a business
Thread, tension, batting
Deciding how to quilt a quilt
Dealing with problem quilts
Different methods for loading quilts
Pantographs
Borders
Stitching a block
Marking quilt designs
Ruler work

*Free to qualified new APQS owners or $200

When:

Saturday, July 24, 2010

9:30AM- 4PM

Where:

Thread Waggle Quilting

Space is limited so, call Angela to reserve your space. 919-576-9897

If this is not a good date, call me so that we can arrange a future date for you to attend.

Alaska Star

2010-07-08T10:46:00.000-04:00

Brenda Jones brought me another beautiful top to quilt. When she picked up the Lover's Knot quilt she mentioned that she had almost thrown that top away. She went home and called me about 3 hours later and the binding was done. I am so happy that she loves the quilt and that she decided to have it quilted. She brought it back with her today so that I could see it completed. It was one of the harder quilts to give back to a customer, but I know that it has a good home and will be loved.

Today she picked up this beauty. It was actually on the frame when she picked up the Lover's Knot so she had seen the very beginning of what I was doing. I am sure that it looked strange at the time, I had just started stablizing it and had quilted the circles around the first row of half stars. There was no background file yet because I had not decided what I wanted to do and I had not done any work in the borders.

I did swirls in the borders, a circle with a quarter inch echo around the stars, a swirly design in the star points and swirly meandering. I left the background inside the circle empty to show off the stars and the circles. I really like the effect it has on the quilt.

I love how the circles turned out. I really like the texture difference between the heavy fill and the blank space.

She brought me another Alaska Star top today. I am looking forward to doing something totally different on it. It is scrappy and made from homespuns. It is just screaming cuddle with me.

Play Time for a Good Cause

2010-07-02T10:00:00.001-04:00

What do you do when you want to play with your new tricked out longarm, but don't have a lot of time? Load a donation baby quilt! This cute top was pieced by Margaret for our our guilds Quilts 4 Kids charity.

Margaret just happened to be at Wish Upon a Quilt when I was delivering a customer quilt. She is trying to get several baby quilts done before our July guild meeting and I offered to quilt the one she had with her at the time. She bought backing for it and off I went to quilt.

After I installed my new wheels last weekend, I really wanted to play on my machine. I decided to do my swirly meander on the baby quilt because it adds a lot of texture.

Lover's Knot

2010-06-29T13:19:00.000-04:00

Brenda Jones and I found each other at the 2009 NC Quilt Symposium at Peace College. We talked about some tops that she has pieced in the 80s. She found my card a couple weeks ago and asked me if I would quilt her tops.

I went back and forth trying to decide whether to use feathers or leaves on this quilt. The leaves won out. I did wreaths around the centers of the light blue areas. I decide not to quilt heavily in the light blue ring and instead did concentric squares.

In the dark blue areas I echo quilted the shape and then quilted leaves and tendrils on the inside. The background is quilted with a leaf and tendril allover file. The border is done with a larger version of the same design.

The back really shows off the quilting.

Millie's New Wheels

2010-06-27T19:14:00.000-04:00

Have you heard about the new M&M wheels from APQS? I wasn't really sure I needed them, but in a moment of weekness last week I order a set. Today was the big day, we installed them on my Millie.

APQS has done a great job in packaging the wheels. The instructions are step by step with loads of pictures. They have even color coded the tubes so that you know which set is for the the head and which is for the carriage. The only mistake I made was that I was not paying attention and I used one of the ones that is pre-drilled for the sprocket and I had to uninstall it so that I could use it with the sprocket. I even did most of the install myself, but I let Matt play too.

He is finishing up the last 2 wheels for me, little does he know that I only let him help so that I could take his picture and post it on the blog. It took us just over an hour to install the wheels and put the head back on.

Look how great the new wheels look.

And even though I clean my rails and try really hard to make sure that there is no thread the old wheels had a greasy thread nest. YUCK!!!!

I loaded practice cloth and played. OH MY!!!! Then I loaded a quilt and did my swirly meander. Why, oh why did I think that I did not really need these wheels? They are fabulous!

Great Idea!

2010-06-26T16:23:00.000-04:00

While meeting with a customer who wanted me to quilt a top that she had pieced for her granddaughter, she asked me if I could quilt the granddaughter's name onto the quilt. The customer did a great job in picking out the fabrics for this quilt it is done in mostly pinks and greens. I thought quilting the name is was such a great idea that I would share with you how it turned out.

The quilting is an all over loops with flowers and leaves.

Fun Fish Quilt!

2010-06-20T08:00:00.001-04:00

Hollie made a beautiful batik top using Terry Atkinson's Fire Escape pattern. She chose fabrics that are water colors and her backing fabric has tropical fish on it. When she first talked to me about the quilt she was thinking of having me load it with the backing up and tracing the fish. The fish were too small for me to do this effectively so we brainstormed and came up with a different plan. This quilt was an absolute BLAST to quilt. There are fishing lines with hooks and worms, fish swiming through water meander, a star fish, an anchor and coral and seaweed on the bottom. Longarmers talk about what we do as drawing with a sewing machine, but this is the first time I actually drew a picture with mine.

The batiks she picked out were perfect for a water scene. She did a great job of getting blues and teals in the blue to green range.

I love the texture on this quilt. The seaweed at the bottom was a great way to add movement and depth to the quilt. Plus it gave me a way to add an anchor.

When I orginally quilted the starfish it just did not show up. So I did a line of pebbling around the edge and quilted in the lines that you see on a real star fish. I really like the way it turned out.

The fish needed to have attitude so that they would stand out against the water meander. So I quilted in scales in the body and streamers on the tails. Without the file they would have been just too plain and would have receded into the background.

It even has a couple of hooks with worms on them that the fish are ignoring. Just another peaceful day out on the lake...

Hollie pieced this top as part of the Olympic Challenge on Anna Norris's Blog.

Cowgirl Quilt

2010-06-14T19:35:00.000-04:00

Lana pieced this cute quilt for a lucky young lady that loves horses. I wanted to so some form of wreath in the large, open blocks with the blue background and some form of feather in the large black border.

There are fire flowers in the the setting triangles by doing a large swirl and then quilting flames around the outside edge. I used circle templates to make the 2 concentric circles in the open blocks and then did flames to make the wreaths.

I used my swirl that I came up with as a border design to complement my swirl meander in both the brown border and in the line dancing in the 4 patches. I really like how it looks in the 4 patches and it really filled up the same nicely.

The tan border has a one of Sue Patten's border designs in it. The outer border has a fern feather in it.

Theresa has been busy again!!!

2010-06-02T15:23:00.000-04:00

My friend Theresa has been busy again. She sent me a couple tops to quilt. The first is a scrappy batik quilt that she made with 6 inch finished squares

I quilted it with line dancing in a denim blue thread that blended in with most of the fabrics.

Theresa worked on the second quilt while she was here helping us move in April. It is also scrappy, she decided to put a solid black border on it with pieced corners. The wide black border was screaming for a thick variegated thread. After laying the same color way of King Tut, Rainbows and Lava on the top, Lava won.

I quilted it with an allover Pothos leaves and tendrils design. I love this design because it adds a lot of movement and it is a blast to quilt. I really get into quilting the tendrils.

Now Stocking L size Magna-Glide Bobbins!

2010-05-29T15:00:00.000-04:00

I have all 12 colors of Fil-Tec Magna-Glide Class L bobbins. They work fabulously in my APQS Millennium.

May Wallhanging

2010-05-28T19:39:00.000-04:00

Several years ago my mom and sister decided to make a wallhanging for each month of the year. They started this project before I started quilting and made one for me as well. Once I started quilting they gave me the tops so that I could quilt them myself. Yesterday, I got a shipment of Magna-Glide bobbins from Fil-Tec. I really wanted to play with the bobbins and I decide to go ahead and quilt my "May" wallhanging.

I did double piano keys in the outer blue border, looping ribbons in the orange border and a small tight version of my swirling meander inthe background. I left the colored part of the pinwheels unquilted so that they would pop up and put swirls in the white centers.

I used So Fine 451 as the top thread and white Magna-Glide in the bobbin. Now for my favorite picture.... the back....

I really like these bobbins! If you haven't tried them yet you really should. If you have an APQS, I left my backlash spring in even thought they say not to. Kim Brunner suggested this at MQS and I have to agree that it really does work extremely well.

Wise Tree by the Art of Possibility

2010-05-27T22:00:00.000-04:00

If you have been in Wish Upon a Quilt recently, you may recognize this quilt.

The fabric is Wise Tree from Free Spirit. The designer is The Art of Possibility Studios. The Art of Possibility Studios represents artist that have physical disabilities. I love this fabric, it is so vibrant and happy. The pattern is Perfect Ten by Swirly Girls Designs. Lynn from Wish feel in love with the fabric and pieced this top. She used the leftover fabric to make the pieced border.

I wanted to show you the unquilted top this time so that you can see how the quilting effects the top. The hardest decision for me was the thread. My initial thought was to use really wild variegated thread. I spooled a lot of thread on this quilt before the gold thread that I finally used. The gold thread has a slight sheen, but it is not metallic. It is actually So Fine, but superior threads. I love how it looks on the marbled brown fabric! It blends into the wild prints but it really shows on the brown.

I did a large swirling meander on the printed fabrics and a coordinating border treatment in the brown frames.

There are offsetting swirls in the brown border and the the pieced border. The beauty of this treatment is that you quilt both borders at the same time as you go around the quilt.

Lynn did a absolutely beautiful job in piecing this quilt. It is one happy bright quilt. I can't help but smile every time I see it.

The Case of Three Hungry Caterpillars Quilts

2010-05-27T21:32:00.000-04:00

I have a customer that has had the best idea for baby quilts. She has been using the Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric and making baby quilts. She gives both the quilt and The Very Hungry Caterpillar book by Eric Carle as her gift. I have been fortunate to quilt 3 of her quilts recently. She wanted them to be custom quilted and I wanted them all to be different.

All of the quilts are pieced a little different. On this one I did different treatments in the two borders and then the same treatment border to border on the panel.

In the panel I did a fun leaf and loop meander. After all caterpillars and butterflies like leaves.

I had a lot of fun doing the outer border. I did a 1 inch crosshatch. That skinny blue strip is actually part of the print on the border fabric. I did stitch in the ditch and then stitched on the line on the other side, so know it looks pieced when you see the quilt in person. In the green I did pothos leaves that ended up looking like butterflies.

The second quilt has a large swirling meander border to border in the panel area. And then separate border treatments.

I did a C and reverse C pattern in the small orange border. Once again I stitched both sides of the blue part of the border stripe and the did a swirling border treatment that coordinates with the meander I did in the center.

On this I did denser quilting and treated the colored dot fabric different then the white back ground.

This has a small, dense swirling meander in the white background. In the dots there is a wiggly crosshatching. I quilted in the caterpillar, butterfly and leaf flowing the lines in the drawings.

I did the pothos leaf butterflies in the orange borders and stitched on both sides of the blue border. Then I did double piano keys in the outer boarder. They are not even, instead I had the double lines fall between the fruit.

Machine Quilters Showcase

2010-05-13T16:06:00.000-04:00

I am at MQS this week. I have had some AWESOME classes and have lots of new ideas. So far I have had classes with Kim Brunner, Renae Haddidin, Myrna Ficken, Claudia Pfeil, Irena Bloom and Sally Terry. My head is about to bust and I still have more classes. I can't wait to get home and use some of the new things I have learned.

And the quilts are stunning. You just can't imagine how beautiful!

Off to my next class...

Wow another month gone!

2010-05-05T13:36:00.000-04:00

I can't believe April is gone! February and March drug by on my end, as I was waiting for the house to be finished. But April, I barely remember at all. It is hard to believe that we moved into the new house at the end of March. Due to my wonderful family and friends it was a quick and painless process. My longarm was done for just under a week. April was really busy for the business I am still amazed at how many more hours I can happily quilt here then at the old house. More hours in the studio means I can quilt many more quilts.

My laptop decided that April was more than it could handle and promptly stopped working on May 1st. Luckily I was able to back it up before it stopped booting. As I was stressing over backing it up, I realized just how much I don't listen to my own advice. For years, as a tech support rep, I told people it was really important to back up their systems. I had NEVER backed up my laptop. Not once in 2 years!

Hopefully I will be able to get the backup drive hooked up to my desktop so that I can share some pictures soon. But right now I need to get Quickbooks installed so that I can print invoices. Life is never dull!

I love Blue and Yellow quilts...

2010-04-28T16:17:00.000-04:00

There is something about Blue and Yellow quilts. They always look so incredibly clean and crisp.

This beautiful top was pieced by Julia. It is a Jelly Roll quilt, but it really doesn't look like one. Julia has a plan for this quilt and decided on UNC blue thread.

The after picture is dark, so you can't see the thread color, but the blue thread really worked well on this quilt. Since the backing and a lot of the fabrics were florals, I used an all over Pothos leaf design. It is one of my very favorite all over quilting designs. I love the texture it gives and quilting the tendrils is really fun.

Curved Quilt from Studio Picture

2010-04-28T16:07:00.001-04:00

There is a beautiful quilt hanging over the rails, waiting to be loaded, in the pictures I posted of my new studio. Julia did a beautiful job piecing the quilt. I have not seen a quilt pieced like this one before, it is kind of like a Drunkards Path with it's curved piecing but it is done free from and has multiple arcs. I really love the way the piecing looks.

For me the focus of this quilt need to stay with the piecing. So I quilted an all over swirl design from border to border then did a complementary design in the border.

My first thought had been to use a light teal blue thread which was the color of the backing fabric, but I really liked the sage green thread better on the top. Luckily the sage green blended with the backing fabric too.

New Studio

2010-04-21T11:53:00.000-04:00

I can't believe that we have only been her for 3 weeks. I am still working on getting things put away in my studio. It is taking longer then I wanted it to, but then I have been steadily quilting customer quilts and putting things away when I get a chance. I love my new space. I have windows across one entire wall. It is so bright that I don't have to use any lights for most of the day. The only issue is that the wall of windows faces due west so the sun beats into the room from about 4PM to sundown.

The first picture is the view from the hallway into my studio.

This picture is from the corner when my DSM is toward my longarm.

I have only gotten one quilt hung so far you can see part of it on right behind my longarm. My design wall in the first picture is actually centered between 2 windows. I also have a large walk in closet and a powder room in my studio.

Funky Lighthouse Quilt

2010-04-21T11:21:00.000-04:00

A couple of weeks ago I showed the first block I quilted on this Funky Lighthouse quilt. I did finish quilting it. I just have not gotten a chance to post it on my blog. This is one fun quilt. It is being raffled off at the United States Power Squadron - District 15 Fall Meeting.

Mystery Quilt

2010-04-21T11:07:00.000-04:00

Wish Upon A Quilt sponsored another Mystery Quilt. We started in July of 2009 picking up one clue a month for 6 months. We had our reveal party in March right before my move. I am always amazed at how different our quilts look. We are all using the same pattern, none of us know what it is going to look like when we pick out our fabric, but they all work. The quilts were all beautiful!

I picked out a really wild multicolored batik and picked colors out of it for my other 3 fabrics. I love, love, love this quilt. It is bright and happy!

I did a border to border all over swirly design on the body of the quilt and the did separate border treatments in each of the 4 borders. I used Superior Rainbows thread. It is a wonderful, shiny variegated thread. This is the first time I have used it and I really like it.

I am still thinking of what I am going to name this quilt. I am leaning toward Prof. Plum in the Studio with the Rotary Cutter.

I'm Back!!!

2010-04-12T18:17:00.000-04:00

Yeah, the move is almost over. My longarm is set up and and I have been happily quilting away. I have actually done a couple of customer quilts already and currently have a custom job on the frame. I have not however gotten the room put away well enough for pictures. Maybe next week... but NO promises.

Now for our funny moving story of the week...

Matt and I went to the house in Wake Forest on Saturday to fix some items that were found on our sellers inspection. We figured that there was about 2 hours of work so we thought we would be done by noon. We had been there about 5 minutes when Matt asked me where the keys to the van where. He drove, I had not taken my set of van keys with me. We looked for the keys in our empty house, the van and the lawn for 3 hours! Our neighbor offered to take me the 20 minutes to the new house to get another set of keys and my car. Matt dug out the hole he had filled in before realizing the keys were missing and shifted through the dirt and mulch... no keys. The key I brought with me would not start the van, Matt thought it might be the battery so we tried to jump the van. Still no luck. So at 3PM, I had had it. I had not eaten breakfasted and I was hungry. I went off to Chick-fil-a and left Matt with the big van brick. While I was gone our neighbor's son started mowing the lawn. He walked up to Matt with the van keys in his hand and asked if they were what he was looking for. He had found them in the middle of the back yard. So 2 hours of work took us all day. But at least we got to spend some time with the neighbors that we love and are going to miss terribly. The good news is that a couple stopped by and we let them see the house since we were there anyways.

Studio is packed!

2010-03-25T10:15:00.000-04:00

It's official, my studio is packed! My longarm will be taken down and moved this weekend. I will not be doing any pick-ups or drop-offs, that are not already scheduled, between now and April 1st. I will post on my blog when my Millie is set up and ready for visitors at the new studio. I will be checking my business line during the move, but may not get back to you until the next business day. If you are tying to schedule a quilt, please leave me a message and I will call you back to schedule a meeting after the chaos is over.

Funky lighthouses

2010-03-22T18:03:00.000-04:00

I just loaded this quilt today. I just love the funky lighthouses. I decided to do a swirly wind looking file behind them. I will post more pictures later in the in the week when I finish the quilt.

Getting ready for the big move...

2010-03-18T12:55:00.000-04:00

I think we are almost ready for the big move. I can't believe that we are closing next week. We did our final walk on Monday and I just stood and enjoyed my new studio. It is so much brighter then my current one. I can't wait to get everything set up so that I can quilt in there. Of course that does mean I have to get these last 3 customer quilts I promised I would have done before the move, so that I can take my beloved Millie apart. The head will be traveling to it's new home in the safety and comfort of my car. No way I am letting movers touch my Millie head... I am only partially taking my frame apart. I am just taking the poles off and the "ladder" and trusses so that I don't have to totally reassemble it at the other end. I need to get it back up so that I can get to the rest of the quilts in line.

I should really take a couple pictures of my old sewing room and dining room so that you can see the boxes that have been stacked for the past couple of weeks. It is just a little overwhelming.

I will post a picture of my lastest mystery quilt after the reveal party at Wish Upon a Quilt on Saturday. I got a little carried away and put way too many borders on it. I am thinking of naming it the Monster Quilt of Mystery, because it was a real pain to quilt.

Janice Pope's Round Robin

2010-03-11T00:59:00.001-05:00

This beautiful Round Robin Quilt belongs to Janice Pope. A lot of hard work and love went into making this quilt top. Janice is a member of the BFF quilt bee. If you happened to be at the December 2009 Capital Quilt Guild meeting, the BFF bee showed all of their tops that they had recently gotten back. It was amazing to see how different and beautiful they all are.

I got to spend a lot of time with this quilt while I was quilting it for Janice. The batik fabrics really sparkle in this quilt. Janice wanted different designs quilted in each border. I had a lot of fun picking out designs and working on the quilt.

To give you perspective the crosshatching in the appliqued ribbon boarder is 1/2 inch squares. I love the texture it give the quilt. I stitched in the ditch around everything. It was extremely time consuming, but was really worth the time.

I did soft swirly files in some areas to counter the straight lines in the piecing and the crosshatching.

I wanted to keep the graphic quality of the solid black so I changed to black thread and did quilting that would hide a little more and let the fabric sing.

Olympic Challenge Quilt - Better late than never!

2010-03-07T20:35:00.000-05:00

Yes, I knew I was crazy to even attempt to do an entire quilt during the Olympics. And, yes, I knew that I had just loaded a custom quilt and that I probably would not be able to actually get the challenge quilt on the frame. I was actually very happy to just get the top pieced before the closing ceremony started last week. Funny thing is most of the other people doing the challenge did not actually get their quilts done either. Nancy did finish her beautiful Day and Night quilt. You can see pictures of it on her blog. http://sassafrashillquilts.blogspot.com/2010/02/finished.html

Anna of http://blackholequilts.blogspot.com/ extended the challenge because most of us did not get our quilts finished. So not only did I finish the custom quilt I have been working on, I also finished another customer quilt that I delivered on Saturday and I quilted my Challenge quilt. It a true study in neutral batiks.

This is only small section of the quilt. It is twin sized. I did say that I knew I crazy right?

Basic Layout

2010-02-14T22:43:00.003-05:00

My design wall is full with another project, so I laid out as much of my Olympic Challenge quilt as I could on my cutting table. I got half of the quilt laid out and have started sewing it together. Then I will lay out the 2nd half and hope for the best. It's scrappy so I think it will be OK. It has been really nice actually getting to do some peicing this weekend.

Sorry my pictures are so dark, I normally take pictures of quilts without flash because I am trying to get pictures of my actually quilting and I forgot to turn my flash back on. Oops!

It snowed....AGAIN!

2010-02-13T08:33:00.003-05:00

One of the nice things about living where we do is that it very rarely snows. Snow is a big deal here. Everything closes down. People stay home. It basically closes down the city. We get excited when it is in the forecast. The grocery stores run out of milk and beer. We usually get snowflakes at least once every winter, but hardly ever get any accumulation. You can tell just driving by someones house if they are new to the area. Because the actually own a snow shovel. For the first couple years that we lived here we were the only house on the street that had shoveled their drive and walks, now we fit right in. It is going to melt anyway so why bother... And it usually does melt fast. So this year is going to stick out because not only was their still snow on my roof and in shady areas from our last snow storm, but I woke up to more.
For the record, I love snow. I call my mom with snow reports. I do the happy dance when it starts snowing. I LOVE SNOW! But the fact remains that I also love not having to shovel it

My 2010 Olympic Challenge Quilt

2010-02-12T22:08:00.003-05:00

Hi all!

I'm a little late, but I have finally decided on which quilt I will be doing. I will be doing Blue Lagoon from Jelly Roll Quilts by Pam & Nicky Lintott. I am using batiks. I went by Wish Upon a Quilt today and picked up an Island Batik jelly roll which consist of all light neutrals and for my back ground I am using a darker brown batik.

The real challenge for me will be finishing up the current quilt that is on my frame so that I can quilt this one.

Olympic Challenge

2010-02-12T17:45:00.000-05:00

My friend , Anna Norris, is sponsoring an Olympic Quilting Challenge on her blog:

http://blackholequilts.blogspot.com/2010/02/2010-quilters-winter-olympics.html

It sounds like it is going to be a lot of fun. People have started to post about the projects that they are starting during the opening ceremonies. Check it out and join in on the fun!

I am going to join in. After all if I could learn to knit socks during the 2008 Summer Olympics then I can do a complete quilt during this Olympics... Right? Of course this does mean that I will really have to get to work on the custom quilt that is currently on my frame. :)

Have you tried Aurifil?

2010-02-09T17:56:00.000-05:00

I am getting ready to load a custom job, which will be quilted with only cotton thread. So I decided to try out the Aurifil thread that I purchased to see how it runs on my Millennium. OH MY! I love, love, love this thread. It is the Mako 50 weight. Talk about a fine line with beautiful stitches. Beautiful! Plus it was super easy to balance my tension. Millie seems to love the thread too. I played around on my practice cloth McTavishing and doing feathers with accents in them. I may actually start working on my wholecloth after I get the studio moved, which is the real reason I wanted to try the thread. But now I am going to go and see if I can get the colors that I need for the quilt I just load.

Where did January go?

2010-02-09T14:07:00.000-05:00

Can it really be February all ready? I can't believe it. January was a blur.

If I look at everything in a positive light, I can say we found out why Mom has not been feeling up to par, I got a closing date for the new house and I got quite a few customer quilts done. Unfortunately not everything in life is positive while it is happening.

Luckily, Mom is starting to feel better, but she scared us all by having to be rushed to the emergency room and then spending several days in the hospital. Not fun at all for any of us. But the good news is that we have found out what caused her weird spells, that she was having at Disney in December and her lack of energy. So now we can do something about it.

When we signed the contract on the new house, it was supposed to be done in February. So when we had not heard anything by the 3rd week in January we started to panic. We finally got notified that it is running a little late and we will be closing the last week of March. Now that we know, we can start packing and organizing for the move. I was at the house last week, all the flooring is in now. They were working on installing door knobs and were waiting for the inspector to come and do the final check on the electrical and OK the power to be turned on to the house. It should have power by now and they should be working on their finishing work.

With everything else going on, I actually did quilt this month too. Quilting is definitely a stress reliever for me! And having customer quilts that had to get done meant that I could not really dwell on things I could not control. Yeah for that!!!

Happy 2010!

2010-01-03T00:27:00.000-05:00

I hope that you have a wonderful 2010!

So far mine has been busy. I quilted all day on Jan. 1st. And I mean all day. I had 2 quilts that I wanted to deliver today. I made my goal. :)

Have I mentioned that I have the best husband in the whole world.... Really, I do! His parents came to visit yesterday afternoon. He made the bed in the guest room, cleaned the guest bath. And made our traditional good luck dinner, right down to the homemade apple sauce. Dinner was wonderful!

It was really nice to be able to relax and spend time with Matt's parents. Plus we got to send Matt's brother-in-law's Christmas gift back to Winston-Salem with them which was nice.

I hope everyone is getting a chance to relax this weekend and spend some time with family!

Another Wreath Quilt

2009-12-29T21:07:00.000-05:00

In case you missed my early post on Wreath Quilts. I delivered 3 of these while I was in Houston this fall. The were all custom quilted. When it was time to tackle the 4th one I decided to see what could do that would be pretty, but would be edge to edge all over. To do this I could not change threads like I had on the first 3 so I had to decide what color to use, I went for a mid tone beige. I thought that if I went with Christmas red or green that it would compete with the wreath design in the beige areas. I really like the way this quilt turned out, so much so that I did the 5th Wreath quilt the same way.

It is quilted with an all over Holly and Berry design that I made up as I went. This is another all over that I am sure that I will use a lot in the future.

Prairie Points...

2009-12-29T20:57:00.000-05:00

I got to do a very special quilt for a customer. She made it for her daughter for Christmas. It is a memory quilt with pictures of her daughter and son growing up. Judie did a beautiful job on this quilt. She has the pictures professional printed on fabric. This is her very first print and she did prairie points. They were already attached to the top when I picked it up. Since the backing need to be turn under and stitched, I need to leave space on the edge of the quilt. Here is a picture of the quilt on my frame. I used low tack blue painter's tape to make were I did not want to stitch so that I did not have to mark the quilt with a marking pencil, pen or chalk. It worked really well.

Did you also notice the flat head pins I used to pin down the prairie points. I did this on all 4 sides making sure that all of the pins were parallel with my rollers. It worked really well. I also did long basting stitches to mount the top so that it would be easier for Judie to get them out when she was hand finishing the quilt edge.

You can see the flowers and leaves I did in the outer border, the feather and hook in the inner board and the all over leaf freehand that I did in the main body of the quilt.

I really like this all over leaf freehand. I am sure that it will be a go to all over design. It really adds a lot of dimension to the quilt.

The neat thing is that I am able to use it to frame things like the pictures on this quilt, as you can see in the corner of the block in the picture above. It was a great choice for this very feminine quilt.

Flowers and Butterflies...

2009-12-29T20:44:00.000-05:00

I thought I would post a couple pictures of some of my recent customer quilts. This one was done by Emily for her daughter. It is a pretty quilt, I did all over quilting with loops, flowers and butterflies. The quilt turned out really cute.

I survived!

2009-12-29T12:31:00.001-05:00

I just realized that I have not posted since the beginning of December. It has been a really busy month! I got all my customer Christmas quilts done a little early. Yeah! I probably could have taken more then I did, but knowing that we were going to Disney, I wanted to make sure that I could get the ones that I committed to done and back before we left. I got them done the week before we went so that was great and I got to relax while we were there. I did take an additional quilt it that I did between my return from Disney and Christmas. I had a little open space and and she need a quilt done by Christmas so it was a perfect fit for both of us. I am hoping to get a little time this evening to post some pictures. I quilted quite a few first quilts for different people. It is refreshing to get to know new quilters, they are always nervous to give me the tops, but so excited to see their quilts.

The new house is progressing and I will try to get some pictures up of it as well. The outside is painted, the drywall is in and the driveway and sidewalks were poured last week.

The current house is putting up a bit of a fight. The oven quit working last week. We went out and looked at new ovens and then called GE to see how much it would be to fix the current one. The repairman was out today and we got a new glow strip installed. At least now I don't have to buy a new range. :) I do have to buy a new over the range microwave, the repair took one look at it and said replace it, it will cost a lot more then a replacement for me to work on it. I thought I had blown up my vacuum on Sunday. It was just a case of it sucking up something that didn't agree with it. Matt fixed it... I so love that man! He could not fix the new flat screen TV with will no longer turn on. He called Samsung and it is still under warranty. They are actually sending a tech out to the house to fix it. I was sure that I was going to have to pay to have it shipped to a service center. What a nice surprise. And before you think there is something up with house, Matt's truck is trying to die as well. I think we just keep things too long. :)

We had a wonderful Christmas with Matt's family. His sister and brother-in-law rented a house in Duck, NC, on the outer banks, and invited his parents and us to come with them. The twins are doing great and we all had fun spoiling them. We are all looking forward to next year when they will be a little older and able to open presents.

Planning for MQS

2009-12-02T20:20:00.000-05:00

I stayed up to 1AM on December 1st so that I could register for MQS. It was really easy this year and I got all the classes that I wanted. YEAH! I am so excited! If someone would have told me a year ago that I would have been up at 1AM to register for quilting classes I would have thought they were nuts. Funny how life can change so much in a year!

They are in the mail!

2009-11-24T12:33:00.001-05:00

Went to the post office this morning and mailed off the last of the Christmas Quilts for this year. What a huge relief! Now I just need to get the last of the local quilts done. So, back to work I go!

Sweet Sampler Quilt

2009-11-18T21:39:00.002-05:00

This beautiful sampler quilt is Nancy Nuestrem's first quilt. She took a beginning quilting class at a local quilt store and they taught it using this sampler. She did beautiful work!

I really like that they did both traditional piecing and needle turn applique. Due to the applique this quilt really needed custom quilt. I stitched around all of the applique and then did a swirly background fill. I used quit a few of my favorite quilting tricks... Line dancing, continous curve, leaves, tendrils and roses. This was a really fun quilt to work on!

Mystery Quilts

2009-11-18T13:17:00.000-05:00

Wish Upon A Quilt sponsored their first mystery quilt last spring. A group of friends and I went to the mountains and has a blast working on our mystery quilts. It was amazing to see the mystery reveal itself, but seeing the tops as we finished them was amazing. Our fabrics were all so very different, but all of our quilts turn out wonderful. I posted pictures of my quilt when I quilted it this summer. This week I got to quilt a couple of my friends quilts as well. I just can believe how different they all look.

Shawna picked out a really pretty print with a beige back ground with chocolate and gold in it that she used as here light fabric. She used gold for her medium and chocolate for her dark. It turned out beautiful. I did custom quilting on her quilt. Line dancing on the stars and ribbons in the gold.

Lori chose a black fabric with bright butterflies and gold accents as her "light" The she added bright green and hot pink as her medium and dark. Her quilt ended up fun and vibrant. I used Heart & Soul Quilts' Star Swirl panto on her quilt.

This quilt pattern is amazing. Not only have all the tops that I have seen looked great, but it also looks great with either custom quilting or a pantograph. And I actually enjoyed doing the pantograph, which is a first for me. I am usually a front of the machine custom quilting girl. It was nice doing something different for a change.

The Crab Quilt

2009-11-18T12:53:00.000-05:00

I have mentioned my friend's Crab quilt in a couple of posts. Here is what the crab looks like before I quilted it...

She came up with the crab design all by herself. I LOVE this crab. It is just too cute! I decide to quilt swirls in the the blue areas and did paisley fill on the crab itself. Large meander in the crabs on the sand fabric and bead boarded the dark blue border fabric.

Here is a closer picture of the quilting.

It is such a fun quilt!

Being on schedule feels great!

2009-11-17T13:12:00.000-05:00

I just loaded the last quilt that absolutely has to be done by the end of this week. YAHOOOOOO! It is Theresa's Crab Quilt and should be lots of fun!

I am hoping to get a chance to post some pictures this evening. I just finished up 2 mystery quilts. They are both the same pattern as mine, that I quilted this summer, but all 3 of the quilts look so different. Lori and Shawna both did much better jobs piecing theirs then I did. I was too busy laughing and having a good time. I love that the quilts all look so different, but that they all look great! Shawna's is done in chocolate and gold. It is a very graphic quilt, but very neutral at the same time. The fabrics make this quilt stunning. Lori's is bright and bold. Bright green and hot pink with black butterfly fabric. It is fun and vibrant!

The quilt that I just finished is a sampler quilt and is the very first quilt that the piecer has every done. She did a beautiful job. I did custom quilting on it to make the needle turn applique pieces pop. I can't wait for her to see the quilt tomorrow. :)

Well, back to the Crab Quilt. Lunch hour is offically over.

What was I thinking...

2009-11-11T11:15:00.000-05:00

Matt and I have been thinking about buying a larger house for about 6 years. We have been looking on and off for about 3 and seriously looking since August. We have built both of our houses that we have owned thus far and decided that this time we would buy a resale. Really we decided... I swear. So can someone please tell us how we ended up signing a contract on a house under construction.

For those of you who are not quilters, this is my busiest time of the year. What was I thinking... Luckily the house will not be finished until Feb 2010, but I did have to go and pick out everything they will put inside it. It actually went pretty fast, because I was very motivated to get out of the Design Center and back into my Studio.

The best thing about the new house... For me is a tie between the kitchen and my new Studio. Those were the 2 things that were at the top of my list. For Matt it is either the 3 car garage, the kitchen or his new home office.

Another Theresa Quilt

2009-11-05T14:29:00.000-05:00

Theresa has been referring to this quilt as her Wild Quilt. It is a very happy, bright batik quilt. I quilted it using King Tut Cleopatra on the top and light periwinkle BOB in the bobbin. I decided that I need to work on getting my swirls a little bigger so that is what I quilted on this quilt.

What's on my frame?

2009-10-29T15:41:00.000-04:00

I have a couple of friends that start out every phone call and email with, so what's on your frame. I love that they are so supportive of my business and me. Since I had a couple of those calls today, I thought I would take a picture and share with everyone.

Hmmm, that looks like another Theresa quilt. :) This one has much larger blocks at 11 inches finished. And it's twin size.

I just love the tree fabric. I don't think you can see the quilting. I am using light blue thread on the top and bobbin. And the quilting is called whimsy or loops. This one will be coming off this afternoon and her crab quilt will be going on.

Theresa's Quilts

2009-10-29T15:34:00.000-04:00

I finally got chance to upload pictures from my camera. Not that it is hard, I just need to actually have the camera and my laptop in the same room. The first picture is of the Christmas Tree quilt. Before you think that she can't take a picture, I went through and colored over the faces in Paint before I upload the picture. I am kind of funny about the idea of putting peoples pictures on the web without their knowledge.

The second quilts is for one of her friends. It had a very straight line feeling, so I had to stop that and put swirls on it. Yes I know I have issues...

She is doing a great job!

Quilting with Friends

2009-10-28T19:10:00.000-04:00

My friend Theresa came to NC to visit me last weekend. She is the one that I taught how to cut 6.5 inch squares in January. I quilted 3 quilts for her in the spring. She brought 4 more quilt tops with her this time. She has taught herself to do half square triangles and has been designing her own tops. Just wait until you see the crab she designed in Excel. It is just too cute! And she made the most adorable Christmas tree quilt which has family pictures on it that she printed on fabric.

I showed her how to add borders and gave her some tips to help her with piecing. We also made a quick top while she was here. I quilted 2 of the tops and have 3 to quilt and send to her. She was here less then 72 hours. It was a busy weekend, but we had a blast!

Back to work!!!

2009-10-23T17:24:00.000-04:00

I have been busy since returning from Houston. I picked this quilt up on the way home from the airport.

It is a wild quilt with lots of fun and happy fabric! I wanted to do something on it that would not cause excess movement. So I decided on Continuous Curve. I used Lakeside Quilt Company's Triple Play ruler. It makes curves easy because the hopping foot is following the inside of the curve instead of the outside like it would be on a circle. I did have to switch over to a larger circle for the larger curves in the large squares on the quilt. I have a really cool circle set by Off the Edge that has multiple sizes of circles.

Here is a close up of the continuous curves:

It ends up making a large orange peel design.

Here is close up of one of the blocks:

I used a lavender thread that matched the dots in the khaki background fabric on top and a royal purple to match the backing in the bobbin. We used a Dream Company's Black Poly batting. This is the first time I have used this batting and I have to say it really surprised me. I did not expect it to feel so soft. If I had not known it was Poly, I would have thought it was cotton. It also shows great stitch definition.

If you would like to see the quilt in person, it will be in Wish Upon a Quilt early in November. They have Brandon Mably's fabric line and kits are available for this quilt.

Quilt Festival

2009-10-23T16:52:00.000-04:00

These are not the best pictures in the world, but I wanted to give you an idea of the size of Quilt Festival. The convention center is HUGE and it is crowded with quilters! I took these pictures from the second floor through the big round red framed windows that look down on the convention floor. I was shooting through the glass of the window, so there is an issue with reflections, but I think you can get an idea of the size and crowds. The first picture is of the food area. This was Thursday afternoon at about 1:30PM and there are very few seats available. What you don't see are the huge lines of people waiting to order. Trust me the lines were long, I just did not take a picture of them.

The next picture is of one of the rows of the vendor mall. It does not look as crowded as it feels when you are down there.

Want to see what the rest of the floor looked like? Well the next picture is what is to the right of the 2nd pictures.

It is kind of hard to see, but there is a beige wall at the far end. All the beautiful show quilts are on the other side of that wall.

If you get a chance you should go to Houston. The classes were awesome, the vendor mall was terrific and there is not a adjective that is good enough to describe the quilts!

Hope to see you there next year!

Finally home!

2009-10-20T12:09:00.000-04:00

I finally made it home yesterday. I had a lot of fun in Houston at Market and Festival. Of course, getting a couple days of with my nephew was great as well. With the exception of my husband, my whole family was in Houston at my sister's house this weekend.

I have to say that the bus system for Quilt Market worked extremely well. We stayed at the Doubletree so we used the bus a lot. The quilts in the show were beautiful!

I was only at the Festival vendor mart for part of Thursday. I really don't like crowds and it is CROWDED! Mom and I had gone to preview the night before. My sister came down to do the show on Thursday so we went back with her. Next year I may just go to the preview night.

I will try to post a picture of the crowd in the next couple of days. I took a picture looking down on the vendor mall Thurday afternoon.

Now, back to work. I have several quilts that I need to do in next couple of days. :)

Longarm Classes

2009-10-14T21:27:00.000-04:00

I have just finished up two days of longarm classes. Yesterday I took a class with Gina Perkes. It was awesome! She was talking about things that can inspire longarm designs and different ways to fill quilting spaces.

Today I took Quilting within the Lines with Pam Clarke and a class on running a longarm business with Linda Taylor. I really learned a lot in Pam's Class. I am sure I will be ordering some of her templates to play with. I did not really learn anything new in Linda's class, but I still really enjoyed it.

Quilting is a small wonderful world!

2009-10-14T21:21:00.000-04:00

I got to see a couple of my mom's friends while at market. Colleen and Chloe from Toadusew and Cathy Messner a fellow longarmer that has done some quilting for them and was here to help them out it their booth. It was nice getting to see all of them again. I even got to see a couple of quilts that Cathy quilted. :)

Hi from Market!

2009-10-10T17:14:00.000-04:00

Have you ever wondered what Market looks like. I took this picture last night after sample spree. There were still vendors busy setting up their booths. I was trying to get a shot of the length of the vendor mall. I had an issue with the glass reflecting the red frame of the windows.

Here is one of one of the rows.

I stopped by to say hi to Mary Corcoran and Janice Pope.

Look how cute Janice's booth looks!

Yesterday was a busy day. We left our hotel at 8AM and got back to our room at 10PM. Luckily we looked at our class list, because we thought our class with Eleanor Burns was on Sunday, but it was at 8AM this morning. Yikes.

We took a class on Eleanor Burn's Day And Night quilt. She is a hoot! The quilt is very graphic and fun. It is also easy. We were out of the room by 9:30 and we all had completed at least one block.

Then vendor mall opened. It is so much fun just walking around and looking at all the quilts. I have also been doing research on batting. Pellon has a new black batting that feels really nice. I want to get some to play with. Mom had to trick me to get a hold of the sample, I was walking through market rubbing it because it feels so good.

I visited the APQS booth. I miss my Millie! I even sat down and played on the George. OMG, even I was able to free motion on it. Wow!

Houston, Here I Come!!!!

2009-10-07T20:17:00.000-04:00

I have packed the 3 Christmas Wreath quilts up as they will be traveling to Houston in my carry on. I just can't get myself to check the quilts.  Logically, I know that TSA is not interested in my quilting, but I really want them to get to my customer.  I can't wait to see the reaction to these quilts.

All I need to do is finish packing my clothes. Then get a good night's sleep and off I go to the airport. :)

For anyone that wants to set a drop off date for their quilt, I will be checking my email throughout my trip. My voicemails are emailed to me so I will return those calls as well.   I will be talking several Longarm classes while I am there and I am sure I will have new ideas to share!

I am taking my camera and will post pictures a couple times while I am gone. I will try to get a picture of Janice Pope in her booth to share with you. I am really excited for her and hope that she gets loads of orders while she is there. Cathy McKillip has assured me that she will be talking to the fabric companies, so it looks like my credit cards will continue to be in danger when I walk into her store.  I am sure she will order all kinds of goodies for us to love on while she is there.

I am sure that I will run into other local ladies while I am there.   I hope everyone traveling has safe trips, that we have fun while we are there and that we have lots to share when we get home!

Three Down...

2009-10-02T21:48:00.000-04:00

Woo Hoo!!! I finished Christmas Wreath #3!

First here are a couple of pictures of #2. The only thing that is different from #1 is the borders. I quilted holly leaves in #2.

Here is the back that shows the border. It is really hard to see on the front of the quilt.

Now for #3. I decided to do an all over in the center part of #3. I love seeing how the quilting really changes the look of the quilt. #3 looks so different from #1 and #2, but I still like it.

Here is a close up of the quilting on the front of #3.

And here is what the back looks like.

Now I need to decide what to do on #4, #5 and #6. :)

Two Down...

2009-10-02T15:01:00.000-04:00

I finished the second Christmas Wreath quilt Wednesday evening. I have enough room to load the third onto the same backing so I did. I am almost finished with it as well. The first 2 were custom, the second is more of an an all over with 2 border treatments. I can't stop my self and I did SID both of the borders on all of the quilts. I just really like the way it looks and it does a good job in stabilizing the quilt. I am going to load a tablerunner on next and then a different Christmas wallhanging. I just need a break before attacking Christmas Wreaths 4, 5, & 6.

I will take picture of #2 & 3 when they come off the frame. I don't think that #1 and #2 will look different from each other from the front. Since the thread matchs well you really can't see what I did in the borders on the front of #2, but it will definately show on the back.

One Down...

2009-09-29T21:32:00.000-04:00

I finished the first of the Christmas quilts. Yeah!

I liked doing the background fill on this one. I did piano keys in the outer border. I really like how piano keys, but I have been trying to get myself to do other border treatments.

If you look closely you can see the holly in the leaf areas.

This is how the center turned out.

See I really did piano keys in the outer border.... I love piano keys. Good thing my customer doesn't mind them. ;) And now pictures of the back.

One more...

The next one is loaded on, I am hoping to get 2 done tomorrow.

What I am working on today...

2009-09-28T18:25:00.002-04:00

Here is what is on my frame today.

I am doing 6 of these quilts. This is only number 1. It is going to be a long week here at Thread Waggle. I have not decided if they will all be the same or if I will do something different on each one. I have been thinking about doing different background fills on each one.

I am doing Holly leaves and ribbons in the green leaf areas.

A swirly McTavish like back ground file. When I stablized the quilt I did arcs in the converse and concave areas so that it will have a lovers knot design on the back of the quilt.

Now I just need to get going on the borders, then on to #2.

Quilting on the Wild Side

2009-09-27T20:39:00.000-04:00

I have recently decided that I love black and white quilts. They always seem to look crisp and clean. I got to quilt one last month that the has dalmation print Minkie as the backing fabric. Boy does Minkie shed. I must have lint brushed that quilt 40 times to try to get the fibers off the front. I like the weight that they Minkee gives the quilt. The texture is just makes you want to cuddle with it.

I liked the border treatment that I did on this quilt. It kind of looks like the fiddle head scroll on a violin. It is hard to see the block quilting, even in person. You can see it on the back of the quilt because Minkee gets a sculpted look when it is quilted. While you can't see the quilt pattern in my picture, it is College Bound by Anything But Boring. Janice does a terrific job designing her patterns. I did not even recognize the pattern at first because it looks so different made out of black and white.

Current Project Update

2009-09-25T12:14:00.000-04:00

I did a post on current projects early this month. My goal was to get up to date on The Quilt Show BOM that I am doing and the current mystery quilt at Wish Upon A Quilt. I am happy to report that I am up to date on both of those projects. Yeah! I also started working on this year's Thimbleberries Club which I had only completed Month 1. I am up to Month 4 now. Woo Hoo! (small personal victory dance!!!)

I will not get to work on any of these projects until after Quilt Market/ Festival next month in Houston. But at least I won't be doing too much catch up.

No more peicing for me this month. Time to post the "Gone Quilting" sign and get to work on the longarm.

New name?

2009-09-25T12:03:00.000-04:00

I think I may have misnamed my company. I was looking at the photos of my customer quilts and there is an overwhelming theme. I am not sure if this is normal or not, but I have done A LOT of christmas quilts. Christmas themed quilts, that is. Trust me, I can quilt holly! Which will come in handy for the next 6 quilts as they are all Christmas themed quilts. The worst part is that I know that I will start signing christmas carols as I am quilting them. Then I won't be able to get those songs out of my head.

So what do you think... Crazy Christmas Quiltier, Quirky Christmas Quilter, Caroling Christmas Quilter...

I think I will just keep what I have, because when it comes right down to it...

I still make thread waggle. :)