Welcome to the first post of my new quilting blog, Patchplay with Me! First, a little about my quilting self. The first quilt I ever made was when I was 18 and a freshman in college. My mom helped me make a twin-sized quilt made of four-inch squares from fabric scraps. It was a cute quilt, hand-quilted, and full of memories, and I used it so much it wore out, but it didn't infect me with the quilting bug. The next quilt I made was 26 years later, a queen-sized quilt made for my oldest son, who was returning home after two years in South Africa. I don't know if it was the fabrics or the sense of accomplishment or the right time in my life, but, man, I was hooked!
Since then I have made many quilts and started or bought patterns or fabric for many more (WIP, UFO, round tuits, whatever you call them, you know we all have them). I love the feel and smell and look of fabric. I love quilt magazines, calendars, gadgets, tools, shows, blogs, podcasts, stores, all things quilty. I currently use a Brother ULT-2002D as my sewing/embroidery machine, which has worked quite well for me, and I bought a Voyager 17 with a Hinterberg stretch frame about 9 months ago. I'm not very proficient with it yet, but I'm learning, and for the money I think it's the best quilting machine out there.
My current sewing room is also my office (I work at home typing court transcripts, a good job, but not very creative) and it's also the laundry room. Yep, the laundry room. The one good thing about it is that it's totally my room because nobody else wants to do laundry. I have my quilting frame and machine downstairs in my daughter's former bedroom. It's a nice big room, sort of chilly in the winter, sometimes floods during a particularly wet spring, but again not one anyone else is fighting over, so I win again.
My sister, Lori, and I would like to start a quilt design business. In fact, this blog is our first step. We live in two different countries, nearly 800 miles apart, and that has made trying to start a business together challenging to say the least, but quilting is also one of the things that keeps us connected. Please look for her blog, Patchplay with Me Too! coming soon. And soon after that you can start looking for our patterns online. To be honest, it's frightening for me just to put these words out there in the quilting world, let alone my designs. I have that same feeling I have just before I cut into a lovely, pristine, expensive piece of fabric. I hestitate, rotary cutter in hand, take a deep breath, straighten my ruler one last time, and go for it. Before I know it's three hours later, I'm knee-deep in fabric scraps and blissfully content. One, two, three .... jump!
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