Category Archives: quilting

Gifts Quilters Could Really Use

Quilters are a selfless lot. They spend untold hours upon hours making beautiful gifts for others and ask nothing in return. During this gift-giving time of year, they definitely deserve something, but what? Here are some suggestions for gifts that quilters really could use:

  • New Quilting Scissors – Destined to be at the top of the list, you know you ruined Your Quilter’s favorite scissors when you used them to cut cardboard, burritos, wire or even roof flashing. You owe a replacement pair.
  • Restaurant Gift Cards – Remember when Your Quilter spent frantic days non-stop to finish that cherished baby quilt or that unforgettable wedding quilt? Well, they are going to do that again one day soon and they are not going to have time to cook dinner. Have someone else do the cooking for you both. Extra points for take-out!
  • Fabric Store Gift Cards – Your Quilter can never have enough fabric so give a little help to build their stash. Be sure to support local, independently owned quilt shops!
  • A Good Chair – If the gamers get fancy chairs with all kinds of lumbar support, then so should the Quilters, after all, quilting is sitting… for creative people.
  • A Really Big Magnet – Preferably on a stick! Tired of walking on quilting pins in the carpet? Well, if Your Quilter had something to pick those tiny little fellas up with, you wouldn’t be finding them while in your sock feet. Makes a great stocking stuffer.
  • Thread – To the uninitiated, this may sound like a terribly boring gift idea, but I can assure you that Your Quilter would find a rainbow box of threadmore delightful than a box of chocolates.

Armed with this handy list of useful suggestions, I hope you can find a nice gift for Your Quilter, because you know as well as I do… you are getting a quilt!

The Rewards of Shopping Local


Everyone loves online shopping: it’s so easy, convenient, and you get exactly what you want showing up at your doorstep. It would be naïve to say we should refrain completely from online shopping – we are just not going to be able to put that toothpaste back in the tube. We should, however, be aware of our choices and make a conscious effort not to forget about local businesses that make up our communities. Not only do these local businesses rely on us for their survival, but their survival benefits us as well. Let’s think about how:

  • Local businesses are owned and operated by our friends, our neighbors, our kid’s best friend’s parents – all people in our communities. These people represent “the little guys”. Big online retailers and megalithic marketplaces are already getting enough tax breaks and other incentives, its up to us to help the Little Guys buy supporting them with our dollars.
  • Money spent locally in our communities goes back into local economies and helps us, too. When we spend our money in a Local Quilt Shop, that business pays taxes to our towns. That money goes to school, roads, police and other local services in our towns – all making our lives better.
  • Shopping local is much more fun and interactive than sitting behind a keyboard. In a time when “working from home” is all the rage, shopping local enables the chance to get to get out of the house, talk to other people, and learn about new patterns and projects you otherwise wouldn’t have.
  • Local Quilt Shops have many unique products you would never find online, items ranging from beautiful hand-dyed materials to tools and accessories made by local artists.

Now get out of your pajamas and make a trip to your Local Quilt Shop. You will be glad you did!

Don’t Stress Out… Quilt!

I’m just about out of thread

As we are heading into the busy holiday season, now is the time we often feel a lot of stress. Between trying to finish end of the year projects at work to all the festive seasonal preparations, it can be an overwhelming time.  It hardly seems like the time to break out a quilt project. But did you know that quilting actually has numerous physical and mental health benefits? Here are few of the nice things that quilting can do for you:

  • Generates a sense of accomplishment – Sure your company didn’t meet its “stretch goals” for the year, but you finished little Suzie’s quilt. Win!
  • A natural anti-depressant – Crafting activities such as quilting, knitting and other handiwork cause your brain to release the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin, the so-called “happy chemicals”.
  • Keeps your brain active and engaged … and thereby postpones cognitive aging and dementia. The more complicated the task the better, so bring on those double wedding ring quilts!
  • Reduces stress – What could be more relaxing than looking at colorful fabrics and shaping them into something both useful and beautiful? Reducing stress lowers the risk of heart attack and stroke. So, quilting might just save your life someday!

The Worst Day Quilting

Quilting is better than working any day

The worst day quilting is still better than the best day working, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have a pretty bad day quilting! We asked our readers “What was your worst day quilting ever?” and got some pretty “bad” responses. Here are some of the worst:

  • Sewing in a block upside down and not noticing it until after it was quilted.
  • Miscalculating the yardage needed and running out of an irreplaceable vintage fabric.
  • Spilling a glass of red wine on a baby quilt top the night before the shower.
  • Finding out your husband used your good quilting scissors to cut wire… as evident by all the mysterious notches in your cuts.
  • Sewing an applique block to your pant leg.
  • Deciding to pre-wash your fabrics and finding out that one of them wasn’t color fast.
  • Discovering the hard way that the cat got accidentally shut in the closet and then relieved himself on an unfinished, folded quilt top.
  • Investing untold hours into a Dresden Plate baby quilt with scalloped edges for a family member only to be told by the recipient “This is lovely, but I already got a quilt for the baby… at Target”.

Your well-meaning husband mistook a bag of quilt tops waiting for the long armer for a clothing bag destined for the donation bin.

  • And, finally, the winner of the Worst day Quilting was hands down (no pun intended): Cutting the tip of your finger off with a rotary cutter. Don’t worry, this fearless quilter went straight to the ER and her steadfast dedication to quilting was unharmed.

 

Use Your Phone… for Quilting?

Silly boy, phones are for quilts!

Phones are used for everything these days. From making dinner reservations to finding an auto shop or counting calories, there is nothing that phones can’t help you with… including quilting? Yes, even quilting, and not just for taking perfect pin-worthy glamor shots. Phones can help you plan your quilt in a number of useful ways:

  • Auditioning Fabrics – Looking for the perfect color combo? Assemble a dozen different color combinations and take a picture of each. The combos will be easier to flip through on your phone and you won’t have to re-arrange fabric piles one hundred times.
  • Layout – Can’t decide between “this way” and “that way”? Take a picture of each layout to compare side by side. You can try printing the options out on paper so they are bigger and easier to see. You can even tack them all up on a wall for thoughtful rumination.
  • Arranging Fabrics by Value – Arranging fabric by value (such as the light-to-dark needed for the perennial favorite Log Cabin quilt) can be difficult, especially when lots of colors are involved. You can achieve this task easily by taking a picture of your fabrics lined up, side by side, then using your phone’s photo edit features to “Save As” a black and white photo. In black and white mode, the colors can now be easily arranged from darkest to lightest.
  • Quilting Calculators – From Binding to Backing, there’s a Quilting Calculator out there to compute every quilting metric. Never get caught speechless at the cutting table again!