Time for another Roll Call?

One time I was sewing in my kithen while some workers were doing stuff on the foundation under me, my DH was helping (I belive I have mentioned the profound idiocy of most of the people my landlord hires plenty of times). One of the guys finally asked DH, "who around here has a Harley and why do we hear it so well here?" So I have a notion that my little 1/15 horsepower Bel-Air Bantam is cousin to a Harley. DH counts it as a pride point.

NightMist

Bloody hell - 3 RCTQers in Scotland all at once. Is that enough critical mass to form a new quilting star or something? I have a group assessment on the 7th - one step down from an interview with the partners - so please cross your fingers from 10am to noon Greenwich Mean Time! How about Friday the 15th? After my dreaded Accountancy tutorial which finishes at noon?

-- Jo in Scotland

Hello from snowy Oregon!

My name is Laurie, I've been reading this group for years but only delurk occasionally.

Liz, I can totally relate to this! My DD is 15 and a freshman in HS (how did *that* happen!) who *allows* me to make costumes. LOL

Anyway, let me backtrack a little - ummm...oh yeah

-I'm about to be 42 (ugh, next week)

-Navy brat (Guam is a far out as we went)

-Married to a great guy for 18.5 yrs who *totally* supports my quilting addiction (he better, he signed me up for my first quilt class)

- 1 DD: beautiful, talented, musical, great student and A QUILTER! (she's also a mall-baby, so we have a great time shopping together)

- 2 QIs (feline): Scooter-grey/white tabby, almost 18yrs (Feb.) who loves all things fabric and Zoe-Siamese, 4.5yrs who has supervised all quilts and materials since she arrived. She especially loves batting!

Started sewing in Jr. High home ec class, made clothes for myself until we had DD and then I made her clothes. Still sew for hubby, but am not allowed to sew for DD anymore. Started quilting 13 yrs ago when DH gave me my first class as a Christmas present... if only he'd known what would happen!

I've done most types: piecing, applique, paper-piecing, traditional, contemporary. I like them all and do it all by machine(some hand applique and I hand-finish my bindings). I'm not crazy about the "quilting" part, but am getting better.

I love to read, sing soprano and play handbells. I started knitting again last year, but only scarves so far (DDs friends seem to like them!) I also work in glass - stained, mosaic and starting to fuse.

I just quit my job as a sub for the school district in hopes of starting my own business selling my textiles and glass work. EEEK!

Chocolate: any will do, but the darker the better! Laurie

Johanna,

I'm not in Scotland, but I'll keep my fingers crossed here in Idaho!

Donna in (SW) Idaho

My turn?

My name is Rose and I live in Northern California, USA. I used to read and post here every day but now its once or twice a week. I have embarked on my third career and am in school full time training to become a Veterinary Technician.

I am 61 years young, divorced twice (and have learned *that* lesson thenkyewverramuch!) I have two lovely DD's and one strapping DS; three grandboys and another (boy or girl we don't know yet) "in the oven". My current QI is an orange marmalade tabby named DC which stands for Devil Cat, Destructo Cat, or Definitely Cute, depending on circumstances. Photos in my Flickr album

Quilting style is more traditional than modern, although I have a Moon over the Mountain in the works for a niece for her HS graduation. I prefer to machine piece but lean more toward hand quilting over machine when time permits. Photos in another Flickr album I am trying to move all my quilt photos over from Webshots but it takes time ... Chocolate favorite is Scharfen Berger, the darker the better :-)

Rose > As Cornwoman wrote 'Now I want to

I'm Taria in the high desert of So. Cal. I hit the big 50 last year. I am a retired SAHM adjusting to a dh (of 27+ years) that retired last year. DS is in San Diego and DD lives down the hall but is threatening to buy a house if the real estate crashes hard enough here. She is a mapmaker and works in GIS. There are 4 QI's here. The golden girls are Georgia and Ginger. They are almost 3 and 4 YO golden retrievers. Lilly and Maki cats are inside cats here. There has been a new interloper kitty outside dh has taken to feeding lately too.

I have sewn since I was a little kid. Amazing how many of us really were just born with that. Mrs. Flatten and 4-H helped me learn to sew pretty well. I took my first quilting class in '76 but really didn't start quilting a lot until the last 10 years or so. I enjoy more traditional work. I do keep a hand quilting project sort of handy but most of my stuff I quilt on a home machine. I have a Janome 6600 I am trying to get to know. I have collected old machines over the years. Many are gone but there is a page with lots of photos:

have been involved with the a local guild for over 12 years and madea lot of wonderful friends. I enjoy gardening and cooking. I have sort of been in a creativity slump in the last few years but I think I am digging my way out of that. I've been hanging around RCTQ for years. I enjoy and appreciate all you wonderful folks here. Taria

Hi Steph. I also live in the San Francisco Bay area (San Jose Bay area?? I hear that SJ is now bigger than SF) and was raised in upstate New York. Such a small world we have here in rctq-land, eh?

Rose in CA @}--->--->--- Rosanne DOT Morgan AT sbcglobal DOT net Disclaimer: Any errors in spelling, fact, or tact are transmission errors. No trees were killed in the sending of this message. However, a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced......

StephM wrote:

We do mostly handwork. I have begun to bring in a sewing machine and let a few use it each meeting. I have 20 4th and 5th graders and we meet every two weeks and occasionally at lunch. I work with another teacher who can't sew but is amazing at threading needles.

Linda PATCHogue, NY

Ooooo, here's what you do, get some nice vanilla ice cream, one of the single serve caramel apple dips and some dark chocolate syrup. Nuke the caramel apple dip for just 15 seconds or so and pour over the ice cream, top with dark chocolate syrup. Heaven.

Turned 60 this past October! My students think I'm 75 but my neighbors think I'm in my 40's. After a hard day at school, I think I'm about 95.

Started sewing clothing in junior high back in the 60's. Swore I'd never be a quilter because I thought making all those squares and triangles and blocks would be boring. But I kept going to quilt shows and looking at Electric Quilt everytime someone was around to demo it. Took on quilting in about 2004. Over the years, all my clothing patterns have shrunk. :-)

Grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. Got married and moved to Maryland. Got divorced 40 years ago! (Now that is something to celebrate!) Moved back to Ohio. Got a Master's of Education in Counseling. Moved back to Maryland. Moved across the river to Virginia. Then to Indianapolis. Now Sparks, Nevada since 2001. Nope, not military. Just led a sheltered childhood and wanted to see the US without living out of a suitcase. I'll probably retire here. No tornadoes, no state taxes, no humidity. I don't think there's any poison ivy either.

Been mostly teaching public school since 1968. Elementary, middle, high school. Math, computer lab. Even spent a few years teaching adults in the computer world. Currently 4th grade.

Only one QI these days. The shelter in Indianapolis said he needed to be an only cat. That was back in '98. He started purring about 2 years ago. BearCat -- possibly a badly bred Turkish Van. He's so soft but not good enough for cat shows. Eh, who cares.

I am an early-to-bed early-to-rise person. Up at 4:00 AM Pacific Time, but that's really only 7:00 AM Eastern. Spent over 50 years in that time zone! My body hasn't adjusted to the time zone change.

I'm the keeper of the website with our picture links:

And like Mary, I'm into paper-piecing these days. Participated in the 2006 Secret Swap Sister event. Participated in Jessamy's 2007 Starry Starry Night Block Swap and the 2007 Baseball Swap. (Doesn't Spring Training start soon? Puhleeeze!!!!) And I looooove playing with Electric Quilt.

When I'm not sewing, I'm reading.

omg, look at all the stuff you folks wrote... i'm older than dirt, tho i know some here are older than me. born there, live here. i figure i btdt. done enough to qualify anyhow. i love fabric. i quilt therefore i am. nuff said, j.

Hi Rose, where in upstate New York are you from? My DH grew up in Potsdam, New York.

Ok, here goes.

I'm 53, living in Alberta, Canada about an hour NW of Calgary. I do NOT consider myself an Albertan. I am Canadian. If I have to narrow it down, I may go for Western Canadian. Born in BC. Moved to Saskatchewan when I was

19, with DH#1. Lived there for 25 years, got divorced and now I'm here. I had 5 bio children with DH#1. DH#2 had 4 children when I met him. The younger 2 living with us full time. He passed on in 2001. His younger 3 call me Mom, the oldest was already a young mom when I came along, so we never had a chance to get very close. So, that gave me 9 kids. Met DH#3 in 2002. He had 5 bio kids plus 2 step kids from a second marriage, and like me, kept them. So my 9 plus his 7 give us 16 children. Those 16 have been quite busy in the last 6 years. When DH#3 and I met there were 3 grandkids on my side and 6 on his side. Now there are 28, and 3 more on the way. Yikes! Only 3 of these are biologically mine, but they all call me Grama, and I love them all. After being a stay at home mom for many years I went back to school and became an office admin person in the legal world. Then tried my hand at Real Estate sales for awhile. Now I have a contract with Canada Post, that takes approx 1 1/2 hours each weekday, and DH and I own and operate a hobby supply business from home (knifemaking supplies). We bought 5 acres of forest last fall about a 20 minute drive from where we live now. We hope to get started on building a house there come spring. We did manage to get a building site cleared and a driveway built before freeze up. Like many other here, I have sewn since I was a little girl. From my early teens I knew that "some day" I wanted to make quilts and saved every scrap. I did make a few baby quilts in my later teens - early 20's but didn't tackle a bed size quilt till I was into my 30's. That first one almost finished my quiltmaking. It was simple 4 inch squares, cut from scraps and old clothing with scissors, after tracing around a cardboard template. Then sewing them into 100 inch long rows. You can imagine the nightmare trying to match all those seams when I joined the rows together! They didn't! Thankfully, I met another who introduced me to rotary cutting, and I bought a book! I think in terms of bed size quilts when I see patterns that I like. I have made wall hangings, table toppers, lap quilts, baby quilts, placemates, tea cozies, etc but my brain seems to think quilts belong on beds. I like traditional pieced patterns best. I used to really like hand work, including applique, but the last few years time is at a premium, and my eyesight seems to be getting worse, so most of what I do is by machine these days. For machines, my newest is a Janome 6500 that I have had for about 3 years now. I also have a Bernina 830, which was the best machine ever, and if I had room, I would have it set up too. I also have a featherweight, a handcrank of some sort, and my mothers old machine, a metal 2 ton monster. The feather weight was a gift from my DS and his wife. The handcrank DH#3 found on Ebay and bought for me. I haven't used either, other than to see if they actually worked, then they got packed away waiting patiently for the day we would move to our "new" house. My quilting haven is destined to be in the basement of this new house - eventually. We have a loft area planned for upstairs that will look down into the living room, and I think that until I get MY space done in the basement I will set my desk and machine up there. There won't be space up there to store stash and supplies or I would claim that space as my own. The "spare room" on the mainfloor has already been claimed by our "supply store". Well, now you know more that you ever wanted to, and its time for me to head for bed.

Quilty hugs to all

Marilyn in Alberta, Canada

"Sally Swindells" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@bt.com...

Wow! I just scrolled down the list, and had to keep scrolling and scrolling....

I'm 59 years old, and am retired as an RN. I had to quit work and got on disability about 5 years ago. I didn't plan on that, but you know how it is. My body had other plans. LOL I'm originally from Montana, but have lived in Iowa since '99. MT still seems like home, though, and probably always will.

I love to quilt, and now have more time to play with my sewing machine. I moved across town in August and have still not gone through all the boxes! I haven't done any sewing since Aug, and my arms and hands are itchin' to get back at it.

I had to have surgery on each hand in Nov., and the result was some tendon damage. I've been working on my PT exercises, though, because I'm not ready to give up sewing!

I have a DD, a DS and a DDIL. And the best -- 2 little granddaughters, who just turned 3 and 6! I've made each of them a "trainer quilt" that have seen better days, and am now working on a "big girl" quilt for each of them. They probably won't be dragging the new ones around all over the house. :)

I am separated from my husband. We got married in 1968, and separated about 5 years ago. It meant some major changes for me, but to tell the truth, I wish I'd kicked him out a lot earlier. Sometimes we just get used to the unhappiness, until we wake up and realize there are better things than sticking in a dead marriage. Besides he just never understood my ferver is collecting fabric. If I got too much, I just bought another bin. He thought I should get rid of it. Gasp!

This is a very large and talkative group. I mostly skim it, now, even though I've been here since '94, I think. It's great when you have a particular question, though, because you'll get lots of good answers. Somebody on here knows what you want to know!

Ren=E9

Replied privately.

Nah, just metal silouhettes of animals. ;-)

By the way, I've made the NSW state team agian - national champs start 29th Feb. Hoping my foot is better by then, and the sewing machine. I've still got a lot of clothing to make before I can get back to any sort of quilting stuff.

I'm Judy from Massachusetts

I have just come back after a pretty long absence. I've been married for 30 years - to the same guy! Hasn't always been great, but we made it. We have 2 kids, my son, 26, and his girlfriend live with us. My daughter will someday graduate from UMass Boston, I hope, she's 23, and living with a roommate.

I work as an usher in a sports arena, currently on medical leave because I have just been diagnosed with small cell lung cancer. I could use all the hugs, prayers, (psychic healers?) you've got right now! I have just finished one round of chemotherapy, which went okay. Round two is coming the 13th of February and I'm not looking forward to it or the rest of the six rounds. I have to cut my long hair, before it falls out, and buy a wig (I'm thinking, besides a "serious" one, I might go for a bright pink one!)

I've been lurking. I'm planning on doing as much quilting as I can while I'm home and not working. I want to make at least quilt tops for all my friends.

Judy

Hello, I'm Linda from western Ohio. I've been reading this group for a few years now, but post only occasionally. I have learned so much about quilting from all of you.

I'm 59 years old, and have been sewing since I was eight years old, when I got a toy sewing machine for Christmas and used it to make doll clothes. It wasn't long until I was using a real machine to make my own clothes, and I've been sewing ever since. Before I started working full time, I had the sewing machine running almost every day of the year.

I made one quilt in the early seventies, a cross-stitched queen size, which I hand quilted with the help of my grandmother. No more quilting projects for several years while my five children were growing up, but now that they are on their own, I've starting quilting again, making baby quilts for the grandkids and projects for our home. My husband of 38 years and I have four grandkids, a girl age six, two boys who are three, and another who is two. Three of them belong to one daughter, and the other boy belongs to our other daughter. Only one of our three sons is married, and has no children. The grandkids all have their birthdays between March 22 and April 8th, so they are generally celebrated together. Last year I made each of them a simple quilt, and those turned out to be the hit of the party. The party was held at our local bowling alley, and the boys laid their quilts out on the floor to try them out, not concerned that they were right where people wanted to be walking through...

I work as a manager of a small bank office located in a supermarket. It's a fun job, but the hours aren't the greatest, so it's not easy to find much time for quilting. Currently I am on disability from work because I'm taking chemo treatments for breast cancer. I have good days and bad days, on the good days I either sew, quilt, or do machine embroidery, all things I enjoy. At the beginning of my disability I made sure I had several projects to work on, and one by one they are getting done. I will be doing seven weeks of radiation treatments after the chemo is over. My boss is urging me to stay on disability through that period too, so maybe I will get them all finished....