A Great Day Out

A new day dawned and I felt like an excited teenager going out into the unknown to try something new.   I set off on my hour drive for my day of tuition with BA at the quilt shop in Cochrane.  As usual a welcoming smile greeted me from all the ladies there.  BA was in the process of guiding another lady through the steps of setting up a quilt to be quilted on her machine 'Millie' an APQS longarm quilting machine.  

I was a bit apprehensive about all this new technical equipment.  BA put me at ease and soon had me set up on the other machine.  I thought I was on a 'white knuckle ride' I was gripping the handles so tightly, however soon discovered you could move the machine around with your little pinky finger, it was so manoeuvrable.  I was soon wandering over the fabric practice sandwich with wiggles, loops, ells and ees, my shoulders were tense but I was having fun!  This was such a wonderful opportunity and great learning experience but not at all relaxing.  



My First Attempt

After a short break I was transferred on to Millie, what a lovely machine - in some ways more complex and technical but much easier to use than the other one which was having a few tension issues.  Millie and I got on well, I was beginning to relax a bit.  We chose the pantograph from a large and varied selection and BA set it up.  I helped load up a new practice sandwich and I was ready to start again.  So many things to remember, and a whole new set of words to learn, brake, rollers, channel locks, stitch regulator, laser guide, white button, black button - my head was buzzing!!

Here are the practice pieces from yesterday's  tutorial.  Thank you so so much BA for such a great day.  



Not so good on smooth ups and downs with the pantograph



This was done on 'Millie'

1st row with stitch regulator, 2nd one without regulator and finally echo quilting and stopping on an intersection 

I returned home tired, a little stiff and totally invigorated by this fantastic experience. Cochrane, Canmore and Calgary quilters just don't know how lucky they are to have this on their doorstep.  I just wish we had such a facility back home in Scotland.   So if anyone out there reading this has any contact details for any longarmers in the central belt who hire out time on their machine please, please let me know.

I am returning next week to have another wee shot and if I'm good enough I might even quilt the Allsorts quilt. 

I hope you are all having a fun quilting week too.