No T-shirts, No problem

Where are the t-shirts? There aren’t any, at least that are recognizable! These were made from different colorful print clothing items. The shapes were cut to get to the desired quilt size and arranged in a layout pleasing to our customer. The back is a soft black minky. It comes in many different colors and feels so nice against your skin. The outer black border on the front is cotton where you can clearly see the quilting in heart shapes in a silver thread. Quilting makes it a quilt ! The very outer thin edge is the binding — another color choice when we’re making a quilt for you. Here it is black cotton. Aesthetically, the binding frames the outer edge. Practically, it hides the raw edges after the quilting resulting in a nice, neat finished edge.

Consider something like this if you don’t necessarily need the entire clothing item any more, maybe considering discarding or donating, but would like a reminder and memento of that special person that wore them.

The quilt becomes a huggable surrogate to hold and cuddle up with just as if that person were right there with you.

High Tech Quilting in the House

Back in the day quilting was all done by hand. Can you imagine how long it would take to stitch all of the layers together by hand with a needle and thread to make a bed-size quilt–forever!  Today, in the 21st century, automation makes it possible to stitch those same layers together, in the pattern of your choice, from thousands of computerized patterns to choose from, with a higher level of precision, accuracy and speed.

As a nurse, it’s a familiar evolution. Computers, once few and far between, are everywhere in healthcare, from med administration to the lab to bedside charting. Pushback? Yes, at first, big time, especially from seasoned, before-computer era nurses.  Some quit. The advantages though now benefit all of us: for patients, faster diagnoses and treatment; for nurses, easier access to essential health information to provide the best care possible.

Back to quilting,  to take advantage of new technology in our industry, we took a leap forward into the 21st and have just purchased a new Innova Navigator computerized robotics quilting system.  http://www.innovalongarm.com .

Shown is the Innova in action on Lena’s graduation quilt.  Learning curve, yes. But, we’re excited and after a week of training and use we’ve got this.  Lena’s quilt turned out perfectly.  Take a look at the closeups.  The blue shown is the back of the quilt, a super soft, plush fabric–minky. The top (or front) is quilted using a variegated (multicolor) thread. The results are exquisite!

This purchase also means, we’ve also shaved at least 3 weeks off of getting your quilt done.

So, what’s your vision?  Bring it. We can and would love to do it for you! The hardest part in making these quilts is giving them back; but, promise, we will give it back (smiles).

Quilters know quilting machines as “longarms”. Check out the evolution. Here’s a little more on the history of quilting automation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longarm_quilting .

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