Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Simply Wednesday

No pictures here today either -- I've spent the day doing my house cleaning -- well, a good once over anyway! Rather be quilting, but who wouldn't!
It's almost 2:30 in the afternoon and I still haven't had a shower, so will be running up to do that soon.
Spent yesterday doing some more Christmas shopping - should have all of it done by Thanksgiving except for one item for DS. Good news is that I did some shopping for myself at the sewing machine shop. I have a Handiquilter (which I hate - but that's another story!). So, I finally broke down and ordered the handles with the speed control knob on them and the frame to put them on so I can actually stand in front of the needle and see what I'm doing. I have a Brother 1500 for the HQ. I've also had handles that DH put on the bottom front of the carriage so I could actually sit in front and sew -- but the foot pedal still needed to be slid along the floor as I went. So, most of the time the HQ table has been in the garage gathering dust. Now I'm going to set it up in the basement where I have plenty of room. I've decided to actually practice, practice, practice until I get good enough to justify buying a longarm (this may take a looooonnnng time! -- but it'll take a long time to save the cash for the longarm, too, so it evens out!). I'll still be limited as to size of quilt I can do on the HQ -- only have an 8 ft table, so basically, nothing wider than 72" fits comfortably. But I can get all the scrap throw-size done in short order easier on the HQ than on my Bernina, in theory!
Off to shower! -- JT

4 comments :

Nines said...

Good luck with the HQ. I have never tried one, but it does sound better than trying to wrestle a quilt through your Bernina. I don't often leave comments on your blog, but I enjoy what you are working on and especially the pictures of the little grandchildren! You get an amazing amount done. Plus housekeeping? Well, it's a goal I'll have to learn to shoot for! *VBG*

Sarah said...

Joanne -

You should check out the Hinterberg quilting set up. They have a web page. I have their machine quilting frame and the Voyager machine and love them both. The Voyager is a midarm (17 inches I think.) The frame is 10 feet long so I can get most any quilt on it. THey are located in West Bend Wisconsin - so if you get to that point you could drive up and check them out.

Joanne said...

Thanks, Nines! I sure don't feel like I get much done! Housekeeping -- just trying to catch the dust balls as they roll in front of me!

Sarah - does Hinterberg make the Voyager? I've never heard of it. There's a Gambill distributor in Janesville -- they also have a short-arm machine -- but I've seen the Gambill Classic in action and really, really drool over them! The Brother has only 9 inches throat space, but it's still better than the Bernina!
Not sure I could talk DH into one of the new frame quilters like Hinterberg -- since I haven't used the HQ as much as I should have, so figure I'll get by with it for now, and practice, practice, practice! - JT

Quilts And Pieces said...

Oh good luck with the HQ. I've only done one quilt with it and found it just so hard to push the foot pedal like you said and I used my regular machine so I couldn't roll too much up in it - so I wasn't too happy with it. Luckily I was just "testing" it out. Looks like some charity quilts would make good practice quilts on it!