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 :
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*
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.
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
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!
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