When I first bought my quilting machine, we were living in Killeen. My parents were alive at that time, and encouraged me to buy the longarm quilter. Mom had been quilting for years and had started paying professional quilters to get her tops quilted. She still hand quilted some of her work; but, mostly the ones that she had put a lot of applique' work into. Unfortunately, she had stacks and stacks of tops that needed quilting. She told me she would split the price of the machine with me if I would quilt all of her tops for her. It was a win-win deal for both of us!
Mom and Dad had a free standing garage, which had been used as a wood working shop. They hadn't done any wood working in years, so it had turned into a huge storage room for Dad's carving tools. Basically, a big mess of a room. They offered the shop to me, so the family helped me cleaned it up, paint it, and replace the garage door with french doors. It was perfect; at the time.
Eventually, Ron and I got tired of living on a cactus and cedar farm, and decided to move to Temple. Luckily, we ended up buying a house that had a room large enough to accommodate a 14ft. quilting frame. So, all of my quilting items were moved to Temple. And... it was perfect again.
When we retired and sold the house in Temple, Scott offered his garage to use as a quilting room. Once again, Ron and I painted, carpeted, and fixed up yet another room for the quilter. We were using Scott's house as a home base while we lived in the 5th wheel, so it was the perfect solution at the time... again.
Life happens, plans change, and we move on... this time back to Temple. We left the quilter at Scott's and it was okay. But, I soon discovered it was actually inconvenient. When the quilting machine is at the same location as my sewing equipment, I can quilt as I go. Meaning, I can assemble a piece, and immediately quilt it. Thus, only requiring a few hours at a time standing behind the quilter. With the quilter in another location, I was driving over to Scott's with numerous pieces to quilt and coming home with a back ache, sore feet, and grumpy because I was exhausted. I decided I needed to have everything in one place. Unfortunately, none of the rooms in the town house would accommodate the quilting frame.
Originally, I wanted to trade my long frame in on a shorter one. Sadly, the company only takes trades on machines; not frames. So, I listed it on their long arm forum as a possible equal trade for a shorter table. I wasn't surprised to find that most people were like me; wanting to trade a long table for a shorter one. I talked to Scott, who is the smartest person I know, about possibly hiring a welder to cut down my existing frame. His main concern was the fact that part of the frame is steel and part is aluminum, which evidently requires specialized welding equipment. Most of the guys he knows through the fire department aren't able to actually do that type of welding.
One day I was driving home from Scott's place and noticed a sign on a fence near his house. It advertised a mobile welding service. I decided to call the number and see if the guy could help me out. At first, he couldn't figure out what the heck I was talking about, but was more than willing to look at the frame. Long story short, he said it wouldn't be a problem. So after some trial and error, schedule conflicts, etc... the frame was cut down to 10 ft. and I was able to move it to the town house!
The first thing I had to do was switch the guest bedroom and master bedroom. So, the twin bunks for the grands were moved into the corner of the master bedroom.
After that, I had to deal with the shelves and shelves of fabric in boxes that had been stored at Scott's garage. All of that needed to be moved over as well. I put most of it on shelves in the master bedroom, and the remainder in shelves inside the guest bedroom closet.
Once all of the fabric was moved, and the welder worked his magic on the frame, we got it moved over as well. It fits perfectly in front of the two windows in the room, providing oodles of natural light.
The best thing about putting the long arm in the master bedroom is the location of the bathroom!! Just steps away from my work station. I am now a much happier quilter because once again... the room is perfect!
As I close out this post, I have to thank my family for being so patient with me. We all thought our moving days ended when Ron retired from the Army. Little did I know that my gypsy blood would bubble up and cause so many moves by choice. Honestly, I hope this is our last move for a very, very long time. But, who knows what life will bring or where this crazy quilting machine will end up next!
No comments:
Post a Comment