Quilting since 1971. That's 40 years.
I started when I was pregnant with my first child. I was 19 at the time. I had a trunk full of scraps left from the sewing I had been doing since I was 8 or 9, sewing Barbie doll clothes and then my own clothes.
My first quilt was made from a pattern I designed myself: Three 1 1/2" strips sewn together to make a 3 1/2" square. (Now known as a rail fence.)I drew the pattern pieces on old newspapers and cut everything with scissors.
After that, I got ahold of some quilt magazines, and I've never really stopped making quilts. I started photographing them in 1978 and kept an album. Only a few were not photographed, at times when I didn't have a working camera, or couldn't afford the film and developing. :) Now it's all digital!