Welcome from Southern California. I always buy good quality fabric. You can learn to quilt projects on your own home machine. Plenty of youtube tutorials. Leah Day is a good one. I'm retired and on a limited budget BUT I love scrap quilting. so Bonnie Hunter might be your gal. Both are also on Facebook. AND as for the cost, that's pretty cheap for professional quilting. I save the LA work for special quilts, say wedding and new baby quilts. You should have access to the Mennonite Church Women too. They often will hand quilt, not sure what their going rate is, BUT maybe they would teach you at the same time. I'm originally from KS and they have always been helpful.