Thank you All! Such helpful replies, I am not regretting having joined the forum. I guess I should be in experimental mindset with the metal-to-metal method; Aunt Becky's Finger Protector beneath on my left hand and a Betweens sharp needle on my right. Oh, and I forgot to mention that a new learning curve for me is that I am trying out a hoop for the first time, although it doesn't have a stand, I am working on a table top. It is 14" I found at a thrift shop and I don't know but for now I'm experimenting with tension with it. All those things are new to me, but I do know that if I keep at it, my stitches will look more even over time. I thought I should mention I found the method with this video a while back :
Metal-to-Metal Hand Quilting with Sharlene Jorgenson & Jean Brown - YouTube
It seems to me that ergonomics and efficiency are the two E's that I strive for, knowing that I can't afford any new reasons to get joints or wrists sore, I like the smooth movements. But I am still finding my way.
Funny backstory; in about 2003 I got a beginner book on Amish quilting, called "An Amish Adventure" and started quilting --did some Amish style pot-holders and one small sampler machine pieced & hand quilted, then about 2008 jumped right in to a 100" x 100" quilt! I loved the way I pieced it, very beautiful, a center diamond with nine patch diamond, and bordered around the edge with nine-patch, ( I will replicated it again much much smaller). The piecing went so fast I was so over confident. So I basted it and (( the funny part...)) thought it a brilliant idea to use it while I stitched on it. Back then I use to read in bed so I thought it a fun idea to stitch a little each night. I thought maybe in a few months it would be finished. I didn't have even a thimble, or hoop, all just improvising from thin air. Well, maybe I pricked my fingers too many times, I don't remember, but I only got one small nine-patch stitched before I stopped all-together, distracted no doubt by some big life thing, but it never even saw a finish binding! I used it that way, basted, for 12 years, before a wildfire came and burned our house and all our things in 2017, and here I am, starting over with a mind to start small, (really small) stay within my ability, keep things ergonomic and user friendly, and most of all
make the effort to finish.
So here I am getting the advice of the Tried & True before getting myself into any seemingly brilliant shortcuts. I say this with a smile and my confession is shared with a bit of laughter too.
Now living in our rebuilt house, two years after the wildfire, I have a small library of quilting books I've collected on Amazon used; the Civil War Legacies, which appeals to me because all of the quilts are so cozy and small...lol! But also I have made the effort to drive to the next county (me who abhors driving these days! ) and acquaint myself with the quilt shop there. I think the idea of throws stacked at the foot of every bed in the house appeals more to me than each bed being actually covered in a quilty head to foot, but there's me getting ahead, visualizing the house full of quilts.
Back to my little Amish coasters, and my coffee table quilt pad , a gift to my husband.
I will make another confession; I have been shopping online for two years while living in a tiny house on the property while the house was getting rebuilt (moved back into an almost-finished house Oct 4 only three months ago) and during my long wait, I shopped to recreate and refine my life in the new house again. I bought a bit too many jellyrolls and quilty things, including a little bag of vintage brass looking thimbles on ebay, which I had every intention to use , both in quilting and hand sewing for clothes, and well, they might not be the recessed tip kind (which in that video above, is the brilliant trick for loading the needle) but I thought, um, that I just might try taking a nail punch to the tip of one of them, and experiment in converting it to a recessed tip. I'll let you all know how that goes.
Oh, lastly, I had loved my mothers' 1970's Elna sewing machine, but lost it. I bought last year at this time totally spontaneous, a Singer 1947 table machine which I love, but already it seems the tension has gone wonky and I might be doing completley hand-pieced things until it is fixed. Just one thing after another, striving for a peaceful quiet life of making.
Thank you so much, and I'll be around.
Jen