I made my first quilt when I was in my early twentys. I thought it looked so easy, hah. I made a triple irish chain in amish fashion solid red white and blue standard bed size. I thought the 2" squares were too big so I made mine 1" and didn't allow for the seams. At the time I didn't know about sewing in strips and then cutting and I also didn't know about rotary cutting. It took me 4 years to cut and sew all those little tiny squares. By the time I was done I was so sick of looking at it. I sent it to my mother for her to quilt and she sent it to her mother to quilt. She in turn gave it to a woman that does quilting professionally. She did a wonderfull job on it. I had forgotten all about it cuz it took years of passing it along cuz nobody wanting to do all that quilting on little 1/2" squares. About 3 years later on a christmas my grandmother presented me with a beautifull quilt. I hadn't realized that it was my old quilt top I made 7 years before. After I saw the quilting workmanship I was hooked. I vowed to learn to hand quilt cuz when I tell someone "I made this" I wanted the pride in knowing I really did make this all by myself. I did quit for about 25 years. Raising kids, going back to school, then entering the work force. I'm now retired and luckily don't have to work anymore so I spend almost all my time on learning to sew again. And this website. I've learned so much from you guys