Well, I was just a kid in my late 60's when I bought my Sweet Sixteen sitdown quilting machine, and now that I'm 71 I still have a lot to learn. I just love playing away at quilting. One suggestion for learning to free motion is to buy a pretty panel. Back and batt it and just follow the lines. I got one with flowers and a bird house and had a ball with it. I put shingles on the roof of the birdhouse and stitched around flowers and leaves. You forget you are doing FMQ and it's like a kid's coloring book. Doesn't matter if you stitch outside the lines - just have fun with it. I offer to quilt some of the charity quilts our guild makes, like Project Linus, so I get plenty of practice and it doesn't have to be perfect. Just do what makes you happy. I think that's the best thing we can do for our health, our brain, and our well being!

It absolutely counts! It's a new, different skill. The fact that you are thinking about a new skill means your brain is not gone.