for me, it's an issue of control. I hate to relinquish my quilt to someone else. Plus, if it didn't turn out like I wanted, I would hate hate hate to be that upset at someone else. upset at myself? I can handle that. and with practice, the efforts are improved vastly!

I can't afford to have someone else do the quilting.... retired..... limited income. But I love to piece more than quilt. I hand quilt the larger ones, machine quilt the small ones. I really love the look of hand quilting but it takes me awhile. Even though I'm retired, I still have a life and find so many things to do...

I also hand piece and hand quilt my quilts. I have one that has been LA quilted and it is beautiful, but it's not homemade in my eyes. It does take an awfully long time to hand quilt, but in the long run, I think it is well worth it. If I could figure out how to post some of my quilt photos, I would. ~~Ann~~

I only hand quilt so I do my own

I sent them out when I was working. Or tied them by hand for a primitive look. Now I SID if it's a lap or twin. Right now a wedding ring quilt is being pieced and my 84 year old mom tells me to hurry it up so she can hand quilt it! She is a champ and gets them done fairly quickly. (A month or two) If I hand quilted them, they would never get done!

I cannot afford the LA so have taken several classes and do all of mine on the Bernina even the extra large ones I do in sections then put the sections together I do not feel like it is really my quilt unless I do all the work does take me longer but with todays fabric prices I do not need to be making a quilt in a day anyway I do enjoy the quilting and do many other things than fm

My least favorite part is sandwiching the quilts. Yesterday I decided I had to do something with the tops I had made. I got backing and batting ready for 5 and have a couple more to go. I will FMQ these on my Bernina 440. It seems when I get a top pieced I have two or three (or more) ideas in my head that I want to do. I used to make mostly large quilts, and have used Marti Michell's method of quilting in sections. Now most of my quilts are lap size. I do love to hand quilt as well but don't hand quilt as many now as that takes quite a while.

Done it all..........machine quilted (simple SID or other straight line design), hand quilted AND sent one out to be edge to edge stitched. I like my quilts, even those for gifts, to be soft and functional with the ability to be washed many, many times. I love hand quilting but it takes me 2-3 months to finish one plus the time it takes to piece it so, from now on I'll be sending them out to be quilted but will try to always have one in the process of hand quilting.

I quilt my own. I make smaller quilts that I can hand quilt, or if I want something 'easy' I will do some in the ditch or echo quilting on the machine. I can do it myself and save a whole lot of money...

I've been making quilts for 30 years and have quilted every one of the quilts I've pieced myself. Started with hand quilting 'til my neck gave out with arthritis and now I machine quilt with an older domestic Kenmore.