I made my first quilt in 1976 or 1977. It was a nine-patch with floral calico prints and muslin and adjacent to these was a muslin square upon which I embroidered a flower (a rose on one, violet on another, etc.). I depended heavily and advice from my mother-in-law, a farmer's wife. It was a full-size quilt, and while the piecing actually was lovely, I tried quilting it on my machine -it took forever, lots of tears, and help from my husband to guide it through my machine. I made just because I wanted the experience, and I never made another quilt until I joined a quilting group at my church in 2015! When I asked to join the group, I told them of my inexperience, but they said, "Good, then you don't have a lot of bad habits to break!." Now, I dedicate most of my time to quilting -I am forever learning something new. Of course, a decent sewing machine, the new fangle tools such as rotary cutters, self-healing mats, wonderful (if you buy quality) pre-cuts, and amazing You Tube videos surely makes quilting easier. Now, there's rarely a day goes by that I am not quilting or thinking about quilting. I think I am addicted!

Oh, gee, I took a beginning quilting class in August 2012 (we did a wall hanging) and decided that I would make a quilt for my great-granddaughter for Christmas. The fabric, I decided, would have to be by Richard Scarry since my granddaughters loved his books and I thought the little characters were so endearing.

i ordered the fabrics, lots of them, and decided an alphabet quilt would be just the thing! Dummy me, I just dove in and started sewing them together, no pattern involved. Probably the craziest thing I've ever done, but I just kept on going. My then-to-be husband was away for the entire month of November, working for FEMA after Hurricane Sandy in NYC. It was just me, 4 dogs, 2 cats, and my sewing machine, so I had plenty of time to do it.

i was determined to get it done and have it quilted by a pro, and I'm so glad I did. It wasn't perfect, but it looked 100% better with the beautiful quilting! When I sent the quilt I enclosed a note saying that it was my first and to please be kind.

They loved it!

My grandmother was a quilter and when she couldn't see well enough to sew anymore she gave me her small stash of fabric. My first quilt was from a pattern in a magazine, don't remember which one. It was house blocks and it's all pieced and quilted by hand. I entered it in the county fair and won first place in "Quilter's First Quilt" category.

Almost forgot - before I met DH, I made a baby quilt, Sunbonnet Sue, machine applique. Had no idea what I was doing. Used my dressmaking scraps.

I grew up helping my gran make quilts, and most of her quilts were very boxy things; trip around the world is the pattern she made most often.

So my first quilt was basically same thing. I decided on red black & white as my colors, and bought a whole bunch of fat quarters and 1/8th cuts and made myself a scrappy, blocky quilt. My seams didn't match up very well but that's OK.

My problem was I kept deciding to make it bigger. It was going to be a throw. Then I decided to make it large enough for my queen size bed. But before I finished it, we upgraded to a King. Not knowing how things were done, I bought a 120" square batting and thought that meant the quilt top had to be same size.

Next thing I know I have a quilt that's a full ten feet in each direction, far larger than any space I had to lay it out to sandwich it. It sat for about 2 years until we had flooring redone, and I took advantage of the empty living room to finally sandwich the thing.

THEN I decided...in for a penny, in for a pound...and decided to FMQ the massive thing. That took me a couple months.

Finally done, I put in on our bed...and it was HUGE. Our bed is platform style and low to the ground - the quilt puddled on the ground on all 4 sides. D'oh!!

SO I ended up cutting about a foot off from each side & 2 feet from the bottom, re-bound the 3 edges, and called it good.

So in the end it took me something like 3-1/2 years to make that quilt, but I started & finished other quilts in between so I'm not sure if it really counts as my first quilt. It's the first one I STARTED, but not the first one I FINISHED!

I plan to eventually tackle the Lone Star, christinelf. Just not now. Too many other irons in the fire.

My first quilt was born out of a shirt that I was making hubby. The shirt went horribly wrong even though I have used the pattern many times before with no problem and I could not bear to waste the fabric so I had a brainwave in the middle of the night which grew and grew into a queen size bed quilt. Never having made a quilt before or even had the internet to help me I just "did it" and possibly made every mistake there was to make but we still use that quilt and it keeps us warm.