When you do decide you are not a newbie?
05-09-2012, 04:35 AM
#21
Senior Member
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: DC area
Posts: 417
I really feel growth when I can "read" a quilt! Understanding how it is put together when I look at it. I feel growth when I do not allow a non meeting seam to linger, but go back in and correct it. I feel growth when I do a quilt 2-3 three times trying different colorways, and on the third time I find ways to make the work easier. It is wonderful to feel growth. I am afraid when I know it all I will be bored!
05-09-2012, 06:17 AM
#24
Super Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Portage, Michigan
Posts: 7,797
I guess I never thought about this before. I have been sewing since I was a child. I did some quilting for store displays but all from kits. After some life events I was given my sister-in-law's stash and began quilting in earnest. I considered myself new to quilting but I was an experienced "sewer". I think I passed from newbie to intermediate when I started reading the board posting and saying to myself, I know that and I do that or I know that, tried it and it did not work for me. No very scientific but that is how I defined my passage from newbie to intermediate.
Who needs the label in the long run. Quilt for the joy of it. There is no need to replicate what you see on the board unless you wish to choose to challenge yourself. Enjoy the beauty of the quilts of others and if a technique catches your interest, give it a try, ask questions here or of any quilting friends that you may have. It is not a contest, it is a journey. Some of use only go a little way from home on journeys but we love the trip. Others travel long distances and others just go to the far regions of the galaxy. What fun for us to have peeks of our member's travels!
Who needs the label in the long run. Quilt for the joy of it. There is no need to replicate what you see on the board unless you wish to choose to challenge yourself. Enjoy the beauty of the quilts of others and if a technique catches your interest, give it a try, ask questions here or of any quilting friends that you may have. It is not a contest, it is a journey. Some of use only go a little way from home on journeys but we love the trip. Others travel long distances and others just go to the far regions of the galaxy. What fun for us to have peeks of our member's travels!
05-09-2012, 06:59 AM
#25
Super Member
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Here and there
Posts: 1,669
Oh, for crying out loud! I've been quilting for 40 years and I am not going to do complicated blocks or any pattern with super small pieces. My motto is keep it simple and large because I like simple and large. People who want to do flying geese, etc. are wonderful and more power to them. But I don't think anybody is a legitimate "newbie" after the first quilt is finished unless you consider that we are all "newbies" bcause we are always learning something new.
I hope you aren't one of those people who isn't happy unless they are feeling guilty over something! For example, I could be feeling guilty right now because I can't decide whether the verb that follows "who"in the last sentence should be singular or plural because I can't decide whether its subject is "one" or "people" or "who."If the subject is "people," is it a collective noun that takes a singular verb? Fiddlesticks! As Winston Churchill once said about dangling prepositions, "This is the kind of nonsense up with which I will not put." Same thing with whether you want to call yourself a "newbie." froggyintexas
I hope you aren't one of those people who isn't happy unless they are feeling guilty over something! For example, I could be feeling guilty right now because I can't decide whether the verb that follows "who"in the last sentence should be singular or plural because I can't decide whether its subject is "one" or "people" or "who."If the subject is "people," is it a collective noun that takes a singular verb? Fiddlesticks! As Winston Churchill once said about dangling prepositions, "This is the kind of nonsense up with which I will not put." Same thing with whether you want to call yourself a "newbie." froggyintexas
I first started quilting in 1992 and then started making rag dolls and sold them in quilt shops along with the patterns. I did that for years. Then I started doing other hobbies. About 3 years ago I got back into quilting and 2 years ago I quit my job and I quilt about 3-4 days a week. I have made over 20 quilts, but I've never made a Y seam (don't even want to try) and shy away from hard blocks. I still fumble over flying geese. I finally had to make them using the one seam method. I see all the beautiful quilts everyone makes here and some of the newbie ones and I still can't figure out if I am a newbie or not. I have a LOT to learn. I don't quilt my quilts. I take them to the LAQ. I applique a lot. I'm learning paper piecing now. I'm doing the free BOM at www.craftsy.com and have been able to make every block easily, but they are easy blocks, which is what I do. But when I look at all the pictures of everyone's quilts, I think I belong in the "newbie" section. So should I consider myself a newbie, which is fine by me because then I don't feel so guilty that I don't try advanced blocks.
05-09-2012, 07:02 AM
#26
Super Member
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: Greenville, South Carolina
Posts: 1,649
I like to call myself a quiltmaker, not a quilter. I've been quilting since 1989. I love to make the tops, but I don't care much to do the quilting. I have hand-quilted a few of my larger ones, and I have machine quilted some, but I do not enjoy the process as much as the creativity and design of the tops. I also teach quiltmaking and sewing, but I don't teach the quilting phase. Right now I have a large quilt that has been in a bag waiting to be quilted since 2006. It is all pinbasted and ready, but I just haven't done it. And now the girl it is for is courting, and there probably will be a wedding next year. So I need to do something about it.
05-09-2012, 07:12 AM
#27
Super Member
Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: Illinois
Posts: 9,018
After you have made one quilt.....you are no longer a newbie.....you are hooked!!!!!
I think most of us find a place in the quilting world where we are comfortable....if that is only doing a 9 patch, but doing it as perfect as humanly possible, that is a quilter.....or there are those who are looking for the next challenge, try it, decide if it is to be added to the list of accomplishments or not mention it again. I look at my quilting time as a time of reflection, relaxation and sense of accomplishment...if it ends up frustration and work, I want no part of it, that is what my quilting allows me to escape from....not just add to.........there, enough phsychology for today, back to quilting..........
I think most of us find a place in the quilting world where we are comfortable....if that is only doing a 9 patch, but doing it as perfect as humanly possible, that is a quilter.....or there are those who are looking for the next challenge, try it, decide if it is to be added to the list of accomplishments or not mention it again. I look at my quilting time as a time of reflection, relaxation and sense of accomplishment...if it ends up frustration and work, I want no part of it, that is what my quilting allows me to escape from....not just add to.........there, enough phsychology for today, back to quilting..........
05-09-2012, 08:05 AM
#30
Super Member
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Fox Valley Wisconsin
Posts: 1,920
You are definitely not a newbie! You could maybe classify yourself as "advanced beginner" if you want.
I have been quilting for over 30 years and there are still patterns I wouldn't attempt...I would call myself an experienced quilter...but not a master quilter.
Really, as long as you enjoy the quilting you are doing there is no reason you need to give yourself a title...
you are a quilter just like the rest of us that make quilts.
I have been quilting for over 30 years and there are still patterns I wouldn't attempt...I would call myself an experienced quilter...but not a master quilter.
Really, as long as you enjoy the quilting you are doing there is no reason you need to give yourself a title...
you are a quilter just like the rest of us that make quilts.
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