If I were you I would begin with making tablerunners, placemats, wall-warmers and since you are keeping your part-time job maybe there might be a good selling field for you. To "invest" into the world of handmade quilts is very precarious, especially now in our present financial cliff........It seems to me that most handmade items are really hard to sell in large enough quantities to make a living at. If we were not quilters on this board, what would be covering our beds??????Probably the store-bought "made in China" ones.