FEATURED QUILTER

 

 Maria Umhey

When I was about nine years old I went with my grandmother to a Ladies Aid Society meeting to tie a quilt stretched on a big wooden frame. That was my first quilting experience. I didn’t begin making quilts myself until my sons were grown and I had finished my work as a chemist, county legislator and business manager.

I enjoy designing colorful, cheerful quilts meant to keep people warm and make them happy. Up to date tools and techniques enable me to make quilts with a traditional look in weeks rather than months. I depend on careful use of color and contrast and the simple shapes passed down to us by our grandmothers to produce crisp, uncluttered designs. No intricate blocks with lots of tiny pieces or fancy needle work here. All my quilts are quilted using a regular sewing machine not a long arm, mostly in-the-ditch with some free motion embellishment. For me, quilts are objects of delight to be used and enjoyed every day. Whether on a bed, on a wall or casually thrown over the back of a chair quilts give a feeling of warmth and comfort to our homes.

Over forty of my quilt designs have been published in magazines, most of them in McCall’s Quick Quilts and The Quilter Magazine. About the biggest kick I get is seeing my designs interpreted by others in the pages showing quilts made by subscribers. I also have a lot of fun designing and building play structures for my grandchildren; another activity which allows me to use scraps and left-overs to spread happiness.

Bonus for Quilt Buyers: I will personalize my quilts for you by attaching a machine embroidered label with a short (15 words or less) message of your choice. Just include your message with your quilt order. Some examples might be:

  • For Mom on her 50 th Birthday - Love Jane
  • Our new Home - 20 Pleasant Street - June, 2006
  • Warm feet for my Best Buddy

 

Shirley Greenhoe

 

I finished my first quilt in 1975, machine pieced, on my mothers Necchi sewing machine, and hand quilted. Making quilts seemed a natural thing to do.  Growing up we always had quilts on our beds, not as a bedspread like we do today but under the bedspread. My mom made quilts and my grandmothers made quilts. I simply decided one day to make a quilt, isn’t that what you did with all the scraps in the sewing bag?  All those bits from the dresses, skirts and blouses  that we had made for ourselves, ”waste not, want not”, my mother and Ben Franklin were fond of saying.

 

The infection from the bite of the quilting bug incubated for a number of years before resurfacing when I innocently took my first quilting class sometime in the early 1980’s from Kathy Green in El Cajon, California.  I was looking for some tricks and shortcuts to quilt making, never dreaming that quilting would consume my life. I learned those tricks and shortcuts and I bought tools (the state of the art equipment at that time was a pair of Ginger shears; they could cut thru 6 layers of fabric without distortion!). Sharyn Craig was teaching quilting classes in San Diego, she was my next teacher and mentor. I bought books and fabric, tools began to improve, rotary cutters arrived, mats and rulers, it was all so very exciting to be a part of this renaissance of quilting. To go from buying tools only at art supply and stationary stores to having quilt shops and special tools designed specifically for quilters showed amazing growth in our industry. Eleanor Burns taught us to “Quilt in a Day”, these quilts that I made mostly got tied. The fun for me, as for most of us, is in the fabric buying, designing and piecing. Tying was a quick way to get them finished.

     
Harriet Hargrave arrived on the scene and showed quilts she had quilted with her home sewing machine! She traveled around teaching us how to machine quilt!  What would our grandmothers have thought of machine quilting?! Well guess what, there are machine quilted quilts dated as early as 1878!  So grandma and great great grandma definitely would have approved!

 

In 1985 I made a quilt for my husband out of his favorite t-shirts.  I took this quilt to EvelynAiello, the only machine quilter in San Diego County at that time. She quilted it on a stand up short arm quilting machine, I was completely intrigued by this amazing sewing machine. That quilt was shown in the magazine “Quilting Today” (number 7, July 1988).

A year later, 1986, I bought Evelyn’s machine and her business; “The Quilting Place” and for a short time I was the only machine quilter in all of San Diego County. It wasn’t long before others were buying quilting machines. Quilters eager to have their quilts finished brought us all plenty of work.

 

I have been quilting professionally now for 19 years, helping quilt makers finish their quilts so that they can make more quilts. I’ve been an instructor at “Machine Quilters Showcase” and “Innovations - a Machine Quilting Conference”, teaching and encouraging new quilt machine owners. I was flattered to be a guest on Jane Donaldson’s quilting show on PBS, “Quilt Central” and now and then I even manage to make and finish a few quilts for myself!

 

   Check out Shirleys quilts for sale in the large quilts catagory!!!

   

 

 Other featured quilters coming soon.