Three years ago, when we moved to our little town, one of the first people I met was an AMAZING woman named Tracie.  She said we should be friends but she walked on water and I didn't so I didn't really believe her.  A few months went by and she asked why we still had not gotten together.  That's when I realized she actually DID want to be my friend.  I never did discover why but that's no longer here nor there.

Turned out we shared a great love of quilting.  When her gorgeous daughter (who also walks on water) got married Tracie made her this scrumptious log cabin quilt.  (You can tell how much I love it because I made it my banner).  One day she called me and said "Get over here and tell me how to do a border on this quilt".  
I grabbed my latest baby and rushed on over.  We hmm'd and ha'd and finally I told her to do a herringbone.
(Confession time: I knew HOW to do a herringbone but I had never actually done one so I couldn't warn her that they are a major pain).

She called me several times over the next couple days to yell at me for putting her through such an ordeal and thanking me for picking such a perfect border.  As you can see, it sets off the quilt perfectly.  So why is it such a pain?  Because you can't chain stitch.  Chain stitching is when you do a bunch of squares or pieces one after the other.  You knock off a whole stack all at once and then iron them all and move onto the next step. With the herringbone, you have to iron after every single piece so, though not difficult, it is very time consuming...especially when you are quilting a queen size border!

If you can zoom in, you will see that I did a different pattern in every square.  I like to use my own quilts to practice different patterns to see which ones I can reasonably do and which ones would drive me crazy if I tried to do an entire quilt top.  

​In the messy background you will see sneak peaks of two other quilts that have been in progress this pregnancy.  The one on the left is my friend's version of "Please teach me to quilt".  I lovingly (???) call this the "Will you PLEASE stop buying material - two sided - way bigger and harder than it needs to be" quilt.  
On the right is my sister's version of "Block of the month - I finished mine - when will you and mom finish yours" quilt.  I will post pictures and stories of those soon*. 

Why is the back so crazy you ask?  There's a great story behind that.  Stay tuned and I'll eventually tell you.

*Soon.  Noun. Definition: Someday.  Probably in my lifetime.

All I needed was a back.  Sounds simple enough.  Remind me to tell you why quilt backs are not simple in my world. For now, all you need to know is that I finished the back (woohoo!) and now it's going on the frame (double woohoo!). And then, I will be finished with everything I ever hoped to accomplish (except that big pile of UPFs) and I need more quilts to quilt.
So, I have spent the week creating a pricing sheet, starting a facebook page, a twitter account, an Instagram account and this webpage.  (Thanks for the enouragement Mom!).  If you have a quilt you just finished or one that has been collecting dust for decades (trust me, I understand!), let me know.  I'd love to quilt your quilt!