The Inaugural AMQA Quilt Show

This was a wonderful show with so many inspirational quilts on display. It was held at the Auditorium at Eventide, Brighton, Queensland, near the edge of the water on the north side of Brisbane. A great venue in a convenient and very beautiful location.
The show ran over the weekend of the 26 - 27 September 2009 and was the very first show run by the Australian Machine Quilting Association in Queensland to focus on machine quilting.

It was a shame that Brisbane was hit by dust storms on the days of the show so fewer people that anticipated ventured out to see it, but even so, it was very well received.


I was very fortunate to win prizes in several categories for quilts I had both made and quilted, and for those some of my wonderful customers had made and I had quilted. They very kindly allowed me to show their quilts. I thought you might like to see these prize wining quilts.

Prize winners

In the Art/Pictorial category quilts I both made and quilted won 1st and 3rd prizes! I was over the moon!

Uluru - 1st Prize	Solutions - 3rd Prize

In the Edge to Edge category Earthy Squares won third prize and Hop, Skip and Jump was Highly Commended. Both quilts were made my Kate Elliott (Scarborough, Qld) and quilted by me.

Earthy Squares	Earthy Squares detail	Hop, Skip and Jump

In the Functional Custom category I entered Burning Desire which was Highly Commended. This quilt is owned by Ann McKenzie but was made for her by her daughter Debbie Morton.

Burning Desire	Burning Desire detail

In the Custom-Heirloom/Traditional section I was fortunate enough to win third prize for quilting Lyndell McDonald's quilt ( Kyogle, NSW) Follow the Path and a Highly Commended for Rosa Mangano's quilt (Gordon Park, Qld) Heirloom Lace.

Follow the Path	Follow the Path detail
Heirloom Lace	Heirloom Lace detail

It was really exciting for me to able share these prizes with my customers and present their ribbons to them.


One of my own personal favourite quilts is Oh My Stars! It was too old to be entered here but I thought you might like to see it anyway.

Information about AMQAS 2010 is now available.

A win at the NSW Quilters' Guild Quilt Show!

The NSW Quilters' Guild Quilt Show is on in Sydney at the moment and one of my clients - Lorna Haigh - won first prize in the Commercially Machine Quilted category! Her quilt is called Australian Wildflowers and is a stained glass style wall hanging that has been machine stitched, hand embroidered and then machine quilted by me. Here is a photo of it.



Congratulations Lorna! A prize well-deserved.

I have had the privilege to quilt some of Lorna's work before. Her quilts vary in style and technique, always something different. I think she likes the fun in challenging me! Check out these:






Visit the Quilters' Guild of NSW website here to see all the winning quilts.

The Quilt Connection goes digital!

Welcome Intelliquilter!

I don't know if you're aware but I've been hankering after a computer for my quilting machine for some time. I've been humming and hawing, waiting for the dollar to improve, tossing up between this machine and that... You know how it goes.

Eventually I decided on the Intelliquilter and now I have it I'm thrilled with what it offers both me, as the operator, and my customers. In fact I've had it now for about 12 months but I wanted to really run it through its paces and totally get my head around the many ways it has to enhance my creativity before I told you about it.

The image on the left is how Intelliquilter sees the pattern. This one is called Sabrina and is designed by Donna Kleinke of One Song Needle Arts. The image on the right shows the quilted version. Isn't it lovely?

New quilting horizons

The Intelliquilter has so many features but from the point of view of "what's in it for you, my customers" it boils down to the following:

• I can now boast a fast turn-around for pantograph (E2E) quilting - only a couple of weeks


• The fact that I can be attending to other things in my studio while the machine is working for me hands-free, is such a welcome change and allows me to service more customers


• The Intelliquilter produces perfect and exact quilting


• No need for paper patterns anymore. Patterns are digitised and stitched out exactly as the designer intended.

The Intelliquilter gives my creativity full rein so please give me a call on 07 3862 8797 or come and talk to me about the many exciting options I can create for your special quilt.

WA Machine Quilting Workshops

WA Machine Quilting Workshops

Robyn Dall of Bunbury, WA sent me the following heartfelt plea...

"Poor WA is very isolated far away from the east coast of Australia where most machine quilting training opportunities happen. Now that the Machine Quilting Conferences that were run by the Gammill dealers at Mittagong NSW, have discontinued, there are even less opportunities. Us WA people need to create our own opportunities for skill development. So wondering if you would be interested in running classes here at my quilting room in Bunbury"

I just couldn't refuse! So started my jaunt to WA! I had a wonderful time and met some really lovely people and committed machine quilters.

The Perth Section of the Trip

What a wonderful welcome! I was met at the airport by Greg Camden - a very accomplished male quilter and WA Agent for Superior Threads - of House of Quilts. Greg and Gayle gave me a very nice dinner and put me up in style despite never having met me before.

Thanks so much Greg and Gayle, I'm looking forward to returning the favour when you visit Queensland.

The next day we gathered at Jo Northcott’s home (Jo Northcott Quilting in Sorrento) for the Machine

Quilters' Gathering which was very well attended. It was great to meet so many quilters. The Gathering was a real hive of activity and discussion and it was good to see networking in WA is in fine form.

There were lots of products on display including backing fabrics from Widebacks Australia and threads from Superior Threads and a scrumptious lunch! So much food!

Stay tuned for the Bunbury Section of my WA trip...