There's No Place Like Home

 

Well it's official...we are moving BACK to Arizona!!, the beginning of June when the twins finish up the school year here in Texas. Now I know I haven't posted in almost a year...there is a perfectly good reason for that, moving then unpacking and trying to get everything to feel like home etc...well truth be told although Texas is a great place it just never felt like home to us. We spent over 20 years spreading our roots and making Arizona home that well, Texas just didn't have a chance in our hearts.

 and definitely couldn't compete with this,

 or this,

 

or even this :)

Good thing we didn't sell our AZ home because that is where we will be heading back to.

Chris will still be working for Epsilon but was given the go ahead to work remotely from AZ. So the Texas house will be going up for sale in April. 

Also while in Texas I just haven't felt like doing much quilting...the TX quilt studio ended up not being as big as I thought it was once I started putting every thing in place, which means I wasn't feeling very creative this past year :( I need to be able to like the space if I am spending lots of time in it, lol I did take pics of the TX quilt studio and will be posting pics of it eventually though, just not today. I also have not purchased ANY new fabric this past year which also could be for my lack of creativity...who knows

I am however looking forward to moving back into my old office and quilt studio...making a few changes with the office furniture and where things will be placed because I did purchased a cutting table and additional IKEA pieces for the studio though. Also I will have to get to work making new quilts to hang on the AZ walls because last year when we were moving to TX I gifted most of the wall quilts to one of my besties.

DH has also been asking me if I am planning on reopening my longarm business since we are moving back to AZ... don't know yet, maybe, I need to think about it some. While I've been in TX I am still getting monthly quilting requests from people back in AZ looking for longarming services. If I do it won't be until the fall at the earliest so we can resettle into the house and get things unpacked. 

Overbooked!

Well I last said that I would be accepting quilt drop offs until the end of March. However since my last post I have gotten extremely busy and will have to move that up a bit. So as of now Gecko Quilts is NO LONGER accepting customer quilts. Sorry but there is only so much time in a day and I can't squeeze anymore in before I move to Texas. Thank You all for your support and business over the past 11 years, it has been a pleasure to quilt for you!

So Much Has Happened Since I Last Posted

So I have been missing in action on this blog since the end of September...with very good reason, that I am now able to share with you. Shortly after my last blog post my DH (Chris) told me that he was looking for another job...sure, OK, fine, he told me that one before ;) but then he said he had applied for out of state jobs...WHAT!! So he had interviews after interviews some on the phone and 2 that flew him out for follow up face to face interviews. The first one (which would be his dream job) was for a "Director of Identity and Access Management" position out of Texas (Dallas/Fort Worth area). All went well and he was told that he was the top candidate for the job. He came back home and waited for the job offer to come but it was being pushed back so when another company offered to fly him out for a face to face interview he said why not. This 2nd one was in South Carolina!!! Within days of Christmas the South Carolina job made him an offer and the week after Christmas we were on a plane heading to South Carolina to look at houses to buy. Found an area where we wanted to build a house and was in the process of filling out the paper work for it when Chris gets a call from the Texas dream job saying that the delay was resolved and if he would be able to phone interview with 2 more people within the week. Of course he said yes. In the mean time with out an actual job offer letter in hand from Texas we decided to proceed forward with South Carolina so Chris put in his notice to Honeywell. The day after his last day at Honeywell the TX phone interviews happened and was invited to another phone interview with the company's CISO (chief internet/security officer) the following day. When all was said and done Chris had an offer letter for his "Dream Job" in TX. So now he had to call the South Carolina Company and give him his regrets (but they knew that he was also waiting for the TX job offer so it wasn't a complete 

shock). 

Now with the destination finally confirmed, and his start date being February 8,2016 We needed to get a few things taken care of, like housing. So off we went to the Dallas/ Fort Worth Area to first secure a short term lease on an apartment  asap and then look for housing for us and the twins when school lets out in May. Oh and 2 days before Christmas Chris totaled my 2014 Ford Mustang (it was the other person's fault she turned left in front of him).

 Here is the picture of my totaled Mustang :(  No one was hurt and the other driver's insurance company claimed responsibility. So we purchased a 2015 Ford Edge to replace the Mustang.

 We broke the new car in with a road trip to TX :) and this is the house we are buying. It's in the Fort Worth area and we asked for a delayed closing so we could close on it in mid April, Then the twins, our 2 dogs and I will be moving there the end of May. The house is smaller than our current house but has 4 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths, a formal living & dining room, a family room, a fireplace, a loft, and....

 this massive game room/media room with a door and 2 walk in closets!!

This will be my new Quilt Studio!!! The room is 18' X 20'

Now you are probably wondering what is going to happen to Gecko Quilts and our current house here in AZ. 

Well, Gecko Quilts will no longer be accepting anymore customer quilts after March 31, 2016. Once I get settled into our new house in TX, Gecko Quilts will be switching gears and will only be only selling finished quilts from my web site or from Etsy (haven't figured that one out yet). As for our current house, well it will be going up for sale before the end of 2016. Our 3 adult kids will be staying in AZ, our son moved out back in October and our 2 older daughters even though they still live with us would not be able to take care of the large house we currently have. So after it sells we will be purchasing a smaller house here in AZ (which our 2 older daughters will live in and take care of it while we are in TX). This way we will have a place to come back and stay when we visit our kids and the smaller home will be the house we come back to live in once Chris retires in 12-15 years. Yup we are getting rid of our current big house and will have a mid size house in TX and a smaller one in AZ. I plan on keeping my blog going so you will still be able to see what I am up to in the future. 

I had a hard time staying off this blog while everything was working itself out,  I wanted to wait until every thing was finalized. And now that my traveling is done until school lets out, the customer quilts that are waiting to be quilted will be getting done asap within the next 2 weeks. The past month has been extremely crazy for us which was why I said that the quilts being dropped off this past December wouldn't be done until sometime in January (the last week of January/ the first week in February I will have them done, for those waiting for your quilts to be finished, I appologize for this delay but you will be recieving a call from me soon to schedule a pick up).

 

Where to begin....

I can't believe that it is a week before Christmas! it seems as though we were just packing away the Christmas decor from last year. So much has happened this year and to tell you the truth, I am happy that this year is almost over. Ok so let's recap my year so far....

My brother in law, passed away just a few weeks after Christmas last year (mid January to be exact) leaving behind 3 kids (20 yr old, 18 yr old and a 15 yr old).

To help my nieces and nephew through this difficult time I offered to make them each a memory quilt using their father's clothing.

 

 This is Tommy's, made from blue jeans, khakis, dress shirts, and ties. I used a Bonnie Hunter pattern to make all 3 quilts.

 

His dad belonged to the Viper Club, it's a car club that the 2 of them enjoyed together so I took the logo from a t-shirt to place it front and center in the quilt. 

 

This is Kristin's quilt...

 

and a close up of it.

 

and this one belongs to Jessie,

 

and a close up of hers. Since they all wanted large full size quilts (better for wrapping themselves up in when they needed a special hug from their dad), it took me quite a long time to make these. But I finished all 3 (bindings, labels, delivered) the week of Thanksgiving.  I am so glad that this huge project is finally done.

But that is not all that I have been doing here at Gecko Quilts. This past fall I announced that I was going to sell my APQS Liberty to purchase a newer larger model with a larger table and that was computerized. After about a month listed on Craigs list, I started to worry that it wouldn't sell quick enough in order for me to have the new set up delivered, and have time to get use to it before my Grand Re-opening in January. So I ended up going with my plan B. Which was to keep my APQS Liberty but upgrade to the larger and newer table that is available and add Quilt Path (the computerized portion) to it. It all got delivered the week of Thanksgiving.   

 

 Here are the new upgrades in my living room waiting for my DH to put it all together. Of course when I went to take the picture Hossa (my daughter's dog) thought I wanted to take his picture so he posed for the camera. 

 

These are my old rails and carriage from my old 12 ft table

  

and my DH Chris putting together the new  14ft table.

 

He thought it would be a good idea if he read the directions on how to attach the new carriage to the table.

 

 There were a lot more wires and parts than my old set up had.

 

 Here's the new carriage on the table. It has a belt on it to make the machine move vertical on the table. There is also another belt that spans the length of the table to move the machine horizontal on the table.

 

 Here is my APQS Liberty all upgraded on her new longer table and decked out with her Surface Pro 3 tablet. After we got it to this part the system wouldn't work like it was suppose to...after several weeks of swapping out this part for that one and replacing one thing for another...APQS decided that the only thing that didn't get replaced at this point was the carriage itself. Se they shipped us out another new carriage. Yup, wouldn't you know the very last thing that we swapped out was the problem. So now that the problems have been resolved I decided to take it for a test ride....

 

Here is what I see when I have a pantograph loaded to be stitched out on a quilt top. Pretty cool, huh?

 

 

This is the small quilt I put on the machine to test it out. It will be turned into a sewing machine cover for my Bernina sewing machine. I just went with a basic meander for my first try...the pattern is called BAM...and will be featured all year long in the seasonal pantographs that I offer.

 

 Well that should catch you all up on what is going on here at Gecko Quilts....everything is up and running (with just a few more additions needing to be added to the website) and we will be right on schedule for the Grand Re-opening in January!!!!! I am so ready to get back to longarming!!! Have a Merry Christmas, and I hope to see you in the next few months.

 

 

The New Website...

is finally working!

I still have to add to the pages but if you go to www.geckoquilts.com you can see what it is starting to look like!

Good Things To Come!

It has been an unusual year so far to say the least, first off I am feeling much better after my last post which I stated that I had shingles and that Gecko Quilts would be in a holding pattern until further notice. During the time off I was able to get a lot of handwork done. I finished all of the embroideries for my Hocuspocusville quilt, yea!!!! But the quilt still needs to be assembled and quilted. I will share the pics at a later time. I also was working on a 1/2" hexie scrap lap quilt, still a work in progress.

With this time off I had a lot of time to think about Gecko Quilts and it's future (if it had one or not).

I have been conflicted the past 2 years and seriously was thinking of getting out of the business. When I started this business in 2005, (hard to believe it's been almost 10 years now) My husband & I had no idea what we were doing or what we were in for. But after relying on our gut instincts and by the help of God to guide us we have built a great business that has always surprised us. We have been fortunate to have a faithful customer base that keeps on growing and for this I am very thankful for. The reason why I have been conflicted was because well I didn't know which direction I wanted to go in...if at all. Well it seems like God has pointed me in a direction that makes sense and is quite doable.  I am going to be upgrading my long arm machine! Yup, which means Gecko Quilts will be around for another 10 years or more :0)

I am upgrading my longarm with a 14 foot "Bliss System" table, and "Quilt Path"!!!!

 What does this mean for my customers, & what will the difference be & when will this all go into effect?

The advantage of this upgrade will be...

1) Larger table (I currently have a 12 ft table and will be upgrading to a 14 ft table) allowing me to be able to quilt those extra large king size quilts that I have had to turn down in the past. I believe that there have only been a few 14ft tables available in this area before, which will be more convenient for my customers.

2) The new Bliss System table will allow my machine to move effortlessly and will require less cleaning/ maintenance allowing more time for quilting!

3) Quilt Path is the computerized portion (yes I will have a computerized machine!!!!!). This will allow me to offer more variety of patterns to my customers, or more complex patterns. The final product will be more consistent through out. Not to mention less time and fatigue on me. It also means I will be able to offer more pantos because they will be in digital form on the computer instead of the paper form that I currently have. Also when I order new ones it will be a simple computer download instead of waiting the 7-10 days for the mail man to deliver them.

I am hoping that I will be able to launch a "Grand Re-Opening" of Gecko Quilts in January 2015 with a brand new website (similar to what we had before but web hosted by Go Daddy. It will once again have a large variety of pantos to choose from on line. I am also planning on selling packaged batting in the new year as well, either Hobbs or Warm and Natural or maybe even both. I am also looking into offering quilt backs for sale too in the future. I know that variety of wide quilt backings in this area is slim so I am hoping to fill that void a bit.  I also plan on offering variegated thread as an option for a fee instead of just the solid thread colors......These are just a few changes I will be making over the next few months. Oh, I almost forgot....there will be new specials and offers available as well, this is what helped build Gecko Quilts into what it is today and it will be part of it's future as well.

I am so excited for this new chapter for Gecko Quilts as well as a clear view of it's future, I no longer feel conflicted and am ready to kick up the business to the next level!!!

Christmas Vacation!

I finished up the last of the customer quilts that were scheduled for the rest of 2013 yesterday-

 

I quilted 7 of them this week you can see the pics of them on my website Gecko Quilts

 

With customer quilts done, I was able to quilt one of my Christmas quilts before the 2nd clue of Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt Celtic Solstice was released.

 

Aren't these gingerbread houses so cute! I downloaded a free applique pattern from Sindy Rodenmayer from her website several years ago.  

Since the Christmas theme in my kitchen/family room is Gingerbread & Sweets, I needed a quick Christmas quilt for my kitchen wall. The fabrics are called Apples & Ginger which is several years old as well (from my stash). I quilted Bell Blossom on it using a cream colored thread.

 

Here are my finished triangle in a square units from clue 1 of the Celtic Solstice mystery, finished trimming the dog ears off them while watching Bonnie's Quilt Cam this week.

 

Good thing too because the 2nd clue was released this morning, looks like I'll be making 244 chevron units that will measure 3 1/2" (3" finished) from these fabrics. Now I really need to get back to cutting the pieces then prepping the 2" sqs. so  I can get some finished before Monday's linky party!

Sweet Treats, Sweet Deals!

Last week I had a few days to do some "stash management" going through the tubs and fine tuning the stash and cycling the old to the smaller bins so it will be used up quicker. 

 This required me to go through the 12 large tubs of fabric that I keep under my long arm machine, pull out the fabric by color and sort them into groups of scraps/pieces smaller than a fat quarter and anything fat quarter size or larger.

 

This is the pile of fabrics smaller than a fat quarter and will be cut into...

 

 

my scrap user system sizes (strings, 1 1/2", 2", 2 1/2", 3 1/2", 5" sq).

 

The larger pieces (1/2" cuts) got cut into fat quarter sizes and the remaining yardage got put back in the tubs under the long arm. You might be wondering why go to all of the trouble....well I have found it is much easier and quicker to "shop your stash" if you are able to see it quickly. It also gave me a better idea of what color families of fabric I was lacking and was in need of adding to. Which brings me to the 2nd half of this post.

This week I celebrated a birthday and I wanted to "round out" my fabric stash color families instead of receiving the regular birthday gifts. Originally I was planning on going to my local quilt store to do the birthday fabric stashing but for some reason I decided to look at some of my favorite online fabric stores to see if there were any specials being offered. Fabric Shack  just added a HUGE amount of fabrics to the sale-abration section of their site fabrics as low as $2.98 per yard and up (minimum amount per cut is 1/2 yard pieces). But don't forget to look in the main fabric section of their site also because there are A LOT of fabrics that are on sale ($4.99-$7.99 per yard with the smallest of cuts being 1/4 yd cuts).

 

 

I was able to get 42 yards of quilt shop quality fabric for only $195.00 plus another $8.00 for shipping! if I would have gone to my local quilt shop for these I would have paid anywhere from $419.00-$503.00 based on the current fabric prices of $9.99-$11.99 per yard.

 

Here is another pic of my new fabrics out of the plastic...per the postage on the box it cost $43.00 to ship but I only paid $8.00 priority mail because I spent over a certain amount in the transaction! As you can see from the pic I was lacking a lot of grey and black on white fabrics from my stash ;0) the three larger cuts of fabric (black, red & orange) is for Bonnie Hunter's Orange Crush quilt I want to make in the future. Also you can get some more sweet deals at the following online quilt stores Whittle's Fabrics, and Connecting Threads

  

and speaking of sweet deals....my daughter Rachel bought me some of my favorite jelly belly flavors for my b-day!

 

Of course dear hubby couldn't be out done by our daughter so he bought me some more jelly bellies!

Ecconomy

The ecconomy, lets face it it stinks. It has affected everything in our lives as quilters, just when you think things might get better (the stock market not taking the deep plunge and staying there anymore...it has been bouncing back, like a bungie cord) think again. Bad cotton crops and corn crops this past year has increased not only the cost of all things cotton such as fabric, thread, batting, clothes but anything that uses corn in products such as feed for animals, products in the grocery stores and yes lets not forget the unstable gas prices, still. Health care is still not any better in fact the costs are also going through the roof more than before. With everything going up in costs what are we quilters to do? How are we suppose to keep our local quilt stores from closing (don't worry, I have no insight if any in our area are closing ;0)) just saying if quilters aren't able to afford to buy from the quilt shops do to less disposable income due to the bad ecconomy how are they to remain open?

If quilters are not able to afford to send their quilts out to us longarm quilters then how are we going to continue to keep our doors open as well? Yes business has slowed way down. Usually by now the snow birds are comming back to town and calling for appointments to drop off their quilt tops. The phone is not ringing, the quilt tops are not being dropped off, the snow birds are not returning as they did before in past years.

So what are quilters doing? Did they stop piecing their tops? Or are they creating tops from their fabric stash and either letting their tops go unfinished? Or are they doing smaller quilt tops and are attempting to quilt them, themselves on their sewing machines? Who knows what is happening in the average american/canadian quilter's home.

I have offered specials, yet obviously they aren't as enticing to get my loyal customers back to having their tops quilted proffesionaly. So don't think I haven't noticed or that I haven't been hearing your frustration over this horrible ecconomy, cause I have..I have heard it loud and clear! 

Starting in January I will be bringing back one of my most popular specials I have done since I opened my doors in 2005. So hang in there fellow quilters, I may not be able to fix the ecconomy, but at least I can try to ease some of it's burden for other quilter's the best way I know. Stay tuned for further info.  

New Promotion for Gecko Quilts Blog(s) Followers Only

Yesterday I quilted one of my own quilts, it will be hanging in my dining room once I bind it. I used my CL square dance design board, here is a quick pic

Recognize it? It's a UFO I did earlier in the year and now it's quilted! but if you want to see more detail of the quilting, you will have to go to my other blog at http://geckoquiltscirclelordscrapbook.blogspot.com/

For all of my customers that sign up as a follower to either one (or both) of my blogs I will give them a special discount on their next quilt when they choose the pattern that I used on the above quilt. You must be a follower of my blog(s) to get the inside scoop on this discount and the discount is only good until Nov. 18, 2011. If you are interested call me for details.

All Moved In

This is my new quilt studio, at this angle no one would ever know that this once was a 1 car garage :0) I don't have any quilts up on the walls in the new studio yet, but I have several places to put some and will when I have a chance to make some new ones.

Ok so it's been a month since I last posted on my blog (oh BTW the Gecko Quilts website is down, we know about it and are in the process of fixing it...the servers that we have the website on didn't do so well in the move). 

And I would like to say that the whole move thing was uneventful but it wasn't. The closing went better than expected (we ended up having to come to the closing with less $ than we originally thought, and our monthly mortgage payment is also less than what we thought it would be.   

We got our keys on my birthday, and had a small pizza party in the new empty house to celebrate it.

The painters started painting the next day (Saturday) and were finished by Thursday. We were moving some things in ourselves while the painting was being done on the inside, in fact we (and when I say we I mean me and my oldest daughter) had moved most of the boxes ourselves before the movers even got to our house on Nov 13th. If I had to do it all over again I would wait and let the movers do it all. 

I wanted to have the whole house unpacked by Thanksgiving, because crazy us...lol, were hosting Thanksgiving for the whole family. This is where it goes bad...I pulled a muscle trying to unpack in time for the Holiday :0( I have been hobbling around this big house in pain for the past 2 weeks.

I was however feeling a little bit better today that I actually was able to quilt! I think that was just what the doctor ordered cause my mood has improved alot because I was able to do something, I 'm not able to do much housework yet though. 

My December is already booked with customer quilts that are in need of quilting before Christmas and January is starting to fill up as well. I can't believe that Christmas is 3 1/2 wks away! There is so much to do...like Christmas shopping,I have absolutely nothing bought yet, not 1 cookie baked for the cookie trays either :0( but at least we got the trees up!  

 

Vacation Days

Gecko Quilts will be closed from Nov. 1, 2010- Nov. 30, 2010

Do to the move, Gecko Quilts will be closed during the above dates, There will be no quilt pick ups or drop offs during this time. On December 1, 2010 quilt drop offs and pick ups will resume at the new location. Stay tuned for further info.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average Closed Above 10,000!

For the first time in over a year the Dow Jones Industrial Average has closed at or over the 10,000 mark at the closing bell on any given Friday!!! This means that my Depression Prevention Special is now officially over! I was starting to think that this day was never goimg to come ;0)


And just as luck would have it, the moment that the stock market closed today... the phone rang. It was a customer with 3 bed size quilts hoping that she could drop off her quilts for the special price. I had to inform her that she was a day late and a dollar short. She sounded a little dissapointed but hey the rules were the rules. Besides I gave her a little heads up on a special I am planning to run all of next year for my 5 year anniversary special and she was a happy customer once more.