Saturday, July 15, 2017

2017 FAL Meet the Host: Izzy

Today's guest blogger is Izzy.  She and I have a few things in common.  We both have a gorgeous granddaughter and have served as VP for our MQG chapters.  Read on and learn more about what things you might also share with us like the love of quilting!, Karen
  

Hi - I'm Izzy from Dizzy Quilts and it's my turn to tell you a little about myself!



I'm a mother, step-mother and foster mother to six children, grand-mother to one gorgeous little girl and wife to my soul mate. During the day, I manage a team of e-Learning designers/developers at a global financial company.

All of this keeps me pretty busy, but I've always made time to be crafty - when I was a little girl, my mom taught me how to knit and I made all my teddy bears knitted sweaters!

During my teenage years, I was a little too busy with school (and with boys!) to craft, but a few years later, when I had my first child, I started sewing.  I made some baby clothes and I made curtains mostly. I even took a sewing class to learn how to make garments for myself, but I never got the hang of that - nothing ever really fit right.

About 9 years ago, I walked into JoAnn's to get fabric for new curtains and spotted the cutest little quilt kits. I bought one, put it together and haven't looked back since! I was completely and totally hooked.

The first few quilts I made were very traditional - lots of small pieces, small florals, etc. I really had no clue what I was doing, but learned so much with the making of these quilts.

A lap size log cabin quilt made for my step-mom

I started making these quilts for pretty much everyone in my family.  And pretty soon, every bed in the house had a quilt on it.

Quilt I made for my sister-in-law - this is Bronx testing it.

I even made quilts as curtains!!
Around 2010, I discovered quilt blogs and the online quilting community.  That literally changed my quilting life!!  I started my own blog, met some amazing people and a couple of years later, found the Montreal Modern Quilt Guild.

Through the members of this guild, I learned about modern quilting and I fell in love with quilting all over again.

I started making modern quilts and building a stash of really colourful fabrics and solid neutrals.



When I first started quilting, my least favourite part of the whole thing was the actual quilting. My sewing machine was pretty small and wrestling with a big quilt in that tiny little space was painful and I very often ended up with puckers on the back of my quilts.  And then I changed two things: my sewing machine and my basting method.


I purchased my Juki TL-2010Q. It is literally a dream to quilt with. Lots of room to the right of the needle and super consistent, fast stitching.

I also learned how to board baste my quilts - which has saved my knees, my back and to a certain extent, my sanity!  :-)

And now quilting is actually my favourite part. I look forward to finishing a top just so I can get to the quilting. My dream is to some day own a long-arm machine, but I would need to get a much bigger house before that could happen!



Last year, I became the Vice-President of the Montreal MQG and that has been a lot of fun. The group is growing and we have such amazing people and quilters.  Each meeting is a great source of inspiration and I'm learning so much.



When I was approached to become a FAL host last year, I was so flattered and so happy. I love hosting these link-ups - so much inspiration and so much talent every quarter.

Thanks for reading and if you have questions, please leave a comment!  :-)

Izzy

3 comments:

  1. Fun to learn more about Izzy!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I have a question about that Juki, does it have a foot pedal thread cutter? and if after using the thread cutter do you have issues with the next fabric sewn being pulled down into the machine. I have looked at a Juki a few times and I like the speed and feel of it but my current machine (Janome 6600) does that fabric capture when I use the thread cutter and it makes me crazy! PS. Love your modern quilts, especially the grey blocks with smaller colored squares!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks for one’s Good posting! I enjoyed reading it, I want to encourage you to definitely continue your great writing, have a nice evening! keeping this website

    Buy Clothes For Kids

    ReplyDelete

Let me know that you stopped by - leave a comment and make my day!