Sharon started her quilting much in the same way many quilters did, buying the wrong fabric, using the wrong batting, and using the wrong needles. It took a little time but she learned, through trial and error, to use what worked for her even though that particular product, piece, or application, might not generally be known as the correct choice. One more thing Sharon learned was not, under any circumstances, to compromise her standards.
In the beginning Sharon had to learn the difference between a scant quarter and a fat quarter, translating all those unusual terms that quilters use. The first year for her was just a continual spin of learning and creating, and learning and creating again, in order to establish her base for future quilting efforts. For the novice the learning curve proved quite steep.
Sharon remembered her grandmother quilting back in the ’60s but everything then seemed so different when compared with modern practices. “I hope that the quilt world will be just as different for my grandchildren,” Sharon says. When first she began she had no idea that quilts were being machine quilted. “I remember only that quilts were all hand-pieced and hand-quilted,” She said.
Sharon remembers her Grandma Larsen counting the stitches per inch and ranting about being inconsistent, so that is where she started, setting out to find exactly how many stitches per inch were needed to make her quilts “just right.” She asked the wrong person, and was told that to ask was just rude. It was Sharon’s first indication that she needed to be a teacher.
Today Sharon is both teacher and artist. Her exceptional quilts, and her courses, can be found on her website: Sharon Schamber.
Tags: fabric, fat-quarter, quilt, quilting, stitches, textile
