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Welcome to the 2009 4th Annual Professional Longarm Yellowbook It’s time to finish your quilt tops! How many quilt tops do you have tucked away, waiting to be quilted? You know, those unfinished masterpieces aren’t really quilts until they are quilted. To finish a quilt yourself, you have several options. The most common are hand quilting and machine quilting. Hand quilting is the process of using a needle and thread to bind the layers together. You simply sew a running type stitch by hand across the entire area to be quilted. If you are going to hand quilt, you should get a quilting frame or hoop to assist in holding the piece being quilted. Machine quilting, as opposed to hand quilting, is the process of sewing the layers of the quilt together by machine. A home sewing machine (or short-arm machine) may be used or there are specialized machines called longarm quilting machines that can be used. When using a home sewing machine, the layers of the quilt (top, batting and backing) are tacked together to keep them in place during quilting. The tacked layers of fabric are then moved through the home sewing machine. A longarm quilting machine is a large-throat industrial sewing machine, hand-guided or computerized, that is set on a track system to stitch over the quilt. It has a special table or frame with long bars or rollers on either side. The fabric layers are generally pinned onto a canvas that is attached to the bars and then rolled onto the bars, keeping them together without pinning or basting the quilt. The head stitches on the fabric as it is unrolled. The quilted fabric is then rolled onto the take up roller on the other side of the frame. On a longarm, the fabric is stationery and the operator moves the sewing head across the fabric. The tables come in several sizes (ranging from 6 to 14 foot lengths) to accommodate various quilt sizes. The sewing heads also come in different sizes. A longer head can reach farther and the operator will have more quilt surface to work on at any given time. A longer head will also have a higher clearance to accommodate a larger quilt sandwich. A fun and creative part of this process is being able to choose what kind of quilting design you want to use to “sandwich” the layers of your quilt. You can choose from freestyle meandering, pantograph (edge to edge repeating pattern), or use a more customized design. Using this reference you can now easily locate professionals throughout the U.S. and Canada who operate machine quilting businesses. These professional quilters are available for hire and ready to partner with you to finish your quilts. In the Professional Longarm Yellowbook, longarm entries across the Canada and the U.S. are arranged within the book by state and organized within each state alphabetically by city. The contact information in each entry generally includes company name, owner’s name, address, phone, fax, e-mail and Web site. Some entries were edited via request of the longarm professional. Throughout the book you will also find advertisements. Perhaps through these sources you can find the products and services you need to complete your next quilting project and further develop your love of quilting. Prefacing the PLYB are articles by four well-known leaders in the quilting world. Thanks to Janet-Lee Santeusanio, Cheryl Uribe, Linda V. Taylor and Mary Schilke for graciously sharing their quilting tips and ideas on pages 6-13. We included our special symbol again in this year’s PLYB. The small symbol represents our charter PLYB listings. Remember, the 2009 PLYB can also be accessed online through www.quiltingprofessional.com. Entries online are divided into five regions. You simply click on the map to view listings organized by state. Online Yellowbook entries will be updated throughout 2009-10 to help give accurate contact information. Yellowbook advertisers are also online at www.quiltingprofessional.com. The list is hyperlinked so you can travel easily to their site and review their entire range of products/services. If you locate a professional longarm quilter using this resource guide, be sure to tell that quilter you found their name in the PLYB! It isn’t a quilt until it’s quilted! # # # # A portion of this article first appeared in the Summer 2008 issue of Notions, the national publication of the American Sewing Guild, www.asg.org . |