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I know many of you have seen this quilt so pardon me....but I love it because of the gals who helped me make it. It is an example of lots of great ladies coming together and without each one of them....this quilt would not have come to fruition.

This is a quilt I made for my living room. I really like the circles and how they play together. Janet Bellinger of Wellsboro, PA was teaching the class at Needles Quilt Shoppe. I decided to take the class and went into Needles to select some fabric. Up until this point I had mainly made quilts as gifts for others.

Katie and Mary,owners of Needles Quilt Shop , encouraged me to pick fabrics that go with my furniture and make a quilt for myself. Well, that was a novel idea. Make something for myself!!! Hmmmm.

Our furniture was in storage and had been for almost a year. So I dug out some photos of my furniture and took them into Needles. Mary and Katie stacked so many bolts of fabric on tables that I thought their arms would fall off. I'm sure their arms have huge muscles from all that hauling and toting those bolts of fabric. I went through the stack and selected the ones I liked the best. They encouraged me to pick things I might not otherwise select as they would enhance the other fabrics I had chosen. So I stretched and got some with little flowers, stars, dots, etc.

Once I started the practice piece for sewing on a curve, I was off and running. I finished the top in less than a week (if my memory serves me correctly!!).

Janet has made many circle quilts and she also is a long arm quilter. Who better to do the quilting? After it had been quilted, my girlfriend, Mary Jane, and I sat down and worked on the piping and the binding. Mary Jane had just gotten the "Piping Hot Binding" tool and we were both eager to try it out. The piping was done in no time and the edges were nice and even. I'm very proud of this quilt and happy that all these wonderful women have helped make the finished project so beautiful. The quilt hangs over a chair in my living room.

This is the Quilt Label:

“Around and Around”

In the year 2005, I took a circle quilt class from Janet Bellinger of Wellsboro , PA at Needles Quilt Shop. Katie Mader & Mary Guinn, the shop owners, inspired me to make a quilt for myself and assisted with the selection of fabrics. Janet did the long arm quilting and my friend Mary Jane Ehlich helped me put the piping and binding on.

Completed July 2007 by: Kelly Howlett March Jackson