Podcast: Quilting Superwoman Jackie Kunkel
Jackie also writes books and patterns, teaches online classes, and is a certified Judy Neimeyer teacher. She is truly a quilting Superwoman and I hope you enjoy learning more about Jackie!
Now for a few links from Jackie’s interview:
Click Here to find Jackie’s website Canton Village Quilt Works.
Jackie began longarm quilting in 2000 because it allowed her to work from home and fit her hours around her kid’s schedule.
She has changed her business over the years – creating a website, selling products online, and writing magazine articles. Jackie believes in remaining flexible so her business can grow and change as the quilting industry changes.
Jackie is also discussed how she became a certified Judy Neimeyer teacher. She was a huge fan of Judy’s quilts and found being certified to be helpful in teaching classes.
Jackie is also a big fan of batik fabrics and has a signature collection with Kathy Engel for Island Batik fabrics. She is working on a designer collection for Fall 2018.
We discussed lead times which can be really challenging with many fabric companies. Many companies will deliver the fabric to create quilts for Quilt Market only 1 month before market. Island Batik is one of the best companies to work for because they deliver the fabric much earlier than average.
Jackie keeps everything balanced by writing everything on a calendar and making sure she has big blocks of time open for designing and creating. She can’t create while traveling and teaching, so she stays really organized with clear goals while she’s home.
Jackie’s doesn’t say no to teaching opportunities, she tries to find a compromise or another time further in the future if a particular time is too busy.
Being in business since 2000, Jackie has seen the quilting industry change quite a lot in the last 17 years. The fabrics and quilting have both dramatically changed. When she began, hand quilting was the only form of quilting considered “real quilting” and that has changed dramatically in the last 10 years.
Jackie believes if you want to stay in business, you need to constantly rethink yourself and evolve. If you can’t do that, you’re not going to survive. Things are constantly changing and you have to remain flexible and excited about changing.
I loved learning from Jackie’s experience and I hope you did too!
The sponsor for this week’s show is the Waterfall Bargello Workshop where you’ll learn how to piece this complex looking Bargello quilt using easy strip piecing techniques.
You’ll also learn how to quilt this wall hanging with a combination of walking foot quilting and free motion quilting designs.
Last week I received this beautiful photo from Maggie with her Waterfall Bargello quilt in rainbow colors. This was so cheerful – absolutely the perfect quilt for spring!
Click Here to find the Waterfall Bargello Workshop.
And a few updates from my neck of the woods:
I’ve moved the podcast to Wednesday again to see if this will help free up my weekends so I can enjoy more time with Josh and James. I found posting on Saturday was resulting in a lot of time online because once I get sucked into the computer, I get kind of stuck.
So be looking for new podcast episodes every other Wednesday! Click Here to find all the podcast episodes shared so far.
The podcast is also on YouTube. Josh has been turning the audio clips into video clips with the podcast artwork. So if you prefer to find us on Youtube, you can always subscribe to our channel and get notified anytime a new video goes live.
Let’s go quilt,
Leah Day
