Annie Smith will be teaching:

On Wednesday, January 20th- 3014C – Build Your Own Color Sense

On Thursday, January 21st- 4015C – The 1:10 Quilt

On Friday, January 22nd- 5014C – Aurifil Thread Matters

On Saturday, January 23rd- 6014C – The “A” Word By Machine

And on Sunday, January 24th- 7012C – A Is For Applique

Annie Smith: 40 Years Quilting

Annie Smith was a garment sewest long before she started quilting. In high school, Annie made clothes for herself, her friends, and then her friends’ moms. Quilting was a natural transition. Annie began by making a quilt for her first baby in 1980. Calico and solid cotton/poly blends were all that were available at the time. No one in her family quilted so there wasn’t anyone who could guide her. Annie’s husband bought her a book which taught her how to piece and quilt by hand. Annie pieced those first blocks from her hospital bed when she developed pregnancy complications. Later, she took classes at a local quilt shop to have a night out and she found that she got hooked quickly.

Quilting Influences

Annie says that the quilt book, Quilts! Quilts!! Quilts!!! by Diana McClun and Laura Nownes (former Road to California featured quilters) has had the biggest influence on her quilting. Annie shares, “That book was cutting edge and rocked the quilting world and changed the way we looked at making quilts. The sampler quilt in that book has been made thousands upon thousands of times. That quilt and the techniques from the book are so varied — that if you follow the instructions to make that quilt, you will gain the most whole instruction for making a quilt that you could ever get. The techniques teach you how to make a quilt from A – Z; quick-piecing, hand-piecing, applique, y-seam construction, drafting, mitered corners, and so, so much more. They also included instructions in the book for anyone who would like to teach, as well as a lesson plan – remarkable.” Annie ended up teaching a 12-week class using that lesson plan for over twenty years for hundreds of students.

Annie’s favorite quilting tool is Clover Fork Pins. They allow her to butt her seams, securing them in place as she stitches. She always ends up with perfectly aligned seams and perfect points. “They’re worth their weight in gold.”

Quilting Space

Annie was asked to describe her quilting work area:

“First of all, I’m a dedicated BERNINA girl — six and counting. I downsized my work area when I moved from California to Texas recently, so I’ve had the challenge of making the most out of my space. I use two Arrow Gidget II tables for work surfaces and rely on Ikea pieces for storage and versatility. I have a few cool things that I love in my work area. I repurposed CD racks from Mexico to use for fat quarter and half-yard fabric collections, which makes it so much easier for me to shop in my own stash.

Then, I have a wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling design wall that I can’t live without. I have a glass white board that is also magnetic, so I can work out quilt details and diagrams and attached fabrics and photos to the board for easy viewing.

I also love to have familiar and sentimental things around me that keep me grounded: family photos, beautiful artwork, framed pieces from my first book, a tin butterfly from Asilomar, CA.

What the Coronavirus has Taught Her

When everything began shutting down in the United States, Annie was on a teaching trip. The past six months have been the longest she’s been home in over fifteen years! Annie has used this time to “truly organize” her workspace, using cool iPhone apps to catalog fabrics, patterns and books (mainly so she doesn’t re-buy the same thing when she shops!). She has also reformatted her in-person lectures and classes so they can be given virtually via Zoom.

Annie and her husband moved to Texas to be near their kids and while they haven’t been able to see them as much as they would like, they’ve still  been able to do some creative events like a cyber baby shower and helping her grandson with his first day of online-Kindergarten while his mom gave birth to a new baby sister.

The pandemic has taught Annie that “life is even more fragile that we think, that the world can come to a screeching halt overnight, and that we are so much more resilient than we realize.”

Teaching at Road 2021

Annie has been teaching quilt classes since 1984. For twenty years, she worked in Silicon Valley and then would teach classes at night and on weekends. She credits her “experience in my job, training employees in customer service excellence practices and soft skills” for really helping her structure curriculum for her quilting students.

The best part of teaching quilting classes for Annie is meeting new people, many of whom have become dear friends. She loves to nurture people and feels she can learn just as much from them. Annie says that she is really grateful for the students who desire to take classes from her — for, if they weren’t there, she wouldn’t be there either.

Annie hopes her students at Road 2021 will gain self-confidence and realize that they are capable of creating so much beauty. Annie says, “They come into class with so much talent already — and I’m there to assist them in learning something new, and, hopefully, exciting. I love to see the light bulb come on over their head when it all clicks in place — it’s delightful to see!”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 29th, 2020 at 10:36 pm and is filed under Uncategorised. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.