Happy Hours

It's been two weeks since Patricia from Handiquilter came to my house to give me a thorough introduction to my longarm machine. She managed to figure out what was wrong with the machine, why I had been having the tensions problems after setting it up, and it has been running without any problems since.
I have been practising, and those have been happy hours, I have produced a stack of trial pieces. But not once have I had occurrences like this again:

Incorrectly adjusted upper thread tension - a thing of the past (hopefully)

I'm trying out patterns of my own 'design' mostly, just working to get the feel for the machine and its movements.

Nothing spectacular yet, and only on remnant pieces of fabric. I've used up most of the remnant batting pieces I had been saving, too, and after taking down one trial piece today

I have just finished mounting what I have decided will be the last complete trial piece.

After I finish practising on this one, I will start doing 'real' quilts. I have found a small piece, a Triple Irish Chain, which I made for a class demonstration and never got around to quilting, which will be the first serious quilt I put up. Then  there are several pieces that were exercises in Nancy Crow workshops, which I will piece together to make a perfect picnic blanket without any artistic value and very suited to trying my hand at going over a bigger piece.
And then there are three larger tops already waiting in line - one for my son, one for a friend of mine, one another result of workshop demonstration pieces (blocks of stars). After that, I will be ready to  take in orders.