I bought my HQ Sixteen at the 2008 HMQS in Sandy, UT. I had been looking at them for a while and HQ had the best product for the best price, and it was just too good of a deal to pass up. Needless to say, my husband was less than thrilled with my purchase. He didn’t see the need for a $9,000 quilting machine, and then there was the problem of where we were going to put it because my current sewing room was NOT big enough, besides the fact that I had three small children and when was I going to find the time to quilt.
My mother, however, was in seventh heaven. As president of her local quilting guild she was ecstatic to have a long-arm quilter in the family. She was going through her fabric closet looking for some I could practice on before I even got the machine.
Things at home were tense between my husband and I, and one night before my HQ Sixteen had been delivered, during a game of pool I jokingly said, “Hey, I’ll play you for my quilting machine. I win, I keep it and you stop being a jerk about it. You win, and I will call and tell them I don’t want it anymore… not to deliver it.” With all seriousness he said, “OK.” I know he thought this would be an easy win for him, because he usually kicks my butt when we play.
Ladies, he never lost so fast! I had only two balls left on the table, he still had all of his and that is when he sunk the 8 ball… making me the instant winner! I started laughing so hard I was almost crying as he stood there with a shocked look on his face. I knew then it was just meant to be.
After that he begrudgingly helped me rearrange some rooms in the house so that I could have the biggest one for my sewing room, and my HQ Sixteen was delivered. We put a TV we had up in my sewing room to entertain the kids while I quilted. My mom brought me some fabric from her stash and a couple of quilts to start on, and as they say, the rest is history.
My mom has been super supportive, and my husband doesn’t complain when I am in the quilting room. He even came to me recently and asked me to make a quilt for someone he works with whose wife was having a baby.
My husband was right on one account it is hard with young children to find the time, and when I do have the time I usually have a couple extra helpers. For example, once while I was quilting my 2 year old gave me a hug and bumped me, she’s also unplugged my machine while I was in the middle of quilting. Another time my 5 year old decided she wanted to help me quilt and grabbed hold of the handles on the opposite side of the table and it took me a minute to figure out why my machine was suddenly so hard to maneuver. Needless to say, there is always a lot of excitement in my quilting room and as a result I am a master at unpicking and very good at “defensive quilting.” Unfortunately while I am in my quilting room my kids have free reign of the house which usually resembles a war zone when I decide to take a break

I own the following HQ machines: