SEWING:
She began sewing around age 12 and took several years of home economics classes in school. From this experience, she enjoyed sewing her own clothing in high school. She has made two wedding dresses (her own and her daughters), and also made shirts and dresses for her children when they were yound. It has already been 40+ years since that first sewing experience.

QUILTING:
As she recalls making two simple baby quilts out of polyester fabrics for two of her children. She did not seriously get into quilting until her youngest was in high school. In about 2002, she figured it was time to do something fun for herself. She took a machine appliqueing class and was hooked. A few years later, she designed some of her own patterns, which are now available as downloadable patterns, in pdf form. And, she also enjoys taking classes to learn new techniques.
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GARDENING:
Her earliest memories of gardening were of a tiny garden plot of about 3' x 3' her mother allotted in the big garden. And, recalls how much she loved running down the long pathways in her grandmother's flower and vegetable garden. It was so big and beautiful to a small girl. Over the years, in her moves she has enjoyed planning gardens and flower beds with her family.
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READING:
She loves reading! This all started back in grade two, as she can still recall the hours spent reading books from the library shelves that were housed on shelves at the back of the classroom. Hence, you could guess that she still enjoys using her library card and buying books online. She enjoys buying books and patterns, as much as fabric! Recently, she was able to purchase an Amazon Kindle eReader, making downloading free and purchased books that much easier.
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ORGANIZING:
She does like to organize things. But, as she says, "Don't get me wrong, my house still gets messy." There is a difference between 'organizing' and 'cleaning'. As she is sure most creative people prefer to work in their studios, more than cleaning the house. Her family long ago got used to finding the furniture re-arranged many times over the years. Her fave method is creating a plan on paper with cut-outs for furniture to scale. So, if it was not nailed down, it was fair game to be moved!
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SCRAPBOOKING:
As many photographs were taken over the years, before digital cameras, there are still many photos waiting for the day to be sorted and put into albums of some type. There definitely would be many hours of scrapbooking fun, if the time allowed such a pleasure. The best hope for this would be for them being converted to digital form. One day, right? With the many areas online, such as: websites, blogs, etc., the digital form is much preferred. One area she has enjoyed is creating scrapbooking cards as they are small and simple projects. And those she's made for others have really enjoyed receiving them.
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PHOTOGRAPHY:
She has taken some photos with regular film cameras, in previous years, but didn't get into that area until 2008, when she wanted to add photos to her Facebook account. She loves using her new digital camera and her fave genre is nature photography. She enjoys finding beauty in the ordinary things around her. The next step is always adding them to her website, blog, and flickr sites.
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WEBSITE DESIGN:
She has enjoyed learning how to create websites and has two of her own to journal her quilting journey. QuiltSamplerJournal.com has a great selection of quilting books and Darlee.ca showcases her cyberspace villa and quilting, where you are currently.