Episode 426: Hello + Welcome to Season 10

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Welcome to Season 10 of the American Patchwork & Quilting podcast! As we enter our 10th season, we're going to take a little time to reflect before we dive into a sneak peek at all the fun things we have coming! If you've been an avid listener to our podcast throughout the years, we want to say thank you for sticking with us -- as you probably heard Pat Sloan say on last week's episode, we're parting ways on this podcast. We've loved working with her these last 9 years, both as the host of our podcast and a frequent designer in our magazines. She's incredibly talented and has so many amazing things going. We give her all our thanks for years of fascinating interviews with hundreds of guests. But a new season (and number 10 at that) means a brand new format that we hope you love! This season, you'll hear more from the editors and designers of our magazines -- on each episode, we'll share helpful tips and tricks to make quilting more fun and address common sewing problems. We'll chat finishing your quilts and tackling your UFOs. We'll conquer common storage and organization problems. We'll update you on trends in the quilting industry (and just fun quilty things we're loving right now). And we'll also share heartwarming stories of quilting making a difference in communities across the world. Best of all -- we'll be featuring YOU, our listeners! We'll be answering questions from our listeners, sharing your best quilting tips, and having discussions around topics that are important to you! So, drop us an email at apqpodcast@meredith.com with any thoughts you have!

And we'll still be doing the interviews that you love! Each episode, we'll have a fun Q&A with someone in the quilting industry. These interviews will be conducted by Jess Zeigler from Threaded Quilting Studio. You may recognize her name from our magazines as a designer or from her popular Instagram where she shares beautiful photos of her longarm quilting. We'll be interviewing her later on this show, so you can learn more about her!

Thanks so much for joining us in this new season!

Doris, the editor of Quilt Sampler, shares a finishing tip to help you on your journey of crossing those projects off your list. On this episode, she gives tips for deciding what to do with the projects that you aren't certain are worth your time to finish. Having a lot of UFOs can be overwhelming and cause feelings of guilt, so it's best to decide which ones you will actually finish and clear out the rest. And we share the July number for the UFO Challenge.

Our organization pro Elizabeth, who's the designer of American Patchwork & Quilting, gives storage tips for your sewing space. We recently asked our Facebook readers how many minutes they spend each week tidying up and organizing their sewing spaces. The average answer was 27 minutes. Whether you have just 5 minutes to do a speed clean or 60 minutes to do a deep dive into organizing your space, Elizabeth has some suggestions to for how to conquer the clutter so you have more time to sew.

We're excited to chat with our guest on today's show. You've heard her on our podcast before and have seen her many times in our magazines. She's a talented pattern designer, longarm quilter, and just so happens to be our newest contributor to our podcast. It's Jess Zeigler from Threaded Quilting Studio. You'll hear Jess weekly on our podcast interviewing guests, and we know she has some amazing Q&As lined up. But for this episode, we thought it would be fun to put Jess in the hot seat so you all can get to know her more.

In this fascinating Q&A, Jess shares what a typical day for her longarm business looks like, her favorite part of the quilting process, and her passion for helping others learn to longarm quilt. She also shares her two top tips for those just starting to machine-quilt their own quilts.

We're so excited to have Jess on board with us. Stay tuned each week to hear Jess interview interesting people in the quilting industry! And make sure to connect with her on social media @threadedquilting to see more of her gorgeous longarm quilting!

Lindsay shared your best advice to common quilting struggles. This episode, we explore machine quilting tips -- everything from practicing freemotion quilting to working with a long arm quilting. If you're interested in submitting your own tip for feature in our magazines or on the podcast, send an email of your tip to APQTips@meredith.com.