About Mary Kendall

Hello, it is so nice to meet you! 

I have the best job ever! I mean who wouldn’t want to work on your beautiful quilts? It is a real joy to see what people are piecing, or to finish a project that may have been waiting for many years. Modern, traditional, or vintage quilts – I love them all.

I’ve been a professional longarm quilter since early 2023, but a small business owner since 1996. I understand the importance of excellent customer service, and how valuable it is to have a few great long-term clients rather than a lot of one-time customers.

In addition to on-the-job training, I’ve completed the following:

  • Rookie Season training with the Longarm League
  • Gammill Quilting with Confidence 2023, Nashville
  • Gammill Quilting with Confidence 2019, Spokane
  • Private training group with Joan Knight, Spokane
  • Skill Builders Club member
Special thanks goes to my friend and mentor, Kim Campbell, and Wanda Jeffries for sharing her longarm business experience.

I started quilting by accident in 2016. At that time we were living in rural Washington State. My husband, Tom, worked in Spokane which was a 45 minute drive. My beloved Jeep decided it needed its engine to be rebuilt. That left me home with no way to go anywhere for a few months. Somehow I came across Missouri Star Quilt Company on YouTube. That was probably a small miracle. I was never a crafty type of person. I wasn’t good at it and I was okay with that. Working in the garden, volunteer work, and being a self-employed web designer/programmer was enough for me. I always have a lot on my plate. Quilting was love at first sight. It is kind of a geeky hobby. Angles, numbers, organization…. right up my alley. The fact that it all turns into something beautiful is a huge bonus.

My husband Tom was a trooper. He would stop at Joann Fabrics on his way home from work with my list of quilt items. Those lovely ladies would lead him around and fill his cart. I loved making that first quilt and have never looked back!

My second quilt was a large queen-size quilt. Once I looked at the 8″ throat on my Costco brother sewing machine I realized I was not going to complete the quilting on that little machine. I sent it off to Missouri Star for longarm quilting.

I also purchased an industrial Juki, like the one Donna Jordan from Jordan Fabrics has. I modified things so I could free motion quilt on it. That was great and I finished a lot of quilts that way. Then I went to my first quilt show and saw a Gammill Statler longarm quilting machine. I couldn’t get it out of my mind. The computerized CAD software it uses was very familiar to me as I had been a web designer for over 20 years. The industrial quality of the machine head and table appealed to my inner geek.

 When COVID happened my web design business suffered like everyone else. I had worked all those years with a group of travel related companies. Many of them retired during COVID. I decided to close my business and become a professional longarmer. I had never used a longarm, but I did a lot of research. I made a business plan. We bought a fully rebuilt Gammill Statler longarm with a 14 foot table. That was complicated. Check out my Dream Studio blog for those details.