Chief Moose, AKA Ann
Ann Skaehill is the owner of Crafty Moose Quilts and has been quilting since 2011. She’s been married for over 25 years and loves to go on hiking adventures with her husband. Their son is almost grown and finding his own way, which is beautiful to watch.
Ann’s passions include designing, constructing, and providing a “tapestry scrapbook” for her customers via t-shirt quilts and memory quilts. Playing with gradients of color in traditionally pieced quilts is happy place. She loves "quick makes" that won't take her more than a week to finish and because she is a visual learner, you will always find helpful diagrams in her quilt patterns.
Want to learn more about the name Moose? Click here to read all about it!
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Ann is also part of the Nine Patch Quilt Collective, a design team that hosts the annual Sweater Weather Sampler.
My Story
I wasn't always into quilting ... or sewing ... or fabric stores or anything remotely related to crafting. I was the athlete in the family and I detested being taken to fabric stores so my big sisters could pick out patterns and fabrics for the clothes mom wanted to make us. You could usually find me INSIDE the round racks of bolts of fabric, creating my own imaginary land of caves and pirates.
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God knew what He was doing when He encouraged my mom and grandmother to hoard some quilting supplies because unbeknownst to me I would one day claim in pure defiance, "I could make a quilt if I wanted to" and I was going to need some supplies.
So I made a quilt. But let's be clear here, it wasn't pretty. In fact, I didn't understand what seam allowances were, how to measure borders BEFORE adding them, and I truly struggled to properly wind the ding-dang bobbin. Mental breakdowns nearly happened over empty or poorly wound bobbins. For those of you who don't sew let's just say that I put together a quilt without understanding ANY of the rules. None of them.
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I am mostly a self-taught quilter and I say "mostly" because I had to rely heavily on my mom to fill in the gaps for me. The good news is I now wind bobbins without a care in the world, I was taught how to properly measure my borders before sewing them on, and mom blessed me with the wonderful gift of a quarter-inch sewing foot. My grandmother passed away before I started to sew but my very first sewing machine was hers! (Thanks, mom!)
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I crave creativity. I love saturated colors, and it's like a cherry on top when there are gradients of color in my quilts. Making t-shirt and memory quilts for others gives me an outlet to put all of my God given gifts into something that others can take with them and keep for a lifetime.
Quilt pattern design wasn't always on my radar but at the prompting of some friends I decided to take the leap and I'm so glad I did. It has proven to be yet another creative outlet for me and it brings me an incredible amount of joy to see people using their own skills to create quilts for their loved ones with my patterns. They get to use their favorite colors, textures, and techniques to bless the people in their lives with their handiwork.
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This small business would still just be a dream if it weren't for my husband. He has believed in me from the start, even when I accidentally cut off a few letters of his favorite college t-shirt in the first t-shirt quilt I ever made. He is also the ultimate quilt holder! If you see photos of my quilts, there is a 99% chance my husband is on the other side of it - I assume he's smiling from ear to ear but one can never be sure about these things.ā