** The Quilter's Cache Story **

  A tale of Cows and Quilts, as told by Marcia Hohn :o)

   I started the Quilter's Cache in 1997 as a one page tribute to my favorite pastime of quilting. I envisioned it and sketched as an ALL ORANGE page, using MS Paint...sent it on to my then beau, now hubby, Joe, who made it into a web page. At that time, I couldn't find many patterns online, and thought it would be SO COOL to draw a pattern every month...and from that humble beginning sprang this monstrosity we now know as the Quilter's Cache...which now has all sorts of Instructional Pages, and hundreds of free patterns, all of which are hand drawn, well mouse drawn, without the use of any quilt programs :o)

  At that time, the Cache was a part of my group of five personal web pages, which are housed on Geocities.com . My personal pages are still there( well they WERE in 2001, when this was written)...BUT....The Cache was growing!...and Geocities only offered 10 meg of space...so, in 1998 we moved to xoom.com, which was then taken over by NBCi.com. Xoom offered "Unlimited Space"....doesn't that sound great???!!.and the Cache was growing....{ picture looking through a microscope at cells replicating...you get the picture?} We had outgrown Geocities, and then, amazingly...we outgrew NBCi as well! By this time, I was adding a pattern nearly every day, and each pattern being very graphics intensive, this all took bandwidth to download and view. ...so...in 2000 we went to our first paying server, a virtual host. That means, my site and several others were housed on one server. ..and the Cache was still growing! In March of 2001 we were mentioned in Country Living Magazine, and got such a response to this that our bandwidth requirements exceeded what the virtual server could support...in other words...we blew them off the web, literally!...time to shell out some cash for the Cache, Marcia!...so we moved the entire site, then including over 10,000 graphics and 250 patterns and pages to a dedicated server, one that houses only the Cache!.. .and we are STILL GROWING!

  At some point, this became more than just a quilting web page, an entity in its own right! We have viewers and followers all over the world! There's a sense of family amongst us, and it's more than I ever could have dreamed! :o) Through my Letters from Mamabear column, you have been there with me as all of this has unfolded...you knew when the skunk came in my kitchen, and I knew when your first grandchild was being born, and what quilt they would receive. You were with me when I got married, and when my daughter graduated from high school, and I helped you learn to quilt when you retired. I gave you that quilt pattern that wrapped your sister when she had breast cancer, and you held me up when I first had my patterns "stolen". Maybe quilters have ALWAYS been family...we surely are here on the Cache!

  Now all of this is going to go even a step further, as I embark on my biggest dream, seeing the Quilter's Cache patterns published in book form! The proceeds of this book, and the volumes that will follow, will pay for the dedicated server the site is now on, and allow me to continue making new free patterns! This is all such a JOY for me! Wish me luck with this one!!( Sadly...no book still...but what the hey...the Adventure has been worth many!)

   In 2001, I gave up my "real Job" to work on THIS real job! The job of making Free patterns!  Many folks don't understand this move...to me, it makes perfect sense...I feel as though this IS my Niche!

   2002...what an exciting year!!...I was contacted by Jean Ann Wright for Quilt magazine, about having some quilts in the magazine, and shortly thereafter about having patterns in EVERY Issue! At the SAME time, Marcus Brother Fabrics asked if I would  make a quilt for them showcasing the America Hurrah fabric Line! This quilt went on tour, and also appeared on their website. I was flying high about all of this, I'll tell you! I also wrote another pattern for them, for a Katie Pasquini  quilt pattern, and made another traditional quilt that appeared on their site :o)

   Now in 2003 I've added several features to the site, among them a Donations button, so folks can contribute to the server expenses if they would like, and the Quilter's Cache Tiny Store which is rolling out with QC items for sale, but will later also include a wide variety of items, including whole Quilt Patterns! The store is not open, currently.

...whole quilt patterns for sale started in December of 2003! This is exciting!! So many folks have written asking for whole quilt yardages, so I hope this will fill that need :o)

This story will be ongoing...and I thank-you ALL for being as part of it!!

Marcia :o)        ...  and OF COURSE...It's an MH PAPER! :o)