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The next quilting couple lives in the beautiful mountains of North Carolina, 30 miles down the hill from Asheville in Marion. Laurie and Dave Dennis tripled their machine quilting business in the first year after moving to Marion from the Florida Keys. They credit the quick expansion to a greater demand in their new area, announcements of their service at their quilt guild, placement of small ads in quilting magazines and their Web site for Beehaven Quilts. In addition to her quilting skills, Laurie created their Web site herself.

Laurie was right out of high school and working for a couple on Cayuga Lake, NY. Dave grew up in that area and was their neighbor. The two met and hit it off right away. Soon after, they married. Dave owned his own company, working heavy construction equipment and they started their family of three children. Dave bought his wife her first sewing machine as a gift because he had this concept that all women wanted and needed a sewing machine. But Laurie was not interested at all in learning to sew. Nonetheless, she decided she would try because it was too costly of a gift to let sit. To her delight, she discovered she had a passion for sewing and was soon making clothing for her children and herself.

Laurie and Dave’s oldest daughter got involved in quilting and influenced Laurie to start quilting around 1995. She says she bought her first quilting machine on a whim. It was a used Quilt King. She was hoping she could supplement the couple’s retirement income, but it soon became much more. Her devotion to quilting grew and her machine quilting skills improved. Soon customers began sending quilt tops her way to finish.

Dave was involved from the very beginning of their machine quilting adventure. He spent so much time resurrecting that used first machine; got it in very good working order and it became more his machine than Laurie’s. Eventually he retrofitted it with a Statler Stitcher. Dave retired three years ago from his work in hospital maintenance and now is a full time quilter.

“People ask what I do. I tell them that I instruct Dave on what color thread to use,” joked Laurie.

The finished basement of the Dennis home is converted to their quilting enterprise. Laurie has her separate space where she does her piecing. One very large room houses their two Gammill Supremes both with Statler Stitchers. One of these is their original Statler unit which Dave took from their old machine and installed on the Gammill. This handyman maintains and rebuilds their machines and does most of the custom quilting.

Of their successful partnership, Dave said jokingly, “I like the way she cleans my truck. Seriously though, Laurie is really my support and I could not do it without her in life and work.”

Laurie believes she and Dave love working together because they worked apart for so long when Dave had go out of town for work. Now they can be together most of the time and their abilities mesh. Laurie said, “Dave is a creative genius. He’ll see a flower, take a digital photo and transfer that to a quilting design. Some of his designs are even selling on the Internet. He can fix almost anything because he innately knows what to do technically.”

Their aptitudes are complementary to each other. Dave has a very strong work ethic and tenacity. Laurie tends to take a break when she runs into a problem. Their approach is to keep a balance between their different temperaments. Occasionally Dave likes to turn off the quilting machine and just go mow the lawn.

After 43 years of marriage, they are still nuts about each other. It has never been 50/50 with this couple. They each put in at least 60 percent so there is always an abundance of energy.

“We make it work because we want it to work,” they said. “We are each others best cheerleaders.”

Reprinted from Quilting Now, May 2007