My first exposure to quilting was in the early 1980’s when I was a stay at home mom raising our two sons. My two great aunts taught me how to quilt and how to finish my quilts by hand quilting them. Everything they taught me was done by templates and with scrap fabric. I made quilts for about 3 years and gave everything away to family and friends.

When I went back to work my quilting got put on hold. In 1991, I joined my husband, Randy, in making kaleidoscopes. I have been making kaleidoscopes every since. I am a self-taught artist with a passion for color. I have always expressed my love of color through our kaleidoscopes.

In 1999 I had reached a point in my life where I needed more, to stimulate my creativity.  I turned to quilting. It was like finding a long lost friend. I have been able to express my love of color not only through my kaleidoscopes but also through my quilts. I joined the Azalea Quilter’s Guild along with the Gold Beach Quilters’ Guild. This has helped me to expand my knowledge of quilting. I find the sharing of ideas and fellowship to be very stimulating.  The fall of 2000, I meet Marilyn Badger, a long arm quilter and teacher. I was very intrigued by the long arm quilting technique and took a class from her. I fell in love with it and in December of 2000 I purchased my long arm quilting machine, the Millennium, from APQS. I have been long arm quilting professionally since January of 2001. I have since then taken a second class from Marilyn Badger, expanding my quilting capabilities. In July of 2002, I attend the first quilt show and conference “QTQ 2002 Quilting the Quilt” in Duluth, Minnesota where I attended numerous workshops. I learned from and assisted in the classroom with long arm quilter’s, Darlene Epp, Dawn Cavanaugh and Pam Clarke. I am always eager to learn new techniques and expand my knowledge on long arm quilting.

It is fun for me to accentuate an already beautiful quilt top with quilting that fits its personality. The quilt top speaks to me and I endeavor to listen. I strive to make every quilt as beautiful as possible and thrive on seeing it come to life.

 I have quilted numerous quilts for Sharyn Craig, author and teacher,  some are published in her new book “Great Sets” along with my Fall Frolic quilt. Here’s a quote from Sharyn Craig.  “Each quilt Shelley has done for me just gets better and better. I love the way she can “read” a quilt and pick just the right pattern and motif for each quilt. Her workmanship and attention to detail are awesome. I would recommend her to anyone.”

 The month of May 2002 one of my own quilts “Raspberry Punch” was on display with Warp1: Original Designs in Textile Art at Southern Coos Hospital in Bandon, OR.

 I quilted  “Autumn Fire” by Connie Jarvis that hung in 2003 Houston International in the “Two Person Category”.

  2005 - "Cheerful Quilts" by Christian Meunier, Shelley Knapp Mary Russell and more. I have two quilts published in this quilting book -- Tange-urple and Jerome Challenge 1 -- aka Circle of Friendship.