My Story Part 4: Building From Scratch (and Why It Matters So Much)

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Right now, as I write this, the concrete floor of Treeline Quilting has been poured on our land on Lincoln Highway, and the steel walls have just begun to go up. Under that concrete is the plumbing, electrical conduit, and radiant floor heat tubing my husband and I laid ourselves. Getting to this point took a lot longer than I ever expected when we decided on building a quilt shop from scratch. Let me back up to tell you about the process of building.

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Engineers, stormwater, and septic

When you build a commercial building from the ground up, there’s a lot that happens before anyone picks up a shovel. We hired an engineer about a year ago, and over the course of the project we ended up working with two when the original one couldn’t get to it in a timely manner.

One of the first big pieces was stormwater. The plan is based on how much of the property gets disturbed during construction, and that decides how big the retention pond needs to be and where it goes. That plan gets approved locally.

At the same time, we needed a septic plan. Soil borings had already been done on the property, and the septic system’s size and location were planned around what we might do there in the future. Because it’s a commercial property, the septic plan had to be approved by the state. That’s the piece that took the longest. By far. Month of waiting and so much frustration because all you could do was just wait.

The hardest part: waiting

If I’m being honest, the septic delays were the most discouraging part of this entire journey so far.

I did everything I was supposed to do. I hired the right people. We spent a lot of money paying them to do what needed to be done. And then… it just didn’t move. There was a lot of waiting and very little communication. When we finally did hear something, it was that a revision was needed, and that meant another 15 days for review. We’d expected that plan to be submitted months before it actually was (remember when I said I had to hire a different engineer?)

I felt completely out of control, because there was truly nothing I could do to make it go faster. If you’ve ever been a planner stuck waiting on someone else, you know exactly the feeling.

The steel for the building was delivered in July. The day it arrived, I came home and panicked, because I thought, “Oh my gosh, it’s go time, and I’m not going to have enough inventory!” So I ordered more. At that point I thought the septic delays might push us back four to six weeks.

It’s been a couple of months longer than that. My shop room at home is very, very full right now, with so much more fabric ordered for the next several months because I thought I would need to ramp my inventory up for a whole building by then. I’d hoped to at least have the building up by October, even if we weren’t open yet, so I’d have a place to start stocking. Instead it’s been a lot of hurry up and wait.

Finally breaking ground

But the permit came through, and we broke ground. Our builder poured the concrete footers, and then it was our turn. Because we own a construction business, my husband and I did the plumbing, electrical conduit, in-floor outlets, and radiant floor heat tubing ourselves.

Of course, it started raining right as we took over, and the site was soaked for two days. Because of course it did.

Then, on October 20, the concrete floor was poured over all of it. Everything we laid by hand is now sealed into the floor of the shop. There’s something pretty special about knowing the floor where I’ll be teaching people to quilt has our own work inside it.

Last week, the steel walls started go up. I’ll be honest: there have been more delays and frustrations along the way than I can count, and things keep slipping a week or two at a time. So I’m keeping my expectations low. My best guess for opening is January or February 2027, and I’ll keep sharing the real story, delays and all, as we go.

What I’m really building

I want to finish this series by telling you what all of this is actually for, because it’s not just building a quilt shop from scratch for a store.

I’m not saying I’m doing things differently from every other shop. But I’m doing it my way. I want Treeline Quilting to be a place where people come and gather. Sales matter, because a business has to make a profit to stay open. There’s overhead, a building to pay for, insurance, utilities, and employees whose families need to eat. But more than anything, I want a community.

There will be a comfy seating area. That’s a must. If someone just needs to come in and unload about a bad day, I want them to be able to. I think human connection is in real decline right now. Social media makes us feel like we know what’s going on with our friends and family, but we rarely see each other face to face. I want to bring that back. If someone is hurting, I want them to have a place to come with a hobby they love, and someone there who will sit with them, listen, and love on them. A place where we get to be human beings again, not just human doers.

I also really, really want to share quilting with the next generation. There’s been a wonderful upswing in people in their late teens and early 20s learning handwork: knitting, crochet, cross-stitch, embroidery, garment sewing, and quilting. Quilting has a reputation as a grandma hobby, and honestly, a lot of quilters are 65 and older. That’s fantastic. But I don’t want this craft to fade away when they’re gone. If younger people are interested, I want the door wide open for them and to be whatever style of quilting they want to do!

That goes back to why I started this blog. Almost everything on it has always been free. Ads and a few affiliate links helped pay for hosting, but the knowledge was free, and I want the shop to have that same spirit. So much of the internet now feels gatekept. You want to learn something, and someone wants to sell you a course before they’ll show you anything. I don’t want money to be the barrier that keeps someone from learning to quilt. There are ways to work around the cost of fabric. But learning to quilt needs to be shared, with the lowest barrier to entry we can possibly manage.

Maybe that sounds a little gushy. But it’s true, and it’s the heart of everything I’m building out there on Lincoln Highway.

Thank you so much for following along. I can’t wait to open the doors and welcome you in. In the meantime, follow along on social media to watch the building go up, one wet, muddy step at a time.