Janel lives in Springfield, Missouri with her husband, two sons, and adorable dogs! Janel loves travel, mountains, and family time on the lake. She loves coffee on her porch, time with her dogs, classical music, and home improvement projects! Many of these experiences have been inspiration for her designs.

Janel started her love of sewing over 30 years ago in elementary school sewing with her mom. Over the years, her mom taught her how to make clothes, bags, upholster furniture, and many home decor items. When she was 21 years old, Janel was introduced to quilting while visiting her Aunt Carol. It was an instant love as Janel loves color, math, and truly all the steps in creating homemade gifts for others. During that weekend, she went to her aunt’s best friend’s house who owned a longarm quilting machine. Seeing the machine at work created a lifelong goal for learning the art of quilting.

As a young mom staying home with her two boys, quilting became a really therapeutic way to finish the day creating quilt blocks and sewing after her boys went to bed. Janel’s Aunt Carol always teased her that she could never just follow a pattern and always wanted to improve, change, or create her own designs. So, the dream to become a quilt pattern designer began to evolve. In 2011, Janel started her own company designing quilt patterns called Nite Owl Quilting (www.niteowlquilting.com). She considers her style modern quilting with traditional charm! Janel’s patterns and quilts have been displayed in International Quilt Market booths with Robert Kaufman fabrics, Stof Fabrics, Maywood Studios fabrics, Checker Distributors, Brewer Sewing
Supplies, and E.E. Schenck. My Sunrise Stag pattern was featured in several issues of the Keepsake Quilting catalog. My It is Well quilted wall art pattern was featured in several issues of the Nancy’s Notions catalog. She now has over 25 published patterns with several more on the way!

In 2015, Janel decided to go back to school to get her teaching degree. In 2016, she began working as a Family Consumer Science Teacher at a local high school teaching primarily sewing and interior design courses. Her love for teaching others sewing and design grew the program and provided an opportunity to write curriculum for the largest school district in the state of Missouri. She has provided high quality curriculum aligning courses with industry standards for Fashion & Interior Design 1, Fashion Design 2, Interior Design 2, Fashion &
Interior Design 3, Exploratory FCS, and Career Development & Entrepreneurship courses. She has been teaching over 100 high school students how to sew every year! As a high school teacher, Janel received an award for the Best Practices in the state of Missouri for running sewing labs after presenting at the Missouri Educators of Family and Consumer Sciences (MoEFACS) Summer Conference in 2019. She has also coached students to receive Gold at FCCLA State competition for Interior Design, Gold at FCCLA State competition for Fashion Construction, and has a student competing for Fashion Construction at the National FCCLA competition during the summer of 2023.

In 2019, Janel completed her Master of Arts in Teaching degree for Family Consumer Sciences. Janel is an avid learner, takes online classes, watches tutorials online, and attends classes every year at International Quilt Market or Festival to continue growing as an artist.

In 2021, Janel began teaching for online retreats through Rebecca Page. She has taught for the Quilting Summit 2021, Quilting Summit 2022, Holiday Crafts Summit 2022, and an upcoming Quilting 101 in 2023. She has loved creating these online courses for quilters and is ready to pursue more time teaching others quilting! She is ready and so happy to share her love of sewing with you! She is excited to shift from teaching high school to focusing on sharing her passion of quilting through patterns, tutorials, and classes!