Quilting Adventures ~ The Friendly Store for Everyone Who Creates With Fabric!

Before I show you all the beautiful things people have been making, I wanted to be sure to tell you that the Halloween fabric is on sale for 40% off!  Even if you don’t have time to make things for this Halloween it’s a great time to add to your stash!! Our Halloween table runner kits and pillowcase kits are 30% off – they sew up really quick so I bet if you came today you’d have a festive table runner or pillowcase for Saturday!  Also, our Market Fat Quarters are 20% off!

It’s that time again!   Y’all have been so busy, it’s hard to keep up!

Bobby S. showed us two quilts that she’s been working on.  The first one is a very pretty Asian sampler block.

Bobby’s second one is a beautiful quilt made from the Medocino line.  The wood grain windows are so fun! She even planned the back to make a pretty scene.

We have a “Dear Jane” group that meets at the shop once a month.  This is a brightly colored variation by Judy M.  – I guess we could call it “Dear Jane Goes Halloween Trick or Treating!”

Judy M. also made this next quilt in Joyce’s Summertime Mystery Club. It has a lot of dimension!

Pam S. sent us a picture of a baby quilt she made from Animal Party.  The bright colors are perfect for a little one.

Nina H. used up some of her red and black stash to make this quilt top based on the “Turning Twenty” pattern.  Red and black are so striking together!

Folks are getting ready for the holidays – including Michelle S. who made a beautiful Christmas tree skirt using the wedge ruler. She finished up this project after taking Cheryl’s tree skirt class last year!

Renee R. made her soft flannel Christmas Tree Skirt during Cheryl’s class this fall.

The next photo shows little Lily B. wearing pants made from Michael Miller corduroy. Her mom found them already made up on her vacation to the Northwest area.

Lastly (for now) Jennifer K.  made the “New Girl Bag” in our Flutterby fabric – very cute!

Keep up all the great work and thank you for showing us your finished projects!

~Kristal

It’s time to tell you about this week’s demo.  I love all of the Marti Michell templates but the 2 1/2″ strippers templates are my favorite!

They are designed to work perfectly with the pre-cut 2 1/2″ jelly roll strips!  With just three templates you can cut seven different shapes.  And from those shapes you can make a ton of different blocks!  One of the other benefits of these templates is that it will help you get perfect, non-bulky seams!

LeMoyne Stars…

Hexagons for using in things like “Grandmothers Garden”…

Shapes for different 3D blocks…

And sooo much more!  Come check out the demo Thursday at 5:30 pm or Saturday at 11 am or 2 pm (or whenever we’re not too busy to show you)!

~Kristal

Before I get to all the great classes we have going on, I wanted to remind you that tomorrow (Tuesday) and Wednesday are “Finish the Bolt” days.  If you buy everything left on any bolt, you’ll get 25% off the material!

We have a lot of classes on the calendar!

The Stack ‘N Whack LeMoyne Star class with Laura starts Wednesday (10/28) at 5:30 and then continues on Saturday (10/31) at 10 am.  This quilt would look great in so many different fabrics!  We only have a couple spots left (don’t forget that you can sign up online)!

Joyce is teaching her Bosa Nova Bag class on Wednesday evening as well (just 6-8 pm).  It’s always fun to have a different way to package those holiday presents!  And there’s also an option to make a bag that would hold a nice bottle of wine – always a good present in my opinion!

Kirsten’s teaching a class about making the cutest baby booties - these would be a perfect present for that new mama in your life!  The class is this Thursday evening from 6-8 pm and only costs $15!

For all the folks out there that want to figure out that machine that has been sitting in the closet for  too long, Joyce is teaching “Get to Know Your Sewing Machine” Friday evening (10/30) from 6-8 pm.  She’ll get you sewing on your machine before you know it!

Jonathan’s teaching a great class during the day on Saturday (10-1) called Window Treatments 101!  You’ll make a practice curtain and Jonathan will teach you everything you need to know to go home and make custom curtains for yourself!

Lastly, Pat Sloan’s Saturday class is full but there are still a few spaces in her Sunday class (10 am – 5 pm)!  We are so excited to have her here and her Wild and Free Applique class is going to be great!  It’s also a great class for using your stash – she actually WANTS you to bring a laundry basket of fabric!  Then she’ll walk you through color and design theory to make a beautiful quilt (you can pick between three of her patterns)!  This one is “Slice of Summer”.

We hope you check out all of these class options!  I always find that I get a lot done when I actually take a class and get out of the house (away from the chores)!

Til next time,

Kristal

Hi everybody,

I’m writing in to let you know about our free demo this week.  We’re going to show you how to use Thangles -  the wonderful product that will help you make perfect half-square triangles!  I truly used to be scared of half-square triangles until I used these!

Also, when you come to the demo you’ll get a free tree skirt pattern.  I’ve never claimed to be a good photographer – it’s much prettier in person!

Lastly, Thangles are used in ‘Scrap Mania’.  And just so you know, all Scrap Mania kits are now 30% off!!!

We hope you come visit us for the demo either Thursday at 5:30 pm or Saturday at 11 & 2 (or whenver we’re not too busy to show you!)!

~Kristal

We’ve been bad about blog posts since getting back from Market – we’re all just kind of spinning in circles playing catch-up!  But we’ll try to get back on track this week. 

I’ve started working on the year-end fabric inventory a little earlier this year because of the impending move, and there are lots of fabric that I’d rather sell than move.  So on Saturday, MaryT went through and marked down all the fabrics that were already on clearance – some are as low as 70% off now! – and today I pulled so many more that they’re piled all on the floor!  Not a good thing at all.  So please come in and do your part to help us move by taking home some of these fabrics! 

We also have a bunch of  “bargain backings” on special – 6 yards for $24.99.  You do the math – it’s an AMAZING value for high-quality cotton fabric for quilt backings.  If none of them suit, there are lots of big enough bolts on the clearance rack to pick up some great backings for a song.  And there are clearance patterns and magazines as low as $2, books as low as $8.

And there will be more!  Stay tuned….

~Joyce

PS  Go Phillies!  Yes, if we go all the way again this year, we *will* have another World Series sale! 

We made it back to Richmond in (relatively) one piece.  I’m finally going through the pictures today, along with all of my mental notes to try and show you the last bit of what we saw, as well as what we’ve ordered.

To give you an idea of what to expect in the next two weeks to six months, here’s some of what we ordered.

• My Happy Garden by Cloud9 Fabrics -  A new company that specializes in organic cotton quilting fabric.
• A new kind of fabric paint by Liquitex that they’re marketing with C & T Publishing.
• Lots of fun new embroidery patterns and books
• Some new Melly and Me stuffed animal patterns
• We looked at some new thread!  We’re not sure which one we like best yet, but we’ve got it narrowed down….
• Some cool new patterns for making floor cloths.
• MORE FLOWER FAIRIES.  They’re pink and green.  I can’t remember any of the flowers, but there’s more. 

Here’s some pictures from our last day at Market.  These first ones are from the Melly and Me booth, including some of their new patterns!

This is the Michael Miller booth.  They had a teardrop trailer in their booth!  Sorry if the pictures are a little iffy….  Oh, and if you see any of the gnomes, we ordered them!

Pictures from Patty Young’s booth including some with her new line, Flora and Fauna.  We ordered some of it, but not all the colorways.  I think mom bought the black and white with green and pink..

Here’s a quick picture from Paula Prass’s booth, with her new line.

Sandi Henderson’s booth was wonderfully decorated in her new line as well.

TA DA!  We actually didn’t order too much fabric this year at Market.  Our fabric reps should ALL be showing up in the next two weeks, so we will be doing all of our ordering then.

Stay tuned to see all the awesome fabrics we’ve received so far this month..

~Phoebe

We are having a great time at Market this year!  But I’m feeling ready to come home soon, if for no other reason than to get warm.  Sounds crazy, I know – but true.

We’ve been so busy having fun that we’ve done a BAD job of taking pictures.  So here’s a few of some of our favorite booths.

First up is Angela and her sweet new hubby from Bunny’s Designs:

Two photos of Heather Bailey’s booth, featuring her new fabric and patterns:

Here’s Anna Maria Horner’s booth – we got to see her adorable baby boy tonight after dinner, and he is just so CUTE!

Can you believe we ordered a Christmas line for *next year* today?

Okay, I know this is a kinda lame blog entry, but there’s a baseball game calling my name.  If we post tomorrow, it will only be if there’s free internet at the airport.  We do Market in the morning and early afternoon, then we’re headed home!  First order of business in the morning – Michael Miller Flower Fairies (and gnomes!). 

~Joyce

Today was the first official day of Quilt Market.  We’re tired.    We had a party to go to tonight, but Phoebe has an English paper to write and I wanted to see the Phillies STOMP the Rockies; it wasn’t until we got back to our room that we learned that the game was postponed because it’s too cold.  Why they seem to think that playing a game in Denver after dark in October makes sense is beyond me, but it does mean that you’ll get today’s blog entry earlier. 

We didn’t take too many pictures today.  In fact, all of the photos are from the Red Rooster booth.  Our teacher Laura Blanchard designs quilts for Red Rooster Fabrics, so we always take pictures of her quilts hanging at Market.  And our employees  Betty and Mary both sew for Red Rooster, too – so here’s all their show and tell!

Here’s a Cat and Mouse that Mary made:

This is Laura, working the Red Rooster book, sitting in front of a quilt she designed from the new Ricky Tims fabric:

Two views of the chair covers that Betty made:

Here are some pillows and a table runner (we have the pattern!) that Betty made:

Here’s a Christmas table runner that Laura made – this is NEXT year’s holiday fabric!

Some Christmas stockings and a tote that Mary made from the same fabric line:

Another quilt that Laura designed, this one from the Sew It Book line of fabric (that we have on order):

Another Laura quilt design, from the Stitch in Time fabric line:

So, what else did we do today?  We walked and walked and walked, 21 aisles of booths of fabric, patterns, notions, etc.  We got some wonderful patterns from Melanie Herlston and Rosalie Quinlan of Mellie and Me (and some great ideas, too), some books (and more patterns to come) from Annie Downs of Hatched and Patched (another Australian designer).  We looked at wool and bamboo/wool felt and new threads.  We ordered 100% ORGANIC fabric from Cloud 9 – it’s not going to be inexpensive, but it’s beautiful and feels delicious!  We ordered some patterns from Rob Appell.  We got some great ideas for our New Years Day Celebration as well as a special event we have in the works for Valentine’s Day.  We visited with lots of friends, old and not-so-old.  Dinner at a new Mexican restaurant that had the best salsa I’ve had outside of Su Casa (and good sangria, too).

So, we’ll try to do a better job of taking pictures tomorrow. 

~Joyce

PS  It is no longer HOT in Houston!

Well, we were almost to the convention center this morning, and running late, before we realized that mom had left the camera in the hotel room.  So I’ll just have to tell you about some of the awesome things we saw.

• Great presentations and new lines from Michael Miller, including Sandi Henderson, Paula Prass, and Patty Young, as well as the new Flower Fairies.
• New Free Spirit/Westminster lines including new Heather Bailey, Jenean Morrison, Jane Sassaman, and little bits of Tina Givens and Anna Maria Horner’s new lines.
• Jane Davila, one of the authors of Art Quilt workbook, who has new line of paints and inks
• New Free Spirit – Terri Mangat
• Pamela Mostek – mom saw something, not sure what….

After the morning and afternoon presentations, mom and I headed off to the Fabric 2.0 party.  Lots of fun, still no pictures!  My friend Mary at Confessions of A Craft Addict said she would try and send me pictures from the party.  We got a chance to hang out with Jane Sassaman, Patty Young, Jay McCarroll, Luana Rubin (owner of equilter.com), Lizzy House, Bari J…… And some other great people that I know I’m forgetting names of.  It was hosted by Caroline Devoy of JCarolineCreative.

Last, but not least, we went to sample spree.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t carry it all back to take a picture, but here is a small sampling of what we got.  Some of Rosalie Quilan’s  patterns (half of the Melly and Me duo), her two books, some fabric, including some Japanese prints and the new Hoffman Challenge!  It’s the pretty blue stuff, and I’m really excited about it.  Also is some cute slippers from a new pattern by The Quilted Fish.

That’s our day so far!  We were on our feet from about 9 AM to 10PM, and we haven’t even hit the show floor yet!  Tomorrow is walking, walking, walking, and then I’ll run back to the room to finish my five page English paper. 

~Phoebe

You knew it was coming.  By now, Joyce and Phoebe are winging away to Houston to have lots of fun and bring us lots of new goodies.  Poor Pattie is stuck at home minding the shop.  Well, that means it’s time for the ever popular Pattie’s in Charge Sale!

Here it is, minimum one yard cuts please:

All Garment Fabrics, including the rayon batiks – 20% off
All Flannel – 20% off
All Holiday fabrics – 20% off
All Thirties Prints – 20% off
All Home Dec fabrics – 20% off
and finally, all clearance fabric will be at least 40% off this weekend!

This sale will run until the end of the day on Monday.  The boss lady should be back by Tuesday.

I do also get to annouce a general sale on all Mettler Poly Sheen threads! 25% off until the end of October!