Wool Projects

Tisha's birthday was an opportunity to bring out the wool for a fun project. Tisha loves crows-not sure what draws her to them, but she is attracted to every one she sees. I saw a really cute crow pincushion in a quilt shop and I bought the Need'l Love Summer Spirit Threads book for the pattern. The pincushion calls for a glass candle holder to be used as the base, but I wanted something more prim. On a trip to an antique mall, Anne found the perfect old black wooden candlestick for me to use. 

Tisha was tickled with her gift and she named him Aiken (because we were in Aiken, SC when Anne found the candlestick).

Anne has been doing some needle felting lately--she is so talented! She made Tisha this absolutely adorable grey wool mouse for her birthday. His name is Stitch :)

Trunk Show with Jodi Barrows

What a talented woman Jodi Barrows is! On Tuesday my local quilt shop, A Scarlet Thread, had Jodi for a visit and a wonderful trunk show. She performs magic with her Square in a Square ruler. 

I asked Jodi before she started speaking if she minded if I took a few pictures of her during her talk and blogged about her. She graciously said that she did not mind at all. So, here is a little look at Jodi and her Square in a Square quilts.

                 

     Jodi is talking about "option 1" with her ruler.  

      

Jodi is demonstrating how easy it is to use the ruler.

This quilt is called All Spruced Up. The pattern is a

 free download on Jodi's website. 

This quilt is being held by Jodi's husband, Steve. 

It is called Primitive Star.

Another star quilt-this one with a Fall flair.

Even the trumpet blocks on this quilt were made with the SnS ruler.

Jodi told us all about the quilting women in her 

family-this is a picture of her great, great

grandmother, Elizabeth.

This quilt is called Missouri Compromise.

I apologize for the blur!

I have been to Jodi's website. It is filled with her books, fabrics, and rulers, but also with wonderful free videos to help you understand and use your SnS rulers. 

Jodi was a wonderful speaker-so personable and warm. If you are ever have a chance to see Jodi's quilts, don't pass on the opportunity. Her ruler is wonderful. I bought one and can't wait to make a quilt using it. Thanks, Jodi, for a fun afternoon. And thank you, A Scarlet Thread, for hosting Jodi.

Happy Quilting.

Show and Tell with Friends

One of my favorite things about getting together with my quilt friends is Show and Tell. We always remember to bring our latest projects to share. Of course, we ooh and aah and we all want to make every quilt we see! 

Our recent reunion was no exception. Pam, Anne, Karen, Tisha and I have been swapping blocks for a year and this trip was a chance for us to all be together again. I wanted to share some of the great show and tell quilts with you.

     

Pam joined the Jo's Little Women club at her local quilt shop and made the quilt on the left. The quilt on the right was a Jo Morton pattern in American Patchwork and Quilting magazine last Fall-Pam made it in Jo's fabrics too.

        

The quilt on the left is called "Across the Wide Missouri" and was made from the patterns in the Kansas City Star newspaper. Anne swapped Churn Dash blocks with a friend and made this beautiful pink and brown quilt on the right. 

Karen held her quilt so high that we can't see her face :( These T blocks were a swap that 6 of us did with each other when we went to the Houston Quilt Show in Nov 2010--Karen is the first of us to put them together, so she wins the prize! Job well done, Karen!

I love Show and Tell, but more than that--I love spending time with friends.

Happy Quilting!

The Old Country Store and Other Amish Quilt Shops

I have to confess, I LOVE FABRIC. I have a lot of it--and I mean a LOT of it. I am sure that  my shelves of fabric could be labeled as S.A.B.L.E. (Stash Accumulation Beyond Life Expectancy) and yet I buy more. I tell my husband that "collecting fabric" is a hobby completely separate and different from quilting. He should not expect me to use all of my fabric. Some of it is just too gorgeous to ever cut into it. :)

A trip to Amish quilt shops is always fun and hard to resist, no matter how much fabric you already own. My very recent trip to Lancaster County, PA yielded a few more yards for my stash. I was very good and used a lot of restraint, though. I did not buy fat quarters or even half yard pieces just to build up my stash-I stuck to shopping for borders and backings, so my purchases were two yards of this one and four yards of that one, etc!

The first two quilt shops that we went to were in Intercourse, PA. The Old Country Store was our first stop and it is always a favorite of mine. 

The shop has a wide variety of fabrics at great prices, and their book selection is awesome. I shop their website when I am at home in GA and even with shipping, their prices are still great. Upstairs is a gift shop and quilt museum. I was thrilled that there was an exhibit of Jo Morton quilts when we were there. 

I am a huge Jo fan so it was so fun to see her work in person!

And all of the Jo Morton fabric was on sale for $5.99/yard!!

Our second stop was right down the street-Zooks Fabrics. A lot of Amish women shop here, so there are a lot of solids for their clothing needs, but they also have a great selection of quilting fabric for the rest of us. Their prices were great too-I didn't see anything over $8.00/yard!

Sauder's Quilt Shop is located off the Pennsylvania turnpike in Denver, PA. It is in the basement of a house, but has thousands of bolts of fabric, lots of notions, and even carries spices, flours, and grains.  In addition to fabric, I bought four packages of batting. I am determined to finish up UFOs and if I can save money on borders, backing and batting, so much the better. EVERYTHING in the store was 20% off, so the bargains were even sweeter!

Our last stop was at Burkholder Fabrics, also in Denver. I do think that they had more bolts of fabrics than any of the other shops. The store has a great notion wall, is very well lit, and is super organized. The employees were so friendly and helpful. We were pressed for time and could have shopped a lot longer here-there was so much to see and buy. They have a great website and I am going to be buying from them in the future too. 

There are many other great quilt shops in Lancaster County, but these were the only ones we went to on this trip. I hope to go back again soon (maybe in March for the Lancaster quilt show) so that I can check out a few more. In the meantime, I need to use up some of the fabric I bought on this trip--or not. :)

A Visit from Tisha

I do realize that it has been almost a month since the last time I posted--but I think I have a pretty good reason. 

-I finished a quilt for a friend's birthday and I didn't want to blog about it because it was a surprise and I didn't want her to see it! 

-I had company for two weeks and it is hard to find time to blog when you are entertaining guests.

-I took my visiting friend on a road trip-and who wants to blog when they are on the road?

I hope these are good enough reasons for my absence. :)

My friend who came to visit is named Tisha and she lives in England. We met on an internet quilting board and fat quarters are what brought us together. I had gotten a lot of gorgeous FQs for $1.00 each and when I posted a pic and bragged about my deal, I offered to shop for anyone who wanted me to pick some up for them too. Tisha took me up on my offer and that was the beginning of our friendship. We emailed and Skyped often for several years and then decided to meet face-to-face two years ago at the Houston quilt show. After the show ended, she and a friend of hers who traveled with her, came to Georgia with me and stayed at my house for a week. Tisha came back again last year for a two week visit and this year she just couldn't stay away. Five of us had done a block swap and we decided to get together in Pennsylvania in September. Since Tisha was part of the swap, she just had to come for a trip to Amish quilt shops!

Tisha arrived on Friday evening, August 31. At 8:30 on Saturday morning we were sitting in my local quilt shop for "strip club". This was followed by shopping, lunch out, and more shopping. Sunday we went to the Braves baseball game-a first for Tisha. (The Braves won in the bottom of the 9th inning/2 outs with a 3 run homer! It was an awesome game!!) 

Tuesday we drove to South Carolina and spent the night with Anne. Wednesday the three of us traveled from SC to northern Maryland---it was a LONG day! Thursday and Friday Tisha, Anne, Pam, Karen and I shopped in some of the Amish quilt shops in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. Thursday we were joined by Diane-a quilting friend of Karen's who lives in the area (lucky girl!!)

Here we are in front of Zook's Fabrics in Intercourse, PA

This is Burkholder's Quilt Shop. It's in the middle of Amish farm land in Denver, PA

I would imagine it is hard to see the sign if the corn is too high.

Tisha's 50th birthday was the perfect opportunity for a big celebration while we were together. Karen, Anne, Pam and I had each made 3 churn dash blocks (Tisha's favorite) and I assembled and quilted a quilt for her. She was tickled to death! 

Here is Tisha with her new quilt

Tisha wanted a picture of her friends who made her quilt.

Tisha left yesterday. I was so sad to see her go.  :(  Her visits are always so hectic and way too short.  Come back soon, Tisha!

I love this Amish farmhouse with the hot air balloon flying overhead.

There are spaces for buggies in every parking lot.