Baby Lock Tech

I'm at the Baby Lock dealer convention in St. Louis - this is the veiw of the arch from our hotel window. The arch is a National Park with a great museaum underground that stretches from one base to the other. If you're ever in St. Louis - go up in the Arch!

Here are some pictures from the past couple of days.

This is the new Sashiko machine - very cool. Here are a couple of samples the educators have done with it.

A pretty top for a little girl's dress!

And a cute top for a play suit. Sashiko is everywhere here!

There are also new sergers where you thread ALL of the looper threads, push ONE button and all the loopers thread at once! I have that class tonight.

Jim took the class for the new Jewell software - VERY neat.

Today I took a class Eileen Roche - the editor of Creative Embroidery Magazine - did you know she grew up in Wildwood? I'm trying to talk her into a visit east to see the family and teach for us. Stay tuned! Here's my project from class today - stipple & applique in the Magna Quilt Hoop - all in one step!

Debbie

What's On Your Design Wall?

I was reading my friend Karen Montgomery's blog yesterday & laughed when I saw her "messy" sewing space - she should come here & see mine! Karen has more than a couple of projects going on & the state of her design wall reflects that - just like mine. I think creative people get borded easily & that's why we always have at least two, maybe three & possibly many more projects in various stages strewn all over our sewing areas. I am telling you here & now, I won't admit to how many I have going on at any given point in time.




This is what my design wall looks like today. The red & white quilt is coming along while I work out the pattern. I bought three bolts of the white print & two bolts of the red print to do another project & then of course, didn't do it . . . Now what to do with the five bolts of fabric giving me the guilts everytime I walk by them in the back room? I'm calling this Necessary Peppermints - because it was necessary to do SOMETHING WITH THE FIVE BOLTS OF FABRIC IN THE BACK ROOM. I am sure everyone of my staff will wrinkle their noses at that name & it will be shortened to just Peppermints. It will be a lap quilt for Chrismas.

See the blocks to the right? That's what happens when you don't pay attention to what you're doing & you not only cut the pieces opposite of what they're supposed to be, but you sew them together wrong. I haven't come up with a name yet for the quilt I'm able to make out of those "mistakes"! I do however, see a baby quilt from that setting in the near future - stay tuned.










The baby quilt on the right is a pattern my friend Kris from Cozy Cottage told me about. We're over run with baby flannels & I needed a new sample. It was easy & came out cute! We're cutting kits so look for it on the website in a couple of days - I still have to quilt it & do the dreaded binding.















The bargello on the bottom left in the first picture is one of those things that seemed like it was going to be great when it was in my head, then I read the size in the pattern & thought, I don't want a lap quilt, I want a wallhanging! Now of course it doesn't look like I thought it would - 1/3 of it is folded under but I'm still not happy with it. I'm thinking it needs lots of embellishing . . . . Don't look for a kit soon! :0)

So what's on your design wall?

More On The Wacky World of Retail

It's August. It's August at the Jersey Shore and it's HOT! Very normal here for this time of year. (The wind shears, wind storms and almost tornadoes are not so normal & I really hope they go away soon!) So what I am sewing and thinking about? Beachy themed samples and displays? Nope, those are about to come down! I've moved onto Fall, Halloween and CHRISTMAS samples and displays!

Let's face it, summer clothes are on sale in all the stores and winter coats are coming out. That to me is a little ridiculous - do I really want to think about a winter coat when it's 95 degrees outside? Now if I need a pair of shorts to go to a barbecue next weekend, am I going to be able to find any? NO! I should have thought of what I wanted to wear to this barbecue in APRIL when they had shorts for sale and planned accordingly - not that I knew anything about this barbecue back then mind you . . .

In the quilt shop world and in the quilter's world - if we want something for Halloween, we have to start thinking about it in August because it just might take us that long to make it. Therefore - Halloween displays are going up in quilt shops all over the country now and not in October. (I wish someone in clothing retail would really sit down and think about when we need a winter coat and adjust their marketing schedule accordingly!)

So, I'm sewing fall samples & thinking about Christmas displays. (I can't actually bring myself to SET UP the Christmas display yet, but I'm thinking about it!) I'm sewing fall samples and admit to having already sewn a couple of Christmas samples. I keep telling myself that sewing projects for cooler weather tricks the mind into actually thinking it's cooler outside - not working yet, but I'm still testing the theory.

Store Happenings

I've been rearranging the store a bit & putting up some new displays. It was 85 and muggy when I was doing the new Halloween/fall display!

We're working kitting on a pumpkin applique, hour glass block kit for a magazine. I'm doing the piecing & Judy's doing the applique for the sample and she's waiting VERY impatiently for me to finish piecing the center so she can start the applique on the borders! I'll post a picture of the finished project, which hopefully will be soon. It will go out on the bed in the lobby - but not for awhile since I'm not ready to look at Fall decor yet!

I've also put off putting up a Christmas display. I don't mind looking at it now but if I have to still be looking at it in November . . . . Here's some samples of kits we've got ready so far.

Lori did the Christmas stitchery and the penguin stocking. I did the tree skirts. The actual sample of the one on the right isn't cut into a tree skirt yet and as you can tell, neither is the tree skirt on the right. Why is it I can't bring myself to cut into them & make them actual tree skirts???

National Parks Adventures - part two

One of the most amazing things about our national parks is the scenery would rival gorgeous scenery anywhere. After a couple of days you almost, but not quite, became immune to it. GORGEOUS views of mountains, lakes, pastures, rivers, streams and wildflowers EVERYWHERE!

Yellowstone National Park not only has the honor of being the first national park, the largest national park - it's also one of the most gorgeous. And having been to Switzerland twice - thank you Bernina! - I can honestly say, the Grand Tetons rival the Alps in beauty. Take a gander at some of these gorgeous pictures.

Ok, I forget - this is either the Yellowstone River or Snake River . . . . either one - it was gorgeous. I kept waiting for John Wayne to ride out into the open! We did see a moose further down this river, of course I left my camera in the car!

This is Yellowstone Canyon. We watched a bald eagle hunting for it's lunch here.

Yes we saw Old Faithful - four times in one day as a matter of fact. I'm ashamed to say that after the second time, we didn't pay much attention to it. And I realize that geysers are a geological minor miracle but I didn't particulary like geology in college . . . Old Faithful was gorgeous the first two times though!

We kept crossing the Continental Divide. From Bayville, NJ at sea level to 8391 feet above sea level was quite a trip!

If you look closely, you can just see the Rainbow at the bottom left of the waterfall.

One of the stranger wildlife forms we encountered! This is actually Tim, Esther's husband take a break above the falls.

The amount of water rushing by was mind boggling.

Next time I'll post pictures of the Grand Tetons.

National Parks Adventures - part one

Jim & I decided to spend our thirtieth wedding anniversary in Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks. Two of his sisters and their husbands, Mary & Jim & Esther & Tim, went with us on the 6 day journey. We saw LOTS of animals and LOTS of geysers - animals I'd love to see more, geysers - hmmm, I think I've seen my fill!

Here are some pics of our animal sightings. Some were close:

These bison owned the road.

See the shadow of the first bison in the picture on the right? It walked right by my window after I hurriedly rolled it up. I'm not sure what good I thought that piece of safety glass was going to do - but it was better than the bisons horn being 6" from my face with NOTHING in between us! I was concentrating on getting the window rolled up so I missed the shot of it up close and personal - but that was ok with me!

This bison was close enough but then it decided to join us on the elevated walkway. Once again I was too freaked out to take an up close & personal picture . . . . but as my brother-in-law Tim said, I've seen the back end of a bison closer than I ever needed to!

This black bear was close enough. I was in the car. I don't have pictures of the young grizzly we saw about 10 feet away, I, unlike my husband, showed great intelligence and stayed in the car, while he and our brother-in-law Jim, jumped out to see it closer. Nope, the glimpse I got of it that close was close enough for me!

Riding around early a few mornings later, I saw what I thought was a roll of hay on the hillside and then I thought - wait a minute, that's the side of a mountain, they don't hay there. So I yelled to driver Jim Antos to stop and got out to look. Yup, the "hay roll" was really the back end of a huge grizzly. We were definitely as close to him as I wanted to get!

And then there were these strange animals - we think they were called Harley Americanus. They were sometimes single but most times in packs. Very strange with colorful dress! These animals were everywhere & seemed to be having the time of their lives. The six of us were happy in our Suburban not having to fend off bugs, wind, and most importantly - bears, bison, elk & anything else with four legs!

We did heed all the signs . . . .

Happy Independence Day!