NJ's 10th Annual Shop Hop

About 11 years ago I had an idea to start a shop hop in NJ.  So I approached two fellow shop owners at a show and asked if they'd be interested.  They were and a new, to NJ, quilting activity was born.  Shops have come and gone - there are four of the original 11 shops left - but the fun of exploring quilting in NJ during a spring weekend remains.  We have a great time!

This year will be our 10th hop and we've chosen a garden theme - we are after all, the Garden State!  Pink is our color this year and pink charms have floated around my sewing room for months.  Sometime around Christmas, I finally conquered the charm mental block and decided to do something totally different for QP.  I knew I wanted to do a garden theme and butterflies.  Chatting with some other shop owners from around the country who were talking about 3D flowers made from ric rac, I thought I have ric rac and a need for 3D flowers, this could work.  

I used EQ and designed the background, sewed the quilt top and thought BLECH, boring.  I knew the embellishments would spice it up but I put it aside for the holidays.  Sometime around the beginning of Feb, I came across it in my to do pile . . .  YIKES, it's due this month!

I quilted it like a madwoman and started adding 3D flowers.  

Then I added 3D butterflies - some were limp, some were too stiff, pitched those and tried something else. 

 Of course I needed beads and that necessitated a bead buying trip!  Some years ago, Sandy Brawner gave me a button that said "Easily Distracted By Bright Shiny Objects", I think of her every time I play with beads.

I'm to the fun part now - playing with the embellishments.  If you look on the shop hop page and notice that it's cropped awfully close to the edges, you'll know that's because I STILL hadn't put the binding on when I sent the picture!  :0)

Till next time.

Hurry, hurry, hurry - WHY?

Reading the paper yesterday, I saw an article from a  columnist who bemoaned the fact that driving is no longer enjoyable - everyone is like a mad person.  She wondered what happened to the leisurely days of getting into your car and going for a ride to enjoy the scenery and the experience.  When, she asked, did it become "Hurry, hurry, hurry, me, me, ME!"?

Don't you feel that way sometimes? About yourself and about other people?  Do we REALLY accomplish more and do a better job when we're doing three things at the same time?  I know the driver yakking on a hand held phone is NOT doing a good job driving, of course neither is the woman yelling at the kids in the backseat or anyone texting (are they crazy or do they just have a death wish?).

Have we all bought into the thought process if we go faster, do more, we'll have more and therefore, we'll be happier?  Hmmm, how's that really working for us?  Reading the paper lately, it doesn't seem like it's going too well.

Gone are the good old days of sitting on the front porch listening to the radio for entertainment, but I'll bet I could find a lot less to do that really doesn't have to be done and I'd be able to sit on the front porch with a book more often.

So I'm going to slow down.  Leave a few minutes earlier for appointments, stop multitasking and look at what I'm doing to see if I REALLY need to do it right then.  I think my blood pressure just might go down.

How about you?  Got a front porch?

Valentine's Day

Our Valentine display.

Yes, it's almost that time - Valentine's Day.  I've been "fluffing" the Valentine's display at the shop and made up some quickie towels using ric rac.  I saw this on a blog somewhere and of course now can't find it.  It was one of those you start at one place and then click on a link, click on another link, then another, and another - and pretty soon two hours are gone, it's WAY past bedtime and you have no idea of how you got to where you are!


I do remember the blogger said that she'd bought towels like this in red and green for Christmas at Pier One maybe?  Anyway, she showed simple towels decorated with ric rac and I thought - I have towels, I have ric rak!


So it was dark and snowing last night so I knew it would be a quiet night at the shop and I could sew.  I dug out all the supplies and mentioned to Holli & Fern what I was planning and Fern suggested I use up the rest of the pre-fused hearts from the small heart wall hanging - two heads are better than one!

These are an EASY project and something you can whip up in a flash to decorate your kitchen.  Gather up a kitchen towel, some appliques if you want and some ric rac - we have ALL kinds at the shop!  Stitch the ric rac, and the appliques if you want them, onto your towels with matching thread.  That's it.  Oh yes, arrange them so you like them, then stitch!


Of course you can go crazy and add machine embroidery, or hand stitch some redwork hearts, cupids or something too.  If you want simple, quick and adorable - go with just the ric rac.


They were so easy, I made some for St. Patrick's Day in green!


Till next time - stitch something!

Book Launch

On Sunday we had a great time launching Linda Hahn's new book New York Beauties Simplified and Sara Hahn's book Dynamic Designs which has great quilting designs for the New York Beauty block.  We love a party at QP!  I have some pictures and a video.  Take a look.

Linda autographs a book

Here's Allan Hahn, Deb Stanley, Kim Mueller, Linda Eaves, me, Rebecca Szabo, Sarah and Linda Hahn.

Some of the gang who had quilts in the book.  

Every good party needs food!

Two light bulbs go out.  In the whole store where to they go out?  Right over where Linda & Sarah are signing books!

Here's a video of Linda and Sarah showing off their work.  Enjoy!

Till next time

Right now

At the moment - right this very moment - I'm all caught up.  Now I'm not saying that state of happy happenstance will last, probably not past this morning anyway!, but for right now I'm not supposed to be sewing anything, cooking anything, baking anything, calling anyone or going anywhere.

Of course there are things I COULD do, but nothing that I HAVE to do.  It's a very unusual state of mind and I'm not sure how to handle it!

So how about you - are you caught up or woefully behind?

Till next time.

New Year's Resolutions And Snow

A new year! Have you made resolutions? Kept any of them yet? Why is it we make all these promises to ourselves and then somehow by mid January they've fallen by the wayside? It's kind of like starting another quilting project before finishing the two you already have going. You know you have to finish that baby quilt for your niece but that new batik lap quilt kit was SOOOO tempting, too tempting and you bought it. (You should count your blessings it was only a kit, when I get tempted it's for a whole line of fabric!)


I don't know about where you live but here at the Jersey shore, we've had a blizzard, a dusting of snow and more snow predicted for today. At this rate, I'll be snowed in long enough to finish up everything I started. Ok, maybe not everything. 


At the moment I only have a doable number of projects started and every single one of them is either a class sample or a sample for the shop - how boring is that?  You'd think with all the fabric, tools, gadgets and patterns at my disposal, I'd at least have something off the charts going on.  Nope - such is the life of a quilt shop owner.


Ok, stashed away in a far corner of my mind are some redwork projects I'm designing.  I'm horrified to tell you one has been in the "working on it" stage for about 6 years.  I've done two samples, you'd think I'd write the pattern and finish the danged thing would you?


So that will be my New Year's resolution - besides the usual one to lose weight - I WILL finish this redwork pattern before the shop's birthday bash in June.  


What's your new year's sewing resolution going to be?  Join me and let's get some UFO's FINISHED!


Till next time.

Little Landscapes

Middle son Jeremy asked for a little landscape something like one we have here at home for his new house.  Since you can't give something like this to one without the other two complaining of favoritism, all three children received an Accidental Landscape for Christmas this year.


Landscape quilts are something I've always wanted to do and Jeremy's request pushed me into doing something a little further out of my comfort zone.  They're not perfect by any means and I was futzing with them right up until they went in the gift bags.  Even now looking at the pictures, I can see things I'd change or places I would have added something.  Thank goodness for deadlines so I had to stop playing!


They were really fun to do and had some unforeseen benefits.  In order to find the fabrics I KNEW I had in my stash, the stash had to be sorted and organized.  While doing that, I managed to clean out a bunch of "What did I buy that for?" fabrics.  Cleaning and organizing the stash took longer than designing and sewing the landscapes!

They aren't very big - 18" x 20".  Perfect for a small wall or alcove.  I wanted them to think of home when they look at theirs so I thread painted Barnegat Lighthouse into all three.  They can pretty well imagine they're looking across the bay to the lighthouse.

I didn't work off a picture, although I looked at a bunch of them to get an idea of what I wanted to do.  I think it made it easier that it was just in my head and sort of like the one we have.  It definitely came in handy when I discovered I'd missed part of the seam on the horizon of one AFTER it was quilted and had to thread paint Island Beach State Park in to seal the hole!

For once I was thrilled I had 17 different fabrics for water.  Everything but the border came from my stash.  Rule of thumb - if you see a landscape fabric, buy it.  You'll probably never find it again and when you do a landscape quilt, it will haunt you that it would have been perfect, if you'd only bought some.  I don't even want to think about how old some of the fabrics are in these!







I like to free motion quilt and the thread stash provided some good threads to add dimension. I really wanted to jazz them up with beads, some lace or something for the whitecaps but I knew my very traditional children would have balked at the "bling".  And at some point, you have to step back from these and say "Enough" - especially when they're Christmas gifts.


You too can play with landscapes.  The thoughts for these came from a great book called Accidental Landscapes.  You can purchase a copy here if you'd like to try.  They're fun!

 I have hundreds of pictures from the gardens of years past.  All patiently waiting for a landscape quilt to hang on my kitchen wall during the winter to add some color to the bleary landscape outside.  Time to get cracking on that!

Till next time.