Indenpendence Day, Buck-A-Block and Strips

We will be closed on Saturday, July 4th in observance of Independence Day. The Buck-A-Block packets may be picked up on Saturday, July 11. See you then!

We have had a a wild time last week at Quilt Country. Judy Niemeyer was here for a week and the classes were wonderful. I still think she is the best teacher I have ever seen in action. The students really enjoyed the class and many of them got quite a bit done. Judy bought several of her new patterns and quilts of her newer patterns that will not be released until August or September. The are beautiful. One of the patterns is the new Bali Wedding Star. This new pattern is really pretty with floating points on the stars. We are anxious for the new pattern to arrive. While Judy was here she hand picked sets of batiks for the arcs of the wedding ring. Of course, you can make anything with these beautiful batiks. Each set has eighty-eight 2 1/2" strips that are in eleven different color ways. They are so beautiful! The photo below is a photo of a set lined up before cutting and then arranged after cutting. We have a few left. They are just so beautiful that they are being gobbled up for lots of other projects. They are $79.95 for the set of strips.

Below are two photos taken during Judy's classes. If you are ever in a position to take a class from Judy it is a great opportunity. She has so many tips involving paper piecing and her beautiful quilts.

Joshua went to swimming lessons today, his 3rd day. I think he is doing great.

Batiks Galore and More

Quilt Country has been getting in a lot of fabric over the last few weeks. There are several pretty bright and cheery florals, the beginnings of our Christmas fabrics and 167 bolts of batiks 11 boxes, from Island Textiles. There were so many boxes the UPS truck backed up to our door! Below are photos of Joan unpacking and checking in the boxes.

Bobbie has been busy working on the displays for the Christmas area and the Christmas fabrics are beginning to arrive. We have ordered some pretty and also some fun Christmas fabrics this year. Our good friend, Sara Tuttle, has a new Christmas line with MODA. It is called Beach Birdies and they are in Santa hats. Really fun!!!

The supergirls have also been busy rearranging the shop and moving groups of fabric to better utilize the space. I think it looks great!!!

One of the things they have been making room for is an expanded line of Artgirlz items. We have new charms, kits and rubber stamps. Lots of cool stuff!

knitted tube socks, YUCK!

I knitted my first sock! I decided on a tube sock because it seemed simple and I am usually OK with tube socks. Well, the self striping yarn doesn't look nice at all in a tube sock. Below are some photos, needles still attached. I like the yarn but not the sock. I will be taking it out and knitting a reg. sock.

We had a fun Memorial Day. I met Jesse and Krissy at the gym for water aerobics which was fun. They hadn't been before and I was glad the came to see what we do. I think Krissy might start going at night. Then I brought Joshua home from the gym with me and he and Tony played in the pool and with the new water cannons. Of course, Tony had to "surprise" him by ambushing him when he walked out of the door in his suit. They had fun and then it was ribs on the grill and potato salad, etc. We celebrated Kelli's birthday with the light strawberry trifle. Yum!

Cooper and Porsche

Cooper is our new puppy. We have had him for one week and it has been very interesting. He is the first boy puppy we have ever had. There are a lot of things that are different when you have a boy instead of a girl.

Porsche really loves him and they play, fight and share the toys. He is a real cutie a while Porsche is sort of equally black and white Cooper is mostly black. He seems smart and eats like a pig. Really, I don't think he even tastes his food and when he finishes he runs over to Porsche's dish. We have to pick him up when he finishes so she can eat.

Crazy for quilting

Crazy quilting has always been one of my favorite types of quilting. Being a slightly obsessive personality I would get into one type of quilting and concentrate on that. There was the Amish phase, the crazy quilting phase the "Lucky" phase...

We have a small display in the shop of some of the crazy quilting items I have done in the past. I loved the hand work at the time but was really bad at the machine finishing. One of the first items I crazy quilted was the heart below. We had just moved to TX and of course I had to make the French knot bluebonnets. Something went wrong when I tried to make it into the heart pin. As you can see the edges are not even at all.

Did you all have the quilted collars to wear over your "granny" dresses? I loved those and wore this one a lot.

This is one for Valentines day.

Many of us at Quilt Country are interested in crazy quilting and have decided to start a crazy quilt friendship group will be meeting on the second Friday of the month. This is not a class but there will be a variety of crazy quilters with a many styles of crazy quilting and we can learn from each other. I plan to use lots of beads on mine. We have the new Alice Wilhoit crazy quilting book and it is really pretty. She uses batiks for her fabrics. I do love batiks... We also have several books using beading instead of stitching. Beads are always fun! I think there is a renewed interest in hand work whether it is applique, embroidery or crazy quilting. The only decision left is to decide on colors and fabric style for my block.