Visiting Sweet Home

It's been a challenging winter. Yesterday, I finally made a road trip to my favorite quilt shop, Sweet Home in Conyers, GA. It was in December, the last time I had visited any quilt shop. It was pure pleasure visiting Melisa and Mike, owners of the shop and visiting with quilting buddies, Karin and Cindi. Even Pat of Silver Thimble fame was there teaching a class for beginner quilters. I love neutral fabrics. The entrance of the shop had several projects in neutral fabrics including Pat's White Chocolate design and her neutral body pillow design, Wrapped in Comfort. I'm working on a king size White Chocolate. I actually expected to have it finished by now :)
"Moda Man" even made it to the shop. He has a special pocket in Karin's "Bad Melisa" bag. He "deactivated" the head-gear that protected us from the "gotta buy this Moda fabric" airwaves.I picked up a charm pack and yard of the new Boutique line to make a tote bag for a gift. I'm also cutting two new projects. I needed more tone-on-tone black fabric to make Pat's Scrappy Nine quilt. I also need more white with black prints.
This motto, "Live Well... Laugh Often...Love Much" is in the entrance/foyer of the shop. Those vibes were vibrating at Sweet Home!Karin had completed piecing her Sixteen Patches and Pinwheels that several of us participated in trading strips. Gorgeous! Can't wait to piece my top.

To Buzz or Not To Buzz

Saturday was our County Reader's Rally. Our school system is huge with over 100 schools. Over 80 schools sent teams to compete in the "Rally." Our school team has been preparing since last May. Our fourth and fifth grade students read 20 books from a list of specific books and have been practicing questions from the books to prepare for the Rally. The competition was fierce in our division. We did win our Division and participated in the Quarter-Finals. Our kids did a fabulous job in that round and will compete in the Final Four on Thursday. The competition will be taped and aired on the School System television channel. This group of students have been a joy. Several were on our team last year. My favorite part of the competition day is spending time with the families. Moms, Dads, Grandparents, younger siblings, teachers, our administrators were all their to encourage our students. Keep your fingers crossed for us as we prepare for our competition on Thursday!

Silver Thimble Saturday Sewing

Today was our monthly Silver Thimble Quilt Company sewing day in Grayson, GA. What a fun day with lots of laughter, talking, show and tell, birthday celebration and sewing! A group of us (me, Kristie, Cindi, Karin and Gretchen) participated in a fabric swap using Civil War reproduction fabrics. We cut strips to make our version of Patches and Pinwheels from Bonnie Hunter's website. Here we are after or exchange of fabric except for Brenda who sewed with the Friday evening group. The fabrics from this exchange are sensational. This will be another stunning quilt.

We had lots of completed tops for Show-N-Tell. Enjoy this parade of awesome quilts!

Karin's stunning version of Carolina Crossing, a Bonnie Hunter mystery.

Gretchen's festive Mardi Gras version of Bonnie Hunter's Orange Crush mystery quilt.
Gretchen's quilt for her first neice/nephew. This is the first of many from Auntie Gretchen.
I'm not a cat person, but Pat's batik cat quilt from Quiltmaker's Favorites was magnificent.
Kristie's quilt using the Hunter Star Ruler and the Rouenneries fabric line by French General was the quilt I wanted to hide in my bags and take home. This is one gorgeous quilt.
Carla used the Hunter Star Ruler for this festive tablerunner.
Sue's Strawberry Pie for her husband incorporated great fabric even some purchased on a trip to Alaska last Summer.
Sandy's black and tan version of Scrappy Nines was another quilt I wanted to stow-away in my luggage.

Mary Agnes' blue and red version of Scrappy Nines was also a great showing. MA changed the borders from the pattern. How nicely this feature enhanced her quilt.

Thanks Pat and Sir Quilt Dude for a wonderful, fun-filled day! How blessed we are to have you working to build our quilting community!

Cutting Fabric for a Swap

(Photo of quilt from Quiltville.com)

One of my favorite things about sewing is cutting fabric. The past two days, I was able to indulge this weakness. My "mini" sewing group trades fabric strips for a chosen project. Last year, we traded "bricks" to make the Bricks & Stepping Stones quilt from Bonnie Hunter's website, Quiltville.com. I'm still working on that top. In fact, I pinned some of the rows together this afternoon to sew the rows together during the week or next weekend at our Silver Thimble sewing day. Our next swap or trade is for a quilt that I've been collecting fabric and wanting to make for over a year, Patches & Pinwheels from the Quiltville site. I first saw a similar quilt in an old quilt book and knew that I had to make this quilt.

Our swap master is Kristie from M.S. Doolitte Quilter. Kristie has a brillant, mathematical mind (among many other talents) She organizes all aspects of our swap and we just have to follow her printed directions. We chose to make this quilt in Civil War reproduction fabrics. Now all of us have fabric in our stash, but we had to immediately purchase additional fabric from Sweet Home, where we were sewing when we plotted this swap.

I used my June Taylor Short Cut ruler to do the cutting for this swap. The directions we used were for Fat Quarters so the ruler was a good size. I cut my 2 inch dark and light fabric strips yesterday. Today, I cut the 4 inch strips then subcut the strips using the Short Cut ruler into 4 inch squares. I have the fabric packaged and ready for our trade next weekend. I'm excited to see what fabric the others have chosen for this new quilting project. I can barely wait to begin this new quilt, my first new project for 2010.