Tag: Fabric

Playing with Fabric

Barsha is an artist I know who is the poster girl for creative play. This stuffed bear is a good example. His story is that Barsha saw the fabric, bought it and just had to make something right away. I think the fabric makes the bear.

We had a long discussion, similar to one that TFQ and I often have, about how people deal with their creativity. We came up with the possibility that people don’t feel free enough in their creativity (pressed for time so everything has to be perfect???) to just play and to make mistakes.

Go forth and play with your fabrics and, yes, make mistakes.

New Fabrics from the East

I returned last night from three weeks away from the computer (mostly) and some serious sightseeing. Much of the sightseeing I did was a at quilt shops, which resulted in a few pieces of new fabric.


Artful Quilter, Centreville, VA

Jinny Beyer Studio, Great Falls, VA

145 Art & Design Studio, Culpeper, VA: I really liked this place. It was on a cute, old-fashioned, walkable and homey little main street. The store had a warm feeling (I think the paint was shades of reds and oranges) with gorgeous huge crown moldings. Lots of interesting fabrics that I hadn’t see before and a wide variety of art supplies including a full complement of Tsukineko inks. Well worth a visit if you are in the neighborhood.

Quilt & Sewing Center, Fredericksburg, VA

Quilting Adventures, Richmond, VA: I have not made a secret of the fact that I am a sucker for this shop. Joyce moved a few months after I was there last and the shop looks great. It is has a cool feeling (blues and greens). I found plenty of pink there, so I don’t think there is a preponderance of blues and greens, but the shop exudes that calm feeling. The fabrics, quilts on display and other things going on (videos playing, samples of boxes, art journals and home dec to view) were really exciting. Joyce had a wonderfully inspiring Christmas tree skirt on display made from the Piece O’Cake book, Welcome to the North Pole. I may just have to make one, especially after I saw the perfect shape (roundish, but not round) at the Renwick.

Capital Quilts, Gaithersburg, MD. (first trip there): the weird brown fabric with the turquoise flowers became a tote bag. Stay tuned for a picture.

Capital Quilts, Gaithersburg, MD. (second trip there)
Pins and Needles, Frederick, MD: only fat quarters, because someone was with me dogging my heels the whole time in the shop. Bleah! Nice shop (what I got to see of it), but unpleasant shopping experience.

Various CT quilt shops

G Street Fabrics, Rockville, MD: they were having a 30% off sale, but their stock was seriously depleted.

FOTY Progress

I sat down today and sewed together all of the FOTY pieces I had cut. I had two batches from a number of sources. The one belowwas from my Memorial Day Weekend travels. The rest of the fabric was from a rip or wo to new Pieces, the fabric I bought while TFQ was here for EBHQ in April and miscellaneous online orders.

The above batch is much more cheerful than the group below.
Now I am only behind on the fabric I bought in Seattle over the weekend. At least it is washed.

PS I don’t know what is going on with the size of my photos. Ever since I got the new version of Photoshop Elements, I can’t adjust the size like I used to be able to in Photoshop Elements 3.0. I may have to breakdown and buy the book THEN go through it. I’ll work through. Thanks for your understanding.

New Online Fabrics

Some of the fabrics came from eQuilter. Once again I was annoyed to see that I already have the pink dots. Something about their site makes the fabric look different. Oh well, at least it isn’t brown. I can use the pink, but I would like to get something new for a change. The Basix dots on the bottom are just replacements for fabrics I have almost used up. I need to get back to those Pineapples.

Additional Seattle Fabrics

TFQ and I went to Angie’s AKA the Quilting Loft. We both made a beeline for the bolts of dots (upper lefthand corner above) when we saw them. Neither of us had seen them before. The mags are mostly patterns, but I am feeling the need to soak in quilt-everything. Fast and Fabulous has a fabric box that I might try to make sometime.

New fabrics

I have no Internet connection at the moment (shocking , I know), so here is a photo via cellphone of the additions to the fabric family. We spent time at Quiltworks Northwest, where the people were very friendly. There were a number of fabrics I remember from my February visit, but some new ones, too. I’ll post a better photo later. Thanks for reading.

Quilt Fabric Manufacturers

Annie of Annie’s Quilting Stash Podcast has cataloged a group of fabric manufacturers and gives links and list of designers for each manufacturer. It is a podcast from earlier this year.

clipped from simplearts.com

Program 118 – Guide to Fabric Manufacturers

podcast
Running time: 00:42:53 Size: 19.7MB

Here are the links to the manufacturers that were covered in this podcast. Just click on their name, and the link will take you right to their website! Their websites aren’t “just for Shop Owners” any longer, but have all kinds of great customer friendly links that will help you find the fabrics that you need for your quilts.

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New Stuff

I saw the cupcake fabric on the Camilla Knits blog (See also blogroll). It is right under the A in Happy. I immediately was inspired to make a bag. Who woldn’t laugh seeing someone carrying a cupcake bag around? Then, I thought it would be unprofessional. TFQ reminded me: WHO CARES??!! I bought it. I sent email, but eventually had to call Clementine’s Dry Goods to actually get the fabric in the mail. Lovely that I did, because I spoke with the most helpful/ customer service oriented person. She didn’t bat an eye when I said that I was calling about a fabric that I had seen in a picture on the Camilla Knits blog. The fabric arrived two days later (no, I didn’t pay for fast shipping) in the lovely little package the you see above with a free Kaffe dots FQ. I’ll have to go and buy stuff there more often.

I would actually like to go to the store and look around. The photos look like it is a wonderfully inviting place. I like the look of the high gloss shelves and I adore those Ladies. I hope to convince DH that I need them for the living room. You can stop laughing now.

I bought these ribbon at the EBHQ show from the Quilted Gypsy, down from the Seattle area. I love these ribbon and want to put them on a bag. I haven’t done it yet, obviously, so another thing to add to your Stay Tuned! pile.

Joyce at Quilting Adventures had a bag contest. I heard about it and sent off the French bag and the Alexander Henry bag. As TFQ predicted, the Alexander Henry bag won a judges choice prize. The prize was the above pack of three FQs (above). So nice! The QA staff got a great photo of it here. You can also see the other bags that won in QA’s Bag Contest Winners post. I am thrilled. What a shot in the arm for me doing a project series that is just kind of playing around.


My sister loves Paris. She went in April despite upcoming end of the semester papers and finals. Since she was there, I sent her to Le Rouvray and she picked out the above fabrics for me. I think they look very French apartment curtains-style.

Denyse Schmidt Returns with more Fabric

TFQ sent me a notice about this post on TrueUp saying that Denyse Schmidt is coming out with another line of fabric. This time it is home dec fabric and it looks like she is repurposing some of of her other designs. You know what? I am fine with that as I don’t think Flea Market Fancy stayed around long enough and wish it would come back.

clipped from www.trueup.net
denyseschmidt-countyfairstack

Denyse Schmidt’s County Fair line is being introduced at Quilt Market next week and will be in stores in June. In addition to favorite designs from her Flea Market Fancy and Katie Jump Rope lines, there are a couple new small-scale geometric patterns and a cheater print called “Patchwork Promenade.” All are on 54?-wide, home dec weight cotton canvas. Patchwork Promenade will make a quick and easy quilt, but that’s not its only application, as you can see below.

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Fabulous Clementine Fabrics

Camilla, of the famous Clementine’s Dry Goods, posted these picts on her blog. Don’t want a happy birthday banner like that one? I love the fabrics she has chosen for her shop and the crisp white shelves on which she stores the fabric. I want that turquoise cupcake fabric!

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Make CHEERFUL Quilts

EBHQ Show April 12-13, 2008

The East Bay Heritage Quilters held their bi-annual show last weekend at the Oakland Convention Center. The best part of the weekend was that TFQ came down to visit and go to the show with me. As usual, I took a lot of pictures. TFQ has a new camera, so her photos are included in the group, which I have added to Flickr.

The show was well hung with plenty of room to look and photograph. The lighting was excellent and while well attended, it wasn’t so crowded that we had to fight with people to see the quilts. The disappointing part of the show was the brown. The overall impression of the show was that there was a preponderance of quilts made from brown or beige or some equally depressing color. These were not the rich chocolate browns of dark chocolate, but the sad, world weary browns of a country/area that is sad.

The above quilt, by Carol Lee Blangsted, a former president of EBHQ, was probably my favorite in the show. The fabric didn’t make my heart sing, but the design was wonderful and the quilt was well executed. Ithought it was a good design for the lovely large print fabrics available now.

The shopping was ok, but there weren’t nearly enough vendors selling fabrics and there were barely any fabrics from any of the new groups that have come out recently. Their loss was Black Cat’s gain.

We spent a lot of time at Black Cat chatting and looking at the fabric. We didn’t get as much bang for our buck, but the fabric choices were fantastic.

I did buy a few fabrics at the show, and one booth, a friend of TFQ’s, had luscious ribbon (see right side of picture above). As you can see dots are still the rage in my life!

I was also on a button kick. The totes require a button and I have been at a loss to find the right ones for various projects. I stocked up at Britex on Friday and partook of one booth’s antique buttons at the show.

The above fabrics were a gift from TFQ. YAY!

Bags Return


Here are some recent fabrics that I bought from Fabric.com. The bottom fabrics are all home dec fabrics. I am going to use them to make another Eco Market Tote. I have a running list in my mind of bags I’d like to make for friends, so this is crossing the first gift off the mental list. I may have enough to make a dotty bag for myself. I had planned to use the stripe as the outside, but DH said that he thought the blue dot outside would be better, so that is what I will do.

The violet dot at the top was me attempting to replace the fabulous violet dot I got somewhere about a year ago. The color is absolutely right, but the weave (what is it with the weave thing I have going??) is really thin and the violet bleeds into the white dots.

Note to online retailers: don’t buy thin fabric and sell it as first quality quiltmaking fabric. Thanks!

Can’t Do Without the Fabric

This is what I bought at Quiltworks Northwest. I hadn’t been there in a long time and they had a TON of fabric. It was everywhere. This is where TFQ bought the bag pattern. The Quilting Loft is a new-ish store in Ballard and well worth the trip to visit. Angie, the owner, is really nice and has great taste in fabric.
This is the fabric I bought at the Quilting Loft.