Past Moda Challenge

A few years ago Moda had a challenge; they created 6 -8 fairly awful fabrics that had to be used in one project. I was completely hooked and spend months purchasing FQs of all of the great Moda fabric of the day. I eventually made 3 quilts for the challenge and I love them all. This quilt is one of my all time favorites. I used a large snail trail pattern but I created it using hundreds of small patches in light and dark fabrics.


Earlier this year I asked my mom, who seems to have my very best quilts, if I could have it back. I wanted to create more quilts using the same idea and charms (charms did not exist when I made this quilt). Well, at Christmas we can up and I walked into Mom's great room and realized that the quilt would never come home with me. My step dad had made an amazing quilt rack to hang the quilt and I was proud to see it up and to see that it hung square and straight.

Oh well, when I was up this weekend I snapped a shot of it so I could share it with the Moda folks next month when I head over to Dallas for the Moda U retreat.

New Books from Lark

Oh thank all powers for Lark Books, they create some of the greatest craft books. I don't purchase a lot of books for the store but I personally wanted these books. They are chock full of great ideas for holiday gift giving. These books are a great gift idea but the projects are even better.

Last night the girls and I went to get some much needed Thai food and while we waited for our carry out we sat on the steps and put sticky noted on all the projects we want to make. Needless to say the books have a lot of pink, green and blue post it notes in them.

I am particularly fond of the pretty little series and can't wait to start making projects from those great books; Pretty Little Patchwork,PL Pot Holders, PL Purses & PL Pincushions (four books in all).


My daughters love Invasion of the Plush Monsters, I think they marked every page.

New Patterns from Melly & Me

Well, I am automatic order with the folks in Upper Ferntree Gully and there are new patterns in from Melly and her sister Rosalie Quinlan. Introducing Petunia, Dudley, Florance, Blossom the butterfly and a new purse pattern Flower Garden. We also added one of their quilt patterns Billie, which I am making a sample of using Malibu Monkey.
From Rosalie we have 6 of her beautiful primitive dolls and her new book called Gifts which is perfect for those of you starting your holiday gift making. Proceeds from her book support Breast Cancer Research, she is a surviver.

Surfing Santa Shirt

Mrs. Claus' created this cool shirt for her Santa using Timeless Treasure material Surfing Santa. Just a hint of what Santa can do: swim with the dolphins, lay on the beach, ride a wave, all in the name of summer fun.

Nancy used McCall's pattern 2149.
Thanks for sharing your Santa with us.

Super Sale @ Meadowgrove

This post is a bit late as the Sew Spring Sale was earlier this spring, but I wanted to share the beautiful location the we rent for our Fall and Spring Sales. The sales are a great opportunity to stock up on $4.00 quilt fabrics and to actually get to touch the fabric. The sales are are scheduled the last weekend of October & March. If you are local to the Atlanta area and want to keep up with our sales and such be sure to mark the "local only" newsletter option when you sign up to get our Newsletter.

One Zipper - Lots of Bags

I am on summer holiday right now and I have BIG PLANS, I tell you, BIG PLANS!

None of which have anything to do with what I have been sewing for the past three days. I went to Gail K last week with the wild idea that I would show folks how to put in a zipper as part of my skill demo at the QSA. Well, it would help if I had a pattern ready and did not decide to teach zippers the day before I left. Another small difficulty is the machine I bring to shows, love it but don't have a zipper foot for it.

I had to scratch the zipper idea but it was gnawing at me so I picked it right back up when I got home. I have made about 15 different bags and may have finally figured out which on I like the best, which is good since I have about 40 more zippers to use up. I promise to post a picture of the winning bag and some instructions when I have a winning bag.

Meadow Bag - Melly & Me

Meadow is the newest bag from the sister team Melly & Me. I love the hip young look of all of their projects and this purse looks GOOD and it is easy to make, only taking about an hour. BUT where are the pockets. Whenever I make a sample for the store I follow the directions without modification but on this one I will certainly add some internal pockets or maybe just a Porta Pocket to my next version. The bag was super popular this past weekend at the Alabama Quilting Symposium, silly me I forgot to bring the Jitterbug fabric. I would have sold a bunch of it.

Dressforms by Michael Miller

Dressforms
Michael Miller

This graphic black and white pattern of vintage dress forms was uber popular last year. I ordered more in October but it was out of stock, MIchael Miller finally reprinted it and here it is!

Kaufman Night and Day

A striking black and white collection with a great selection of positive and negative prints and a variety of scales and styles.

Peace on Earth from Moda

I can smell a traditional Olde Tyme Christmas in our future. Peace on Earth from Moda hits all of the right spots. It even HAS spots... er, okay DOTS! Dots, stripes, holly, evergreen, berries and to really bring the spirit of Peace on Earth, we even see old world maps for the truly global Christmas. I can see a holiday tables set with hand made cloth napkins and table runners. Or couple of new stockings for those extra guests or last minute gifts.

Berries and maps make great shopping totes and gift bags too. Where to start? At the Some Art Fabric Christmas Shop of course!

This pattern book is a great resource for all of these ideas. Happy Hour contains super simple quilts, a tote bag, table runner, and pillow.

Sewing Your Own Bra

Sunday I took an amazing class with world class sewing teacher Anne St Claire, she owns Needle Nook Sewing. On Friday we all trooped in to be measured and fitted for our very own custom support system. My bra issues were limited, I don't really own any real ones, as I am just now throwing away my nursing bras.

I struggled through and finished my first every bra, ( 8 hours) it was no where near as complicated as I thought it would be but I don't really like the flimsy, slidey tricot and it did not like my cute little travel machine. There are a lot of steps to make a properly supportive garment and my new bra is very perky but I don't like the underwire even if it makes for a better look.

One of Anne's entourage, Deb, made a bra using standard quilt cotton and I am kinda excited about that. I have a piece of fabric from Moda's new line Fresh Squeezed, (I know it was my hubby's idea) in the wash right now. I need to make a second bra before I forget everything I learned yesterday.

Well here is the finished BRA. I did not use underwire in this one because the one I made yesterday feels like it is digging into my arm pits and my chest. Even with the same pattern these bras are vastly different. The woven cotton one has some weird issues, like the puckers on the seam and a bit of a compressed breast tissue, but the bra is comfortable, more of a house bra than and out and about bra. The second bra only took about 3 hours. I don't think I am going into the lingerie business but I will pursue making bras.

Fat Quarters - Survey...

New Ideas at SAF

Fat quarters! So popular at our vending events -- we are going to offer them in limited quantities in our newest lines.

Please help us meet your online sewing needs by completing this very short survey at the following link.

Some Art Fabric Fat Quarters Inquiry

Indie Craft Experience 08

I had a super cool crafter day. We went to the Lucky # 7 Indie Craft Experience at Centienial Park in good ole HOT Atlanta GA! Last night we had a huge thunder shower and I was afraid the weather would be gross for the show, but it was beautiful, a super wilty 105 ish and I felt bad for the vendors at the show but man what a great event.

The first booth was the welcome station were we picked up a muslin totes with excellent swag. Our next stop was at the Craft: booth. I ordered a subscription and received a copy of the magazine. We stopped at the Janome booth and received a free Kwik Sew Pattern 3133. Perfect hat and tote pattern and then entered a raffle for a free sewing machine. I purchase 3 screen printed tee shirts from three different booth and a ceramic spoon rest to replace our recently broken one.

The green "shiver me timbers" came from Firefly Designs
The red pig tailed skull came from Bunnyorama
The pink tee with the monkey came from Sheriff Peanut

Desi got the cute robot from Fatty Cakes I will get her to post where all of her other stuff came from.

FYI for artist:
I had a difficult time listing all of you great crafters because some of you guys did not actually tag your products so I can stop by and shop online. Luckily the organizer created such a great info pack that those of us with time and a good memory will be able to figure out where we made our purchases.

Other FAV booth were Sublime Stitching, when am I going to have time to do that!! and Katy Dement , the paper lady.

Event Critique
First, it was easy to find, look for the tents, I did not see a lot of signage but the tents were a dead give away and then I saw the signs, parking was not bad although a bit pricey at $10.00 bucks. We were there right at 11:00 so we were able to find a parking space that was shaded -- super PLUS. We did not hit any traffic but we came down Lucky Street.

I stumbled upon this event by luck through my Atlanta Printmaking Yahoo group and I am happy I did but I never heard a single radio ad for it. That said, it appeared to be fairly well attended.

Their web site is well done and so is their event brochure. The brochure is informative with a map and a list of vendors and their web info. I know I will spend some time visiting all of their vendors online in the cool comfort of my home. There was a wide variety of different crafts, a great bit of recycled items that sparked my interest, although I did not want to lug around a air plane made of aluminum cans from Waldenour (their shop is local so I will visit them soon).

I will certainly join the ICE Atlanta mailing list and spread the news. I also hope to join the Atlanta Craft Mafia. I hope they are sponsoring some thing closer to the holiday when I can go a bit more wild in my shopping.

Thumbs WAY up to all the crafters and I can't wait to visit you online.