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I’m sure y’all noticed our new logo that Paige added not too long ago to the blog and Etsy.
We have a talented graphic designer.
Holly Shoulders
Think • Creative Design
email: hashoulders@comcast.net
http://thinkcreativedesign.weebly.com
We asked her to design something modern/whimsy, with daisies, in a blue/green combo. It’s exactly what we had in mind.
We had some note cards and business cards made up too. We couldn’t be happier with it Holly. Thank you!
In exchange for her work, she asked if we could make her a couple of gumdrops for her children. We made the large gumdrops and used Amy Butler’s Daisy Chain in pink and turquoise.
We hope your kids love these as much as we love our logo! Thanks again Holly:)
Wanna make your own gumdrops? We’re holding a gumdrop class if you live in the Chicagoland area. All you need is basic sewing skills. Click on the Contact us and drop us an email if you’re interested. You will be addicted to gumdrops too!
Paige is also giving private machine quilting lessons, one on one, for anyone interested in learning machine quilting. The class can be tailored to your experience level, so that you will feel confident in your machine quilting.
Can you believe…100 posts already! We’ve come a long way and we’d like to thank everyone for their support by having a giveaway.
We’re giving away the Bliss Table Runner. Paige did a great job machine quilting it.
And how about the spring/summer issue of Quilt Samplers Top 10 Shop Hop to go with it. My favorite magazine, which I wait ever so patiently for twice a year. You’ll love it too!
Just leave us a comment to enter. The giveaway ends Saturday, May 7th. I’ll post the winner on Monday, May 9th.
Good luck everyone!
The Garden of Ideas Shop Hop was this weekend. Can you believe that this will be my 1st shop hop? Paige and I thought it might be fun to take y’all along with us. So, let’s go…
1st up, Basket Cases Unlimited. We absolutely love this tiny shop in the country. It’s one of those shops that is small but seems to have what you were looking for. Being a barn in Clare, Il, makes this shop quaint. They sell handmade baskets, soaps, and herbs downstairs, and the quilt shop is upstairs, along with a longarm. Always friendly and always a project in the works for these ladies.
Busy, busy, busy…
My purchases from Basket Cases. Some Sugar Pop and Central Park.
Tammy Tadds, Sycamore, IL. If you love bright colors and fun fabrics, Tammy’s is the place. She’s been in the Quilt Sampler Top 10 Shop Hop magazine and designs her own fabric and patterns. She has a great decorating style. Her favorite colors are pink and green, and the shop reflects that with her pink phones, pink wheelbarrow, and don’t even get me started on the pink Christmas tree. This is one stop I don’t miss at Christmas!
I’m in love with this quilt!
And this wool pillow.
Is this just about the cutest shop you’ve ever seen? I had more pics from Tammy’s, but with Mother’s Day coming up, I can’t show those:))
Great ideas from her shop are that every time you come in you get to choose a 5″ square from the jar and don’t forget your jelly beans:) It’s just a fun store!
I’m already hungry and I haven’t had my coffee. After seeing these wool cupcake pincushions at Tammy’s we went on our way to the real thing.
We had to visit Sweet Dream Desserts while we were in Sycamore. Best cupcakes ever! Besides, no one should have to shop hungry, right? They had these blue and green daisy cookies that matched our logo. They jumped in my bag along with a giant sugar cookie for Russell and carrot cake and red velvet cake cupcakes!
Prairie Shop Quilts in Batavia, IL. This is the shop that I learned to do beautiful hand applique. I had a great instructor and I took to it right away. This shop has a longarm in it that can be rented hourly and they even give lessons on it. A great way to test drive before you buy.
Look at this BOM they are doing from Blackbird Designs.
Some great modern prints.
They also do “Challenges”, where you take a theme and interpret it into mini quilt..like art. This seems very challenging to me. I need to learn to think outside the box. This would be therapy for me. Or I’d need therapy after because I’d be so stressed:) I do really like to see what creativity comes from these challenges though.
Paige and I really liked this quilt and thought it would be really cool in bright batiks. Smile Paige!
We then headed to Quilt In Joy to see what was happening there. Kathi said it was the busiest shop hop she’s had! Yay!
Here’s some cool boy’s prints that just came in from Michael Miller. Boy’s tend to get overlooked and sometimes it’s hard to make them a quilt. These would be great pillowcases too. At one of the other stores we saw Space Invaders and Pac Man!
We hope you enjoyed the ride. We had a great time. We were already planning our next trip!
I pulled some of our favorite pics from the designers blogs to show you whats coming soon. Visit Valori Wells and Joel Dewberry for more info on these fab lines. I know Valori has been busy making some pretty cool stuff from Wrenly.
Wrenly by Valori Wells…
And some Heirloom by Joel Dewberry…
Both of these, Wrenly and Heirloom, will be out in June.
I’m pretty sure that both Paige and I are a bit obsessed with dresdens. Paige is working on a quilt that has a giant dredsen in the center and I’m still pluggin away at my embroidered ones. We are planning on having both of those ready by summer. We have high hopes for a quilt show we’d like to enter.
Our latest is the sample we made with the Artful Home Table Runner…I’m in love!
I also made a set of 6 matching napkins to go with it. Both the table runner and napkins have a little extra touch with the teal flange. I think it really sets it off. And Paige’s quilting is awesome as usual!
Of course, I had to make a Christmas one! I used Heather Mulder Peterson’s Christmas line from last year, At Home for the Holidays. I embroidered 6 strand french knots in the middle like a dresden flower. This one isn’t quilted yet but soon will be. It will be available in the Etsy Shop also…that is, if I can part with it:)
We’re also kitting the Artful Home one and it comes with the free pattern! Hopefully I will have these posted on Etsy soon. We’ve been having nothing but rain here and my pics look so harsh with the flash. We need sunshine!
Have you noticed the Quilting Bloggers button on our sidebar?
They are a resource for finding blogs in your state, or what’s going on in the blogging world. They offer quilting tips and tricks and tutorials. Every week they have a themed contest. This week is Easter quilts. I added my Rabbits Prefer Embroidery to it this time. It’s a Bunny Hill design that is redwork but I decided to use pastels for Easter. The prize is Christmas fabric! You know I couldn’t resist that:)
Voting starts today and ends Sunday at midnight. So head on over and vote if you feel like surfing the internet on your holiday. This link will take you to the site or simply use the sidebar button.
We hope everyone enjoys their holiday weekend. I hope to get some serious sewing done!
Happy Easter!
I belong to a Flickr group called Tea Buddies. You’ve probably seen me mention Jeanne, our group admin. And I’m sure you’ve read some of the awesome comments left by my buddy friends on the blog. This year Jeanne had this great idea to let each one of us host a month. The hostess chooses topics for discussion, keeps us all engaged, and even gives us a little something to-do.
April was Diane’s month, some of you know her by Mimi’sdarlins. She designed this cute flower applique that can be made into a pillow or whatever you choose. I chose to machine applique the flowers, embroidery the stems and add a Pick-a-Bunch saying.
Another inspiration piece for my studio. Wouldn’t this be cute framed? Thanks Diane! This was a lot of fun:)
I’m always on the lookout for studio decor. Our SewMod logo colors are a turquoise and green and our tagline is Need To Create. So while I was in Wal-Mart yesterday picking up a prescription, I came across these tubs that are our colors. I can store stuff in them..supplies.
They even have Daisies on them! Cuteness!
Then I noticed these candles in the same prints and one of them has sayings written on them. One of the words…create! Well, I had to have these too.
I also got this white wire basket that I think is perfect to display fat quarters….$5!
I really think it’s Wal-Mart’s purpose to keep you in the store to spend money. I even called the prescription in ahead of time but it was still…”that will be another 10 minutes”. So during that 10 minutes, I managed to see all these goodies, gather Easter Basket gifts, and ink for my printer. I fell into the trap. All to the tune of 100 extra $$.
I’m telling myself that these studio goodies are my Easter Basket gifts:)
We purchased several bolts from Riley Blake last week.
Some Sugar and Spice. We ordered the main piece to this which has all the red and blue daisies on it but it was already gone. We are learning that the process for buying fabric from manufacturers is ….you snooze, you lose!
And some Happier.
These 2 bolts are so cute. The Happier main has a whole scene going on if you look closely. Birds, butterflies, caterpillars. I just knew when this arrived that I had to embroidery something. I immediately thought how nice it would be to ride my bike along this fabric, so I jotted down some ideas and used the tree and critters as inspiration.
I used some scraps cut into different sizes to raw edge applique at the top. It’s a scrappy sky!
Just a little wall decor for my new studio. It’s going to be so nice to surround my sewing room with inspiring things, like this, fabric, or random pics. You never know what might set you in the right direction to make something unique. I even collected some Halloween scrap-booking papers the other day. I know something creative will come from those. Especially since we expect the Riley Blake Trick or Treat line soon.
Vicki is collecting those little cards that are on the front of Moda’s Layer Cakes packaging. I thought that was a cute idea to inspire her and decorate her studio as well. I’m sure, knowing Vicki, that her collection will be quite large:)
So, tell me do you randomly collect anything besides fabric that inspires you?
Yes, we’re still on comfort food here. Yesterday I woke up to a white ground. Sure it melted by noon but still, it’s the middle of April!
Last Sunday, neighbor Susan cooked dinner. She makes a really good chicken pot pie. We had some pink lemonade to go along with it.
And I made Paula’s Strawberry Cake.
It turned out pretty, didn’t it? At least this piece did. I had a cake malfunction when I removed the wax paper from the bottom after icing it. The paper pulled the bottom of the cake off:(
It was an ugly, lopsided, tasty mess !! I wouldn’t take ugly to a party but I sure will eat it:) Here’s the link for the recipe if you wanna give it a try. It has 5 stars & you won’t be disappointed.
And if you do decide to make this, I did make a few changes to the recipe though.
It definitely only needs 4-1/2-5 C powdered sugar for the icing and one 16oz. tub of the frozen strawberries in syrup from Target. Use 10 oz for the cake and 1/4 C for the icing. Using 15 will make the batter too runny.
Also use parchment paper in the pans to get the cakes out easily without them sticking.
And it takes about 30 min. instead of the 20 to bake.
Give it a try y’all. As I’m writing this it’s already 1/2 gone. And no, I didn’t eat it all:) We share in this neighborhood. Don’t worry Paige…I’m saving you a piece!
The Sweet Pickins’ club at Quilt In Joy is a year long club that features the This And That Pattern Company. They meet every month for a demo on a pattern taught by Laura, one of Quilt In Joy’s talented employees.
Meet Laura….and the pickins’ club
The projects they work on in this club are so darn cute. If I wasn’t already committed to a million things, I think this would be on my to-do’s.
They’re also working on a mystery quilt along with their monthly pattern pick. Kathy’s off to a great start with her 1st block.
Here’s a few of the projects. A cute wallet clutch, a basket for your desk, and aren’t those notebook covers adorable!
This month’s project is the Lazy Daisy bag. Laura made it out of the Bliss charm pack with some Michael Miller handles.
And Kathy is using Max and Whiskers from Basic Grey.
Paige made a pattern of the cute kitty in the fabric line for Kathy to applique on the front of the bag instead of the daisies.
Kathy, you’ve got to bring your bag into the shop when your done so I can get get pics. It’s gonna be seriously cute!
Have a great weekend y’all!
SewMod