Stop staring and start sewing!

May Giveaway Day!!!

Yay!  It's Giveaway Day again!!

I'm so happy to take part in Sew Mama Sew's May Giveaway Day!  I joined in back in December and it was lots of fun and I made lots of new friends! 

I'm trying to think of a creative way to pick the winner but it's late and my brain is out of gas so I'm going to be lazy and let random.org pick as usual.  Just tell me (and everyone else) the name of your absolute favorite all time fabric print.  Mine is probably Amy Butler's Sunburst print from her Temple Flowers line.  Oh I loved that collection!  It's the fabric that made me fall in love with the "good stuff".  Little did I know I had "crossed over" and could never go back. 

Oh, and here's the prize!  The Orange Kirman Apron Kit from my Apron in an Hour kits.  The winner will get the fabric needed to make this apron (international is fine!) and I will email the downloadable pdf file.  Blog post here.

And great news!  I just found out that Jennifer Paganelli's Dance with Me and Tanya Whelan's French Hatbox will be here this week (I'm thinking Thursday)! I've already loaded them into the store for purchase and will ship them out as soon as that big, strong, handsome UPS guy drops them off (not that I ever see his face because he runs off so fast after ringing the bell).  I've got a few more lines coming in the next 2 weeks (Lantern Bloom, Full Bloom, and For your Home) and then it gets even crazier (3 huge collection toward the end of June)!  If you're interested in receiving notices when new fabrics and patterns arrive just join my mailing list (at the bottom of the sidebar to the right).

Good luck!!  The drawing is on Sunday the 31st.  Thanks for visiting (feel free to take a look around)!

How Jona got her groove back?

The winner of Friday's Pink Fig Patterns give away is Allison, who left a comment at 7:05 pm on 5/22 (yes, you Allison!).  Oh, and I wanted to share one more nice thing that happened as I was leaving Quilt Market.  Remember how I was on the same plane as Kaffe Fassett going to Pittsburgh?  Well I was just getting seated on the plane headed home when Erin McMorris boarded.  I met her at market and she is truly a sweet person (I know!  Another one!).  I wish she had sat next to me but she's probably glad because I would've talked her ear off for the next 5 hours.

Well, I'm trying to get back into the groove here.  Fortunately I came home to a very clean slate.  Olivia is my oldest and she is a great employee.  I asked her if she could just spruce up the store while I was gone and this is what I walked up to when I got home (cue "Stairway to Heaven" now)...

We rearrange this space just about every two months so it will look different in a couple of weeks because my son just finished his school year and I'm not homeschooling him next year so we've kicked him, and his stuff, out of my office.  I'm setting up my sewing space in there next to my desk.  That gives us room for more shelves which means...more fabric!  And since I spent like a drunken fabric sailor on furlough while I was at market, I'm going to need it.

If you ordered fabric last week, we are all caught up now.  I'm sorry for taking longer than usual to get things out but between the post market rush and the sale it got a little crazy around here.  Thank you for being so patient!

Okay, I know you're totally tired of me giving stuff away but unfortunately tomorrow is the blog give away on Sew Mama Sew.  So you need to go over there tomorrow and follow the links to all of the blogs that are giving away goodies (finished goodies, and non-finished goodies).  And if you have a blog you can join in and give something away (the guidelines are listed there in that post).  And that's the last of my give-aways, honest!  Well until next month when I celebrate Fabritopia's first birthday.  Yay!

Quilt Market Grande Finale Friday

One thing I really liked about this Quilt Market was the way the guys were representing.  Here is the Be a Man display (a tailgate!) in the Free Spirit row.  I can't wait to get my hands on this fabric!

And here is Scott Jarrard, one of Free Spirit's new designers, standing next to his Boogie Monster creation.  Nice guy, great designs!  Check out his site (with fabric peeks)!

Okay, so here's Joey chatting with a gal at the Colonial Needle Company booth.  One thing Joey was pleased to discover at market is that women really like a man who knits.  He was flashing his socks to anyone who would look (you know the socks I wanted for myself? yes, those).

Here is Anna Griffin's fresh and frothy booth.  Seriously dreamy!

Here is the ever gracious and uber creative Amy Butler in her booth (quite the popular place).

Here is Sandi with her little video recorder.  I had no idea she was video blogging the whole time (I mean I saw the camera but didn't quite catch onto the fact that she intended to put this stuff on her blog).  So tune in over there because I understand there are a few folks concerned about being seen with no make-up (could get interesting).

Oh, and if you look over Sandi's shoulder in the above picture (on the right side) you'll see April Cornell (yes! April Cornell!) with the long hair.  April organized a "Twitter meet up" so we all gathered at the Moda booth at 10:00 on Saturday.  It's kind of like a flash mob but more genteel.  Here you can see Jennifer Paganelli gathered with us.  Jennifer drove down from Connecticut and apparently it was a longer drive than expected so we didn't get to see her until Saturday morning.

And here are Designing Women who Tweet.  Genevieve Gail, Joanna Figueroa (finally got to meet her and she's sooo nice!), Paula Prass, Sandi Henderson, and Bari J Ackerman.  Now one of these ladies has no idea how to tweet from her phone so she's faking it, but I'm not telling which one it is!

Okay, what's the worst thing that can happen at a fashion event????  Someone else showing up in the same fabric!!  Ack!  Here are Myrinda from Fabric Hound and Cynthia Mann from Fabric Worm who ran into each other and became instant best friends.  Too much fun!

Another amazing quilt.  This is Cinda's Circles by Karen Pharr.  Wow!

And double wow!  A Walk in the Autumn Garden by Kathy Howard.

This is one of the Moda fabrics I ordered for the store.  It's called au.then.tic by Sweetwater and it gorgeous.  Vibrant and soothing at the same time.

Closer look at some of the prints.

And I couldn't stop myself from ordering a whole bunch of Rouenneries by French General.  It includes linens, linen blends and some "silkies".  Oh, and amazing ticking stripes.

Okay, so here's what's coming!  From Free Spirit...Vicki Payne's For your Home (shipping to me now!), David Walker's Oh Boy, Douglas Day's Be a Man, Dena's Christmas Snow (and I'm hoping to squeeze in Jenean Morrison's Picnic Parade).  From Michael Miller....Paula Prass's Summer Soiree, Patty Young's Mezzanine, Pillow and Maxfield's Whimsy, and Laura Gunn's Lantern Bloom.  From Moda...French General's Rouenneries, Sweetwater's au.then.tic.

Whew!  Oh and a bunch of patterns from Pink Fig and Boutique Chic!!

As for me, I have 8 patterns (yes 8!) on my drawing board that we intend to have available in time for the Fall Quilt Market (which is only 5 months away!).  So you can stop nagging me because I'm seriously working on it (like right now!).  Or maybe you should keep nagging me so I don't get lazy here?!  Anyway, I appreciate any encouragement!

Alrighty then!!  The winner of yesterday's Learn to Sew Lace up Cards (which are now for sale here in my store!) give-away is Pam (as in Pam Kitty Morning, one of my favorite quilty bloggy type friends ever!!)!  Be happy for Pam (you still have one more chance!) and run over to her blog because she has some great Quilt Market posts from the perspective of a quilter (imagine that)!

And the final give-away for the week is a real humdinger!  3 patterns from Pink Fig (a 30.00 value!).  I know a lot of you sew for your daughters and granddaughters so I'm sure these will find a very happy home.  Just leave a comment (like I need to tell you!).

Whew!  I hope everybody liked my re-cap this week.  It was lots of fun bringing it to you!  Please follow the links to some of the new folks popping up in the fabric world and give them lots of encouragement (and the "old folks" too!). 

I can't express how much I love being a part of this incredible industry.  It is filled with people who are not just talented but incredibly kind (I haven't met one mean person yet!).  I've been blessed with wonderful friendships that make it hard to leave Quilt Market without crying.  There's nothing quite like being able to spend time with people who totally understand each other's fabric obsessions!  October can't get here soon enough!

More Quilt Market thrills

I was heading somewhere fast when out of the corner of my eye I saw this...Mark Lipinski!  So I got a quick picture.  Check out the gal next to him.  I seriously think she has no idea who she's standing next to or she'd look a lot more excited than this.  Don't you think?

Okay, I've been waiting to show you these booths because they are soooo colorful and amazing (and they belong to some of my favoritest fabricky people ever!) I didn't want them lost in the mix. 

Here is Paula's booth and isn't it stunning??!  Her next line, Summer Soiree, just thrills me because it's pretty and colorful and the black and white fabrics just knock it out of the ballpark.

Those stunning bags were made by Simone Howell (check out her flickr page if you want your socks knocked off).  I knew Simone was going to be there so I just looked around for a great purse until I saw one that looked like her style.  I walked up, checked the name tag and sure enough, it was her!  She was part of our Thursday night dinner group so it was nice to spend a little time chatting with her.

Stunning!!

I want that on my wall!!

Okay, here is Patty's booth and it was soooo cute!  I love the colors!  She and Jon had a bit of a disaster after building it (go read it on her blog and weep) but they put it back together and here it is!

Here is Patty (taken zillions of orders for patterns I'm sure!).

Here's Jon hiding behind the display.  He's got that intimidating Fu Manchu look going on here but believe me, he's harmless. 

On Friday we surprised Patty with some birthday balloons and a very loud rendition of Happy Birthday to You.  I took her card all over the floor and managed to get some great signatures on it...."Um....Mr. Fassett...um, well..my friend Patty...well she's a super famous designer and...well...it's her birthday today and...um...could you sign her card...maybe?  Yes?  Yes?!  Ssssscore!" 

Okay, Joey spent a lot of time over at the Sew Seredipity booth because we simply adore Keith and Kay.  Keith works with the same obscure radio system that Joey does so they're always like "radios...blah, blah, blah....radios....blah blah blah".  So Kay and I ignore them because we're all like "fabric....blah blah blah.....fabric....blah blah blah".  So that's why we like them.

Here are some of her new designs.  Yep, they're coming to Fabritopia.

Oh man, that red coat!!  The ruffles are silk and it was simply stunning!

Here they are!  Oh, and check this out!  Kay has a deal with McCall's Patterns (sweet!) so you can pick up some of her patterns at your local store too!

Here is an amazing quilt called The Beauty of Pensacola by Judy Holley.  Amazing detail.

This jacket was pretty amazing.  It has a koi pond on the left (when you're looking at it, not wearing it) and a peacock on the right.  Wow!

The winner of yesterday's Moda box is Stephanie (yes, you Stephanie S.!) who said "okay, I would LOVE to know where to find those buttons! I'm a sucker for buttons like that....what? you're going to sell them in your shop?! you rock :) seriously, will you sell them in your shop? pretty please (insert cheezy grin) :)"  LOL!!  Stephanie cracks me up.

Alrighty, here's todays awesome market give-away!  The Moda home booth is great and they have some terrific things for kids like paper dolls and lace up sewing cards with vintage designs on them.  So here you go!  A box of "Learn to Sew" lace up cards by Moda for your favorite little "wannabe sewist".  Leave a comment and cross your fingers (or make the sign of the cross and say a prayer...whatever you think you need to do to increase your chances!).

Grand finale tomorrow!  Thanks for hanging out with me!

Booths, booths, and more booths

Okay, I finished Twilight and I'm waiting on the second one just to prove everyone wrong.  I can have self control (and I seriously have a ton of work to get done around here)!

Today I'm just going to share lots of booth pictures! 

This is Heather Ross's booth which is showcasing her Weekend Sewing book (don't tell me you haven't bough it yet!) and her Far Far Away fabric collection.

Here are some bags by Kokka.  I love Kokka fabrics (they know how to put "cute" on a bolt!) and hope to carry it in the store if I can find more space here.

More adorable Kokka bags (little ones!).

I love this vintage button booth!!  Love it!

Westminster now has "Lifestyle Products" and they make me ga-ga!!  Umbrella's, rugs, plates, lots of things made from your favorite designers fabrics.

More!

Here is Lila Tueller in her booth (Joey made a joke about the mannequin being Elinor Peace Bailey and I elbowed him hard in the ribs, but it made me laugh).  Lila always uses such pretty colors in her designs.

And here is Chelsea of Pink Fig Designs (Lila's niece!) in her darling booth.  I ordered a bunch of Chelsea's pattern (and have some to give-away later this week so don't go away!).

Here is the Michael Miller suite.  Colors galore!!

Here's another view.   See those curtained areas??  We'll they store supplies behind them and I found out one of them is just stuffed with snacks!  Smart (and good to know in case of a power outage which locks the doors and we can't get out)!

Pillow and Maxfield booth.  I had no intention of ordering this fabric when I arrived.  Now I'm getting all of it.  In fact I'm getting a lot of things I had no intention of getting and I'm not quite sure how to explain it to Joey.  He does this whole "how are you going to pay for this?" thing and I just smile and say "oh, stop being so silly!". 

Laura Gunn's booth.  Laura was the only one there with a tree in her booth.  I can't wait to get this fabric!!!

Laura and Heather getting things ready.  You know you've arrived when Heather Bailey is doing the grunt work setting up your booth! 

Here are Kathy Miller and Jon Young (Patty's husband) after setting up the Pillow and Maxfield booth.  Kathy is such a nice person (so is Jon)!

This is Vicki Payne (and me!) in her beautiful booth.  I really picked her brain (more like the Spanish Inquisition!) about her fabric.  It's decorator weight (and 54 inches across!) but I really wanted to know how it held up when used for clothing.  It would be a shame to just hang it in your house when you can wear it on your body (unless you placed the flower print wrong and had a flower smack dab on each boob, which I think we've all done at least once).  So I ended up ordering a ton of it (self control with Twilight, no self control with fabric....I'm sensing a weakness here...).

Oh, and that's the blouse I dyed with the top I made at the last minute (great colors together)!

Here's a pretty view of the Allegheny River.  This is the view out the window of the convention center.  So nice.

Here's a great quilted outfit called Lookin "Fur" Bigfoot by Virgie Fisher.  Check out that cantene!  I love this!

Look at the back of that velvet cape!!  Golly!

We were on our way to dinner when we ran into Mary of Flourishes sitting outside of the Sonoma Grille and were quickly distracted by the hat on the guy behind her.  It's a cowboy hat made from a Coors beer case!!  Haha!!  That's Sandi Henderson on the left.

Here we are the first night we arrived eating dinner at the Sonoma Grille (pretty food, tasty food, but dainty proportions.  And we were starving!).  Left to right is Lori who owns Buy the Bolt, Jennifer Storey, Myrinda of Fabric Hound, Bari J. Ackerman, Paula Prass, me, and Jamie Miolanen (she owns Maricopa fabrics and Lori is her mom).  Joey and I ran into Lori and Jamie everywhere and were exchanging "so...what's the scuttlebutt???" conversations the whole time.  We love them!

Okay!  The winner of yesterdays give-away is Dorothy, who said " love reading your recap and checking out the photos!" at 1:35 on 5/19.  Congratulations Dorothy!!  Yippy!!

Today's give-away is this awesome stack of 320 2.5 inch squares and a pincushion pattern you can make with some of them (in this sweet little box).  I love it!  I love Moda!!  I love my Moda rep (he makes us laugh)!!

I have some great stuff for tomorrow and I'm having a MASSIVE sale at Fabritopia to clear out some space (and pay for the goo-gobs of stuff I ordered at market)!!!  Don't go anywhere (except to my store and then back!)!

Fabric 2 point faux

I have to say it's getting very hard to blog right now.  See I wanted a book to read on the plane ride home from Pittsburgh so Joey got Twilight for me and I'm having a hard time putting it down (I'm just past the halfway point).  But I will try here (because I don't want to disappoint anyone, right?).

While in Pittsburgh we stayed at the Omni Penn hotel and wow, is it beautiful.  Chandeliers, marble, brass, just gorgeous.  This is the Starbucks on the bottom level!  Glorious!

Here are Myrinda (Fabric Hound) and Bari (I think Bari's tweeting) taking a time-out with me at Starbucks.  I've been whining for an iPhone since I saw everyone tweeting during market..."but Honey....all my friends have one!"  Market takes a real toll on your feet so these sitting times were a sweet relief. 

Here is Bari in her booth for Windham.  She received the stack of her fabrics while we were at market so all of her displays were made with the strike-offs she had at home (every last scrap!) but you would never have known it.  It all looks so colorful and fun!  Check out her coat in this post, and then look at this picture and see what she's done to it!  I just love creative people!

Here she is with visitors Genevieve Gail and Kay Whitt.  Actually Genevieve wasn't visiting since her display for her new line Flower Bucket (check it out on her blog!) was right next to Bari's display. 

Okay, when I found out there would be no fabric 2.0 party (sob!) I contacted Patty Young and offered to put something together since the party task had been delegated to her and I knew she was swamped with building a booth and getting all her stuff ready.  Joey and I looked everywhere for a cool place to meet but we finally gave up and said "let's just meet in the lobby of the Omni".  It turned out to be a perfect location!  Gorgeous ambiance and a couple of restaurants/bars to choose from.  Nice!

A seriously star-studded event in a relaxed setting.  We were all pinching ourselves!  Here are Patty Young, Jenean Morrison, Paula Prass, Mary Beth (from True up) and Jessica Levitt.

Heather and Laura showed up.  They were staying at the hotel too and Heather had just gotten off her plane so I'm sure she was exhausted but we grabbed her anyway!

Here they are chatting with Jessica (while I sneak some pics).

I love this picture of Scott Hanson and Paula Prass!  I met Scott and said "Wow!  You're much taller than I expected (I think he hears that a lot)!" and Paula is petite so it's funny seeing them standing next to each other (you can see Sandi Henderson in the background behind Paula).

Here are Bari on the left, and Susanne from C & T publishing on the right.  I didn't catch the name of the gal in the middle but I think she's Sandy from C & T (I'll try to track down that info).  We had a great time running into Susanne in the halls at market!  She's really lots of fun and has a great sense of humor (and fabulous neck scarves!).

Here is Phyllis Dobbs chatting with me.  I met Phyllis on Twitter (What?!  You're not tweeting???  You're missing out then!) and went to her schoolhouse presentation on trends and fads where she did a great job educating us and showing us her darling new designs.  Nicest lady!

Okay, here are Jessica Levitt and Scott Hanson and if I were you I would bookmark their blogs and keep an eye on them so you can say you were following them back before they became truly famous.  That's all I'm saying so don't pester me for details because my lips are sealed, so there!

Here are Joey and I sharing a chair (a chair was quite a commodity at this gathering!).  I took this picture from Jessica's blog (I hope she doesn't mind!).

Here are Jen McLean (Tula Pink!) and Myrinda chatting about the new Tula Pink collection from Moda (gorgeous of course!).

Myself chatting with Jenean Morrison.  It was such a treat to spend time getting to know Jenean!  She is so sweet and humble and I could spend hours picking her fertile brain!

Here's a little Pittsburgh history!  I would love to spend a week here just visiting cemeteries (I love cemeteries!), and historical (we're talking Revolutionary era) sites.  I mean, here we were eating delicious pizza by the slice in a dive just across the street from the site of Fort LaFayette!  Amazing!

Here is a stunning quilt called "Celebration" by Marlene Shea.  This is one of those works that just causes your emotions to rise up.  Beautiful.

Okay, the winner of yesterday's picnic basket give-away is Jenny who said " Great pictures! Thanks for sharing!" at 6:46 pm on 5/18.  Yay Jenny (have "your people" contact "my people" and we'll get this out to you!  Ha!).

Today's give-away is this darling set of 2 fat quarters from the fabulous folks at Quilting Treasures (Phyllis's group)!  I'm having a hard time parting with this and my girls are begging for it so I need to get it out of the house fast!  You know the rote: leave a comment, yada, yada....

Lots more pictures tomorrow!  Booths, celebrity sightings, fabricky stuff!  Weeeeee!

Sleepless in Pittsburgh

Okay, so after 2 1/2 hours of sleep Joey and I head out to Chicago.  I nodded on and off during the flight (lack of sleep combined with dramanine) so it's all a blur.  When we arrived we quickly made our way to our connecting flight and as we were boarding the plane Joey whispers to me "That's Kaffe Fassett behind us".  And I'm like "OMG!  No way!"  And sure enough, there he is.  He's much taller than I realized since I had only seen him sitting down at the last Quilt Market (honestly, he's a seriously beautiful man).  Fortunately our plane was delayed on the tarmac which gave me plenty of time to text everybody I know and let them know "I'm on the plane WITH KAFFE FASSETT!", then I had to turn my phone off.  Teehee.

We arrived in Pittsburgh at the same time as Bari J. and we grabbed a cab together since we stayed at the same hotel.  The fun had begun!  Bari was debuting her first line for Windham so there was a lot of anticipation.  Also staying there (same room as Bari) were Paula Prass and her daughter Jennifer Storey and Sandi Henderson.

Here are Paula and Jennifer on our trolley ride heading over to the convention center Thursday morning.

Here is Paula showcasing her beautiful Summer Soiree line at the Schoolhouse Series.  Yes, I've ordered it all!

Here are some more shots of the beautiful things made from Paula's fabric (even more later!).

Here is Patty Young getting ready to tell us about her new line Mezzanine (yep, ordered it already!) and her line of patterns (got 'em!).  That's her hubby Jon in the orange shirt hanging up the quilt.

Here are Patty and Jon setting up their Modkid booth (taken from the sky bridge and I hate heights, which shows you how badly I wanted this shot).

Here is Laura Gunn showing her premier collection, Lantern Bloom, for Michael Miller (that's Kathy Miller holding up the display).  Yep, I ordered that one too.

Here she is showing us the original artwork that the fabric is taken from.  If you like her style then keep an eye on Crate and Barrel.  Just sayin'

Here is Kathy showing us the new line from Pillow and Maxfield (yep, it's coming).  It's gorgeous, has great colors, and is incredibly soft.

Okay, it is Quilt Market so here's a beautiful quilt called The Breath of Life by Chitagun Aichi of Japan.  Stunning!!!

Here's a closer look (I love the ants!).

Joey made me take a picture of this place (teehee!).

And here is the darling and talented (and oh my gosh, so nice!!) Jenean Morrison showing us her latest collection for Free Spirit.  It's called Picnic Parade and the colors are wonderful!

Here she is showing off a burp rag and apron made by the uber talented Carrie Sommer.

And here's todays give-away (thanks to Jenean!).  A cute little picnic basket with a roll of her gorgeous fabric in it!  Just leave a comment!

More tomorrow!!  Stay tuned!

Quilt Market hang over

I'm back from Pittsburgh but still could use another full nights rest in order to feel completely human again.  It was a frantic fabric frenzy and I loved every minute of it!

Here is a picture of all the busy folks setting up their beautiful booths (and this is just one side of the display floor).

I've got lots of pictures, stories, and goodies to share so I'm going to sit down and sort through everything and be back tomorrow to start my week long review.  So fasten your seat belts!  (Or you can visit Trueup for Mary Beth's review if you want a peek.  Yes, that's super casual looking Joey in the center of the picture! )

The winner of Louise's Saucy Apron pattern give away is Mushyhed who left a comment at 10:20 on 5/12.  Congrats to Mushyhed!

Later Gator!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day!  I had a fairly peaceful day (well, as peaceful as one can get with 5 kids in the house) and the smoke detector only went off once so that's always good.  I'm still enjoying the beautiful flowers Peety got me.  Great colors!

All right!  I think I'm ready for Quilt Market!  It looks like the weather will be fairly reasonable (in the 70's and raining off and on) so I think I have the right clothes for Pittsburgh.  I made two tops using Butterick 5487 (slightly modified) and I'm very happy with them.  I may try tweaking this pattern into a dress for summer.  The straps aren't bulky but they cover my bra-straps and that makes me very happy!  Sorry for the dark picture, I finished the bottom one too late to get good light.  I know they are lightweight tops but I'm wearing them under other things and I wanted some things I could wear here in the Arizona summer.

I threw the Stitch magazine in the picture so you would have some recommended reading whilst I'm gone. :D  There are some great patterns included in it and some of them are from my favorite designer/blogger friends (whom I hope to see this weekend!).  There's a gorgeous pillow by Kay (using Paula's fabric) and a terrific twirl skirt from Chelsea (and lots more).

One thing I absolutely love about having a blog is all the amazing friends I have made from all over the world (I love the internet!).  If you are in the states you need to make some friends in Australia because then you will always have someone to chat with when you're up in the middle of the night.  My friend Louise honored me by using my Apron in an Hour tutorial at The Stitches and Craft Show in Brisbane a couple of weeks ago.  Her class was called "Return of the Housewife" (no not "Return of the Living Dead" even though every housewife feels like that now and again).  Check out all of the gals wearing their aprons.  I've gone international!!!  She even sent me my own show guide where it says "You'll make an 'Apron in an Hour' using America's Jona Giammalva's easy pattern."  I know, not "America's sweetheart" but I'll take it!

Louise has just released a beautiful apron pattern of her own and I should have them in the store next week.  But she did send me one to share with my readers (and it's nice!) so be sure to leave a comment (make it an Australian comment if you dare!) and I'll randomize everyone on Sunday.

Here's a peek at the apron pattern.  That's my green suitcase which I am busy packing (or will be in a minute).  Isn't that a great color?

Okay, I have to get up in the dark to make it to the airport.  Tomorrow I'll take some dramamine to help me not barf (seriously, you do not want to sit next to me on a plane) and maybe it will knock me out for a bit.  I'll be back blogging Monday with some great pictures and all the fabric news that's fit to print (and maybe some good dirt that's not fit to print but I'll print it anyway!).  And I'll have lots of good Quilt Market swag (which I just found out stands for "stuff we all get") to share so there will be give-aways alllllll week long!  Have a wonderful rest of the week and weekend!!

I'm dying here!! Really!

Look at what I did last night!  I've had these blouses in my closet for ever and although I love the shape of them I've never once worn them (tags still on)!  White is so blah.  I mean it's terrific if your a waiter or lab technician but other than that, why bother?

I used Dylon on both of them.  The one on the left is Amazon Green and the right is China Blue.  Such an improvement!  The green one is silk and the color set in nicely but the camisole with it is polyester and it didn't take a bit of the color so I'm going to have to find something else to go under it but at least I know to get a natural fiber so I can dye that too.  I'm really happy with the shade of blue on the right and I'm sure I'll get lots of use out of this blouse now.  That was fun and I stirred it a lot so the color is even on both of them (I usually end up with a marble effect so I'm very pleased).  I'll be doing more of this I'm sure!

And Scott over at Blue Nickel Studios has his Be A Man ("BAM") quilt up! That fabric is such a hoot and I can't wait to get it in the store. There is a beer print in this line and I think it would make a hilarious baby bib (why be ordinary?) so hopefully one of my pregnant friends will have a boy.

We're leaving for Quilt Market in 4 more days!!!  Joey and I ran out and bought umbrellas last night since the forecast for Pittsburgh looks like we'll get rained on at least once but probably more.  Unfortunately there will be no Fabric 2.0 party this time but we didn't want to miss out on a chance to all get together so if you're going to be there we'll be gathering at the Palm Court Lounge Thursday evening (after the Schoolhouse series) starting at 6:30.  The lounge is located in the ground floor of the OMNI Penn Hotel (about 1/2 mile from the convention center) and there is a free shuttle (Molly's Trolleys) to and from the convention center starting at 7:00.  This is a great time meet your favorite "online" friends (bloggers, store owners, designers, everyone!) and it's open to everybody so there are no excuses for missing it (except for the fact that you'll have to pay for your own drinks and food and that's not even a good excuse, just a cheap one!).  Don't forget to bring your camera!