As a reminder, here are the fabrics that I bought on my recent shopping trip to the Back Porch Quilt Shop:

I love the black and white, and gray fabrics! The faces print may be my favorite in this group. I love the way they look at me! The safety pins, in gray, will be fun to use. And, of course, the text is wonderful. This text print has more going on it—it's not as quiet as many of my text prints. But sometimes that is what is needed.

The blue/teal/periwinkle spotted fabric is one I really like—mostly because I am drawn to this combination of blues lately. There was a time when these colors together set my teeth on edge. Funny, isn't it, how your tastes change? The other three fabrics look nice with the spotted print but I would absolutely pull more from my stash to build this into a quilt.

I bought a yard of the map-of-Rome (not Paris) fabric. It's light and pretty and should be easy to use. I don't know where, but surely I will find a qult for it. 

It looks nice with the greens that I bought, although I didn't buy them to use together. 

And it's fun with the golds and that feminine floral print! 

When I shop for fabric, I buy what I know I can use. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but eventually. I stick to colors that are clearer, rather than really gray, because that's what I use 99% of the time. I find it easy to build quilts out of my stash because what I buy fits into my color palette.

Happy shopping!

Have you ever wondered why you can never eat just one? Click here to read the NY Times article that will tell you why. It's pretty interesting, and sort of scary, just how easily we can be manipulated by food science.

I haven't tasted a nacho cheese chip in years because they are not were not gluten free. As I was typing that I thought I'd do a quick fact check and, guess what? I can eat them again!

From the Frito Lay site: "In 2011 we reformulated Doritos Nacho Cheese Tortilla Chips to remove wheat from the recipe. While some older packages may show "wheat" on the ingredient statement, please be assured that all Doritos Nacho Cheese Tortilla Chips currently being sold in the US do not contain wheat."

However, just because I can eat them, that doesn't mean I will eat them. I've gone years without them and that proves to me that I can (maybe) continue to resist the lure of the yummy, golden, salty, tastiness that is Nacho Cheese Doritos.

Have you seen Kathy Doughty's newest book, Making Quilts? If not, you should look for it!

Kathy is one of my favorite quilting friends, although I don't get to see her often. She owns Material Obsession, a quilt shop in Sydney, Australia. She also writes a great blog! There is a link to the Material Obsession blog in the column at right, or you can click here. 

Making Quilts was originally published by Quiltmania, in France. The text is in both French and English making the book bigger because of the extra pages required for both languages. In the same way that books from the US are often more expensive overseas, that book was more expensive here in the US—but not any more!

Luckily for us, Making Quilts has been re-issued (in English only) by Stash Books! You can find it at your local quilt shop, from Amazon, or from C&T. 

Kathy has a fearless way of combining color and pattern—in quilts, in her wardrobe, in her home. The chair below is one that she showed on her blog a while back. She had it recoverd in that great fabric to go in her home. I want to go sit in that chair, in that room, and soak in the color!

Kathy sometimes teaches in the US. If you ever get a chance to take a class from her, you won't be disappointed. Until then, you might want to check out her book!