I have had a small pile of vintage/old fabric (probably linen and/or cotton) suitable for embroidery or cross stitch. Jan emailed right away and they will go to her. It’s nice to be able to pass this nice fabric on to a good home.
Now, isn’t that a sentence that makes a quilter smile? The Northern Star Quilters put on a very nice show. The quilts were impressive—and so were the vendors :-). I bought fabric that I don’t usually find—but not too much because space in my suitcase was limited.
I stopped at Quilters’ Express to Japan where I bought the print on the right. The print on the left was a gift from students in my class at Empty Spools that I’ve been meaning to post for weeks. Both were designed by Yoshiko Jinzenji for Yuwa.
I love her fabric and was sad to learn that she may not be designing any more. So, if you like her fabric, I suggest you hunt it down and buy it now. I also bought this kimono fabric—some vintage, some not. And a really cool Japanese panel print not pictured.
I stopped at Handloom Batik. The owner, Oosha (whose name I may be misspelling) remembered me from years back—and she remembered that I bought a mustard-colored gauze scarf. I admit to being seriously impressed.
These fabrics are all hand stamped (or woven in the case of that central blue fabric). They have an attitude that is both casual and stately. I love them. (FYI: all of the fabrics pictured in this post have been washed in the washer and dried in the dryer.)
I bought another gauzy scarf. It is big, more like a sari. In fact, it could be a sari. I admit to not knowing. My new scarf is blue with accents of red and white. The fabric is light but also warm. Oosha says she uses one at home as a light cover when she’s chilly in her chair.
As Oosha was (carefully) folding my scarf, she realized that she had not ‘cleaned’ it. Women tie the fabric with fine thread to make that dotted pattern, before it is dyed. There are hundreds of thread wraps on each scarf. Oosha said that the women do this work while gossiping, thus making it both a productive and fun time.
She was going to take the time to pull the threads off for me but I said, no, I’d be happy to do that myself. In fact, I did enjoy it! It was sort of like peeling a sunburn, except that I wear sunscreen so haven’t had that sensation in years. (Funny to imagine that the day may come when people have no idea what that phrase means.)
You have to find Oosha at a quilt show and I hope you do find her. Handloom Batiks is not currently online.
None of these were bargain fabrics. I’m as happy as the next quilter to find a bargain but I’m also willing to pay the price for unusual, interesting fabric. I don’t want to encourage crazy spending, but it is true that I have never regretted this sort of purchase.
If you haven’t looked at the fabric page at pieceocake.com lately, you have missed seeing the big prints that I’ve recently added, along with some interesting smaller-scale prints…
There are BIG numbers in 4 different colorways, flowers, dots, and more…
While I put these together into fat quarter bundles, you can buy them separately. If that’s the case, go to the fabric page and click on the swatch that interests you.
This is probably the oddest of the fabrics I’ve added. It’s called Junebug, by Alexander Henry. I suspect I will use it on a quilt back, but it could also show up on t a quilt front. In fact, it would be fun to use in the free Really Simply 9-Patch pattern (click here, scroll down, click the link).
I put Junebug with a black print and with the saffron Numbers… I have no idea why I like these together, but I do.
I only got one bolt of each of these new fabrics and won’t re-order. If any of them make you happy, order while I have plenty. I’ll send a newsletter in a week or so and there’s no telling how much of any print will be left :-).
I sent a newsletter, but if you are not on my newsletter list, you may have missed the news.. I have some new fat quarter bundles! They, and the rest of my fabric on the bolt, are all 10% off from now through Sunday. I don’t know when on Sunday. (For more on that, go to the end of the post.) The coupon code is ‘fabricfun’. Enter it in the coupon box and the discount will be applied. (If you forget to do that, we’ll take care of it when we process your order.)
I think that each of these bundles is a great starting point for a quilt. I would take them to my stash and start adding to them!
You would have no reason to know this, but setting up a coupon in my Yahoo Store is a almost convoluted. I had a choice of when the coupon code would expire and I chose ‘through Sunday.’ It didn’t give me a choice of time zone… in fact, now that I think of it I hope it is this coming Sunday. I suppose on Monday I’ll know if that is the case or not :-). Honestly, ‘d rather be sewing than sorting out these pesky details!
Linda is on her way home after having been here since last Tuesday. We worked on two up-coming books. One book is about appliqueing with wool in combination with cotton and linen fabrics. I can’t show you any projects but I can show you a pile of fabric that I will use to make a table runner. Just looking at the colors makes me happy!
We also went to McKinney to shop for fabric (twice) at both The Quilt Asylum and Happiness is Quilting. We are also working on a revision of our Piecing book and we needed new fabric for those quilts. I won the spending contest, but not by a whole lot :-). My fabric is now washed and folded (Linda helped me with that). Paul will wash her fabric when she gets home.
Most of the fabrics in my piles, below, are from our shopping trips, and some is from my stash. I’m sure that these fabrics will be joined by others as I make the quilts on my list.
The fabric I bought seemed so much bigger when it was in the shopping bags than it does when it has been neatly folded and stacked. I suppose that’s a good thing—otherwise I would need another closet for my stash.
Every day is a sprint.
I'm guessing that the same is true for many of you. I sometimes wonder if it has always been this way. I have dim memories of times when I could sit and read a book—very dim memories. I don't necessarily think that my life was better then, but there are days when I wish I could focus on one thing without knowing how many other things I also need to be doing. OK, enough of that 🙂
I was in Monterey and Pacific Grove, CA, last week to teach for the quilt guild. Monterey is such a great place to be. The people were wonderful, the weather was lovely. On the way to dinner one evening I spotted this in the sidewalk. It made me smile.
While there, I got to visit one of my all-time favorite shops, The Back Porch. Of course, I shopped…
I didn't shop for anything in particular and the stacks reflect that.
In the same way that I did after my last shopping trip, I thought I'd tell you why I bought what I did. The first two fabrics that went in my pile were these:
Both are linens from Kokka. The penguins are designed by Nancy Wolff, the telephones by Melody Miller. They are not inexpensive fabrics but I have used similar fabric before and I am always sorry when it's gone. (FYI: Linen and regular cottons are not a problem to combine in quilts. They sew together well.)
The penguins have text on them! You know how I love text…
These two cottons are both designed by Stella but I didn't realize that when I bought them. One of my students had used the light branch fabric as a background and I really liked it. The concentric circles didn't make me think of tree rings until I saw the two fabrics together.
Besides the fact that the Kokka linen is expensive, I'll bet that many of you don't buy it because you aren't sure how to put it with other fabric. Here are some ideas:
I would not have normally have thought about putting the tree fabric with the penguins but it works! I would add more fabric, but this is a nice start.
The more delicate, feminine floral looks really good with the telephones. It makes me think of myself as a teenager. I probably add some light fuschia and teal, possibly a lot of cream, and a deep dark burgundy.
The orange tile print from Kaffe Fassett is pretty nice with the telephones too. In fact, it surprised me…
And I like it even better with the yellow and orange fabric by Thomas Knauer for Andover—although I would use the yellow in very small doses.
What else I would add? Probably blue, more aqua than true blue.
I'll share more in a couple of days. Until then, I hope you have a nice holiday weekend!
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