Retreat Shopping & Prizes

 

At the retreat, I went shopping with everyone at the Family Threads quilt shop. They generously gave our group a retreat discount. I got some blue thread for sewing on the facings of Running Out of Raincloud. A pack of chrome sewing machine needles because I wasn't sure I had some with me. And a pack of John James chenille needles, always good to have for hand stitching. There was a good selection of sale fabrics, those two on the left, the weird green plaid and the orange/yellow/pink text block fabric were a great deal. 

I then couldn't resist the good range of Marcia Derse fabrics.

Here's the Marcia Derse fat quarter pack un-packed.

After I laid the fat quarters out, I realized that a couple of them were not Marcia Derse, but Carrie Bloomston instead, that's okay they play well with each other.

We played some fun retreat games, and I scored a great ruler that I haven't tried out yet. Several people there said it was good and I do love the non-slip-i-ness of Creative Grids rulers. 

The ruler came all wrapped up in the cute holiday print FQ which exactly coordinates with the jelly roll strip that I got in another game. A nice coincidence.

The retreat had a little gift shop, so I checked it out and bought a stretchy Our Lady of Guadalupe bracelet, some Monastery Creamed Honey (yummy!), a nice bottle of goat milk body lotion from a local farm, Bell Hill Farm. I'd also bought some of the same company's goat milk soap at the quilt shop. 

The final shopping opportunity didn't work out as the store was closed on Monday's. Friend Jaye had spotted a Featherweight for a very good price and I was toying with the idea of getting it. Am I now a person who really really wants a Featherweight? Maybe so, several people use them at Sew Days and really like them. If they're in good shape they have a very good stitch. Some research is necessary, so I think I was lucky the shop was closed.

First Retreat Day Report

 It was a beautiful drive down to the BAMGG retreat in San Juan Bautista. 

Shopping as a group at Family Threads quilt shop was very fun.

I helped set up and our fabulous organizer, Bonnie handed out detailed very clear lists of steps for each thing we needed to do before everyone arrived. A great innovation that really worked out well!

My first project was trimming the edges of Running Out of Raincloud, and then sewing on the facings. I also made a hanging sleeve, so all done except for the hand sewing.0"”1

Handwork Supplies

Recognizing the upcoming increase in my handwork efforts I did a mini online shop for new supplies to make it easier. I can't resist a coupon sometimes, and "they" seem to know it. As part of the QuiltCon Together experience, we've gotten some great offers from the sponsors and vendors, one of which was from Brooklyn Haberdashery. 

I ordered two things that were irresistible to me. A ruby red leather scissors sheath.

And a magnetic ceramic button by Cohana, in this lovely sage green. My plan is to use it as a needle rest because I'm always losing my needle when I set down my handwork.

PIQF Purchases

 

I didn't go too crazy buying stuff at PIQF this year, but I did grab a few things. Right on top is a small-ish new ruler from The Stitchin' Post. It has the no slip dots and is a nice compact usable size. Do I have enough rulers now? Yes, yes I do.
Some Renaissance Ribbons, Tula Pink style. Aren't these fun? Their booth was very colorful and I wanted to buy everything. They had some of the designs printed out on this 3" wide velvet low nap ribbon. It was lovely but I refrained from buying any.
The grey honeycomb thing is a silicone mini-iron rest. Since I have one of those, I thought it'd be good to have a place to rest it when it's in use.
I've been on the lookout for a particular grey to use for a binding on the Body Double quilt, so I bought two things that might work. I just need to hold it up to the actual quilt and see how it looks.
Of course I had to get some of the Tula Pink purple monkey fabric to go with the ribbons. And another ruler fabric and a blue on blue interesting print.

A Few New

 I'm going to try hand-stitching with this baker's twine. It's just too cute (maybe it's just the packaging?) not to give it a go. And a new way to glue, so far it's pretty handy, but it's on the drippy side so I'm not sure I prefer it to plain old glue stick.

Some new fabrics, which look like they're up to something all on their own. Always nice to find an Alison Glass print on the clearance rack, it wa quite the deal, I bought the bold end, so it's enough to make a shirt, so who knows.

New Tools

After reviewing the Shark Applicutter, I realized I probably needed some replacement blades, and I found them over on Missouri Quilt Co.
Of course, a few other things ended up in my bag, like a new Sizzix die - a rhombus with an equilateral triangle which has all kinds of possibilities.

A binding tool ruler I've heard good things about which will hopefully help me since I always struggle with this last step in joining up the binding.

A layer cake of new Alison Glass fabrics from the Sun Print line.

And why not a gigantic Pinkerville owl patch from Tula Pink because it made me smile.

Underneath it all a nice grey fabric with words, add it to the pile of those.

I think I'm full up on rulers and tools for now.

Ribbons and Rulers

 These ribbons are so gorgeous, Renaissance Ribbons doing such a great job of translating quilt/fabric designers work into such a different medium. Not sure what I'll do with these, but they have some great project suggestions on their site.

A trip to my LQS, Modern Handmade last month. I'm going to give this BlocLoc ruler thing a try, starting with the Flying Geese version. More on that later after I've tried it.  I also picked up a quilt pattern that caught my eye, (you can see a peek of it on the top there) which is not a thing I usually do, but it looked like such a great way to highlight great fabric. And then three fabrics on clearance sale, love it.

Recent Acquisitions

 Recent purchases that I thought were worth talking about here. Aurifil Thread acquisition has reached maximum for me, mostly because I ran out of room in my thread box! Only a few repeats with colors I already owned. If you like this thread, try the Cotton Club's thread club.

 There were so many color choices for this cork fabric, and I couldn't pick so I went with a neutral near natural one. This will be made into a bag, It's fairly thin and very flexible, the backing is poly-urethane. I'm interested to see how it sews up. Sew Sweetness carries many choices. And they have a video on how to sew with it which should be useful.

 RFID blocking fabric to be used in bags and wallets, etc. (A tin-foil hat too perhaps?) The only instructions that came with it was to NOT iron it ever, so that'll make it kind of tough to use in sewing a bag or a wallet, hmmm. They sell it at Nancy's Notions in case you're intrigued.

 A rather crazy selection of fabrics (even for me) I bought at Golden State Quilting. Guess I was needing some color that day or something. I have been challenged to use these all in one quilt. Hmmmm.

Who knew you could buy Cherrywood fabric scraps at your LQS? Too fun, huh? Such a nice selection, I really love how this fabric feels.

At The Local

I recently visited the local Japanese grocery store (Misuwa Marketplace) which is the size of a regular ol' American grocery store but has the added benefit of a very cool bookshop inside of it. This is once you get beyond the awesome factor of a whole refrigerated case of various sorts of tofu, another filled with an amazing selection of mushrooms of every sort, all the seaweed you could ever want, an in-store sushi chef, noodle cafe, a Shisiedo makeup outlet, etc.

It's a bizarre sort of place, but very enjoyable and friendly and I'm glad there's one not too far away to visit occasionally.

I found the above goodies in the bookstore.

•  A new watercolor brush that holds water in the handle, very handy for travel.  (And hard to explain to Chinese airport security guards, whoops)
• A new kind of origami paper, which I like to use in collages since I'm pretty awful at origami.  
• The beautiful red fabric is an official Furoshiki, a cloth that is used (and re-used) for wrapping gifts.  I've been doing my own half-assed version of this when I give presents, especially to quilting friends, but I thought it would be fun to try it with a real one.  Who will be the lucky giftee has not yet be decided but the red and the almost polka-dots is a pretty big hint I'd say.

As I'm on a non-Nook-book diet, I had to put back several crafting, paper, Japanese clothing, knitting (whywhywhy, I don't knit) and art books.

Stealing Pillow Ideas

Looking around Pier1 for a basket of a certain dimension, I was attracted to this big shelf of pillows. So many fun ideas for texture, shape and design. I especially like the one on the bottom row in the middle with the layered scallops.

I was a teensy bit worried about getting scratched by the beaded ones that my husband was threatening to throw at me. A pillow fight in the pillow department, makes sense to me, except for all the breakables surrounding us...

Cornucopia Full Again

I wish I could buy these Ugg boots, aren't they cute? I have no idea why they sell these in California, who needs warm boots like these?? I have been hankering after a new pair of boots for a while now, perhaps I'll find have to make some felted ones or maybe some Arwen's Elf boots!

So with our living room almost done, we're now looking to replace the teeny tiny sconce that is almost at the top of the 22' wall. It looks rather silly and puny and just plain lonely. I'm looking for something big and dramatic, so we went to the lighting store. Armed with only my camera on my phone, here is what we found that I liked. None of them seem big enough though.
Is this not THE cutest picture ever?
If only this was 3' across, or maybe we could put up more than one.... I love the shadows it casts.
I liked this floral shape, but no way am I getting an upward facing wall sconce. It would fill up with dust and dead bugs, and since it is so high up the wall it would not be easy to clean out... makes me go ewwww just thinking about it.

Recently I've been looking into some of the newer fabrics that are out there as alternatives to cotton. Cotton is really tough to produce organically, and it is a crop that depletes the soil at a pretty quick pace. A good blog for info is Organic Clothing.

So bamboo keeps coming up as an alternative. Dharma Trading has three types available. And there is actually a partial bamboo mix batting for using in quilting. Next time I need batting, I'm going to try this one. I've heard good things about it sewing up well, haven't heard or read anything about how it washes up though. Couldn't find it online either, even though someone had said they bought it at Joann's...

And finally,

How about this for a cool workshop/class to take? Women Art Life looks like a really worthwhile one to spend your time and money on.

Interacting with My Environment

Interacting with my environment this month for self portrait challenge.
One of the main things I do this time of year is a lot of driving around. I don't really know why, but end of spring, beginning of summer finds me tooling around almost daily, and now with gas prices so high, trying to keep my speed down to save gas. A lot of the time it is getting errands done that are easier without the boys along, so I cram a lot of it in before school lets out for summer. Also, the weather is nicer, so it is fun to get and go places. I'm frequenting garden shops at this time of year too.

So after all this driving around, what after all have I accomplished?
Keeping the economy going by shopping? check.
Making sure the oil companies get record profits again? Double Check, grrrrr.
Feeling the freedom of the road, where I could go anywhere, do anything, as I'm unencumbered by the extra bodies in the car? Check.
Spring/Summer Fever? Yup, most likely.
Indulging my Sagittarius gotta go, gotta travel thing for road trips? Definitely.

I do try to keep it interesting, thus the devil smiley bendy hanging from the rear-view mirror, my comfy back pillow, bottle of cold water, usually some fresh rosemary on the dashboard and the very loud music that you can't hear. Pretty sure it was The Shins, maybe not though.

And oh, fine, Ok, I acknowledge that this is not the smartest thing in the world to do, taking a picture while driving on the freeway.

Having a Ball in Berkeley

To continue on my weekend trip report, here are pictures of the fun happenings in Berkeley, where brunch at Tacubaya with friends and of course some shopping happened.

Tacubaya is a great restaurant, here is the cool ceiling, and I loved all the different intense colours painted on the walls. Very vivid. Huevos divorciadas was my meal, yum, a red sauce on one side and a fresh green tomatillo sauce over the over easy eggs and yummy fresh made corn tortillas.

Don't kristen and Jaye look great against the pink wall? I didn't get a picture of kristen's adorable daughter or Jaye's adorable son who also joined us. They were too busy drawing and getting impromptu art lessons from Pamela.

Oh, look, I'm in the picture now. Thanks to W for taking this picture, good job~

And then here is Pamela. We all look good in pink! Pretty in Pink even....

At The Ark toystore we found a display of Fun Meals, and Pamela scooped up many boxes, hoping to find a lobster dinner. After frantically opening them and enjoying the sushi, desserts and other foods, no lobster love . These goodies are really going to look great on quilts Pamela!

The inside of the fabulous package reveals, a teeny tiny mexican dinner, complete with Corona Beer!

Then we crossed the street to the Crate & Barrel Outlet, where after some digging in the remnant bin I found some Marimekko scraps, as well as some cool cocktail napkins (look for them appearing in a quilt near you), and some placemats. I'm working out how to use the placemats in a sculpture, more on that later!

I bought these three fabrics at New Pieces, the one on the left is Japanese ikat in a strange orange and green combo.

At Black Cat Quilts I found these four fat quarters. The one on the right looks like a blurry city streetscape. I also found these cool triskele frog closures.

Phew, that was a lot of fun and a lot of shopping. I'm still recovering three days later!
It is so fun to get together with people you know well online, and continue the virtual conversations complete with body language, facial expressions, and voice tone. A whole 'nother level to communicating, that is for sure.

ISO A certain Fabric for a Certain Friend

Friend Jaye was searching desperately for a Denyse Schmidt fabric "Flea Market Frenzy or some such name". Soooooo not feeling like staying at home yesterday after my chiropractic appointment, I set forth in search of this elusive fabric.

I started out closest to home, and had no luck at the first quilt shop I tried, and I didn't buy a thing, gasp! shock! amazement!

Next up was Cabrillo Sewing in Capitola. They had a lot of nice fabric, but I was good and didn't buy any. But I was taken in by this book, "Creating Your Perfect Quilting Space" and Threads magazines. Hey, I have to plan out my new quilt studio, I need some guidance!

Not done yet, so I headed back over the freeway to Beverly's, hey all cotton fabric on sale. uhoh. A skirt will be made out of the greenapple/floral, maybe with a flounce of the measuring tape. I cracked up the cutting clerk by saying I wasn't going to be using it as a waistband, oh no sireebob! And the kittys? Why did I buy that? I recognized them! That's why. I think this is a recycled print, or something, I swear I had something when I was a kid with these very same cats on it. A case of retro-deja-vu??

Anyways, my clothing aim or thoughts are swinging towards dressing more like a "grown-up, an artist, a creative and a put-together, capable person" instead of a "I'm exhausted, in pain, and I don't care, so don't make me think about what I'm wearing as long as it doesn't hurt person". I'm trying some cotton kirts first, instead of my dyed, worn-out, hand-dyed, very disreputable looking shorts.

And for some reason, I bought this dress pattern, guess I'm planning on attending some party this summer where I will show off my perfectly tanned and buffed out shoulders. Oh yeah, the housewarming party we are hoping to throw for ourselves, that must be it! This will be the first dress I've made with boning in it, but I figure, I won't need to wear any other "support garments", so it is a tradeoff, right? Will I find the fabric in my stash? Maybe....stay tuned....

Last but not least (I knew I should have gone here first!) was Hart's Fabric in Santa Cruz. Of course they had it! An entire rounder of Denyse Schmidt fabric, with a bit of the end goal fabric right there in front of me, I almost missed it. Isn't it cute? Or perhaps perky? Or just plain ol' pretty? Or naturally nice? I like it. Maybe she won't reaaaaalllly need it? maybe. Here it is, with a skull patch I had to have. Don't they look great together? Maybe for a new handbag???

And I again had to feed my clothing pattern addiction. Gawd. I had to have this McCall's pattern. Don't you love the necklines? And that tulip hem? I love that hemline, it makes you feel like you are dancing even when you are just walking.

Then, hanging oh so temptingly over the cutting station was an absolutely beautiful outfit, done up in natural linen, apple green and brown. With an overskirt, and a bolero jacket/shrug kinda thing. It looked so comfy and unique, and so I bought the pattern, it is a Burda, for "Young" (ahem). And no I won't be doing it up in prom type fabrics....I'm thinking of the hemp/silk noil I saw somewhere recently, was it Dharma Trading maybe?? Anyhoo, that would be a good fabric for this, especially if I dye it and do some discharge patterning...

Then I thought I'd try Goodwill in Santa Cruz, to see if they had any good vintage-y fabric goodness. Not really although I did buy these two pieces, one of which you will recognize if you have ever stayed at a major name hotel in Tahiti (didn't notice the printed on label in one corner, oops) for a grand total of $4.50! The weird brown one will become one of the aforementioned cotton skirts, and the black/white one will also, with the addition of some other black/white prints as it is on the smallish side (at least to make a skirt for me!).

Oh, and of course some books. ahem. 3 of which I have already read and wanted to share with my family and reread, and one which had been recommended to me , The Invention of Hugo Cabret.

Now, I'm totally pooped but it is 1:30 and by the time I get home, it will be time to go pick up Alex from school, so to kill a bit more time, I swung by my favorite garden store. And wandered around, choosing a new blueberry bush (to replace one of our now dead ones), a pineapple guava (feijoa), lemongrass, pineapple sage, and Her, she will go in the pot where I have my Kaffir Lime, and lemongrass

Pshew, I'm almost as tired out from telling you what I did yesterday, than I was after doing it!