Quilt Market, Day 3

Sometimes, watching all the people at Quilt Market is as much fun as looking at what is in all the booths! This group of ladies from Texas come to Market each year together, and they always dress up. They told me that they live nearby, so they change their attire and wear different outfits each day. Fun!

Here’s more of what I saw today:

Amy Butler in her booth, showing off her new collection called "Lark."

I love Seuss, so I just had to have my photograph taken with The Cat in the Hat! Shannon Fabrics makes super-soft plush fabrics, and they will have a new line of Seuss fabrics out by Spring Market in Kansas City.

Check out these neat buttons. They are made by gluing fabric or paper on top of wood forms by AdornIt, and retail for about $3 per pack. I bought some to try out.

Arrow Sewing Cabinets caught my eye, because they make some cabinets for sewing machines that are actually pretty. (Imagine that!) Several models on the floor look like antiques adapted for sewing, but have modern features, and are painted cool colors, like green, pink and white.

They have a lower price-point than most cabinets, too!

I broke down and bought a super-comfortable chair with excellent lumbar support, and with wonderful fabric.

The C&T Publishing booth; customers can look at new releases and new products, get more information, and place orders. That's "Papillon," the quilt on the cover of my book, displayed on the far right at the top.

Simplicity introduced a new machine earlier this year that creates bias and makes piping (by heating a fusible adhesive that wraps around the cording and fuses to the fabric).

This morning, in a class I took with Ruth Chandler and Liz Kettle from Textile Evolution, we used Simplicity's needle felting machine. It worked great, and is very lightweight, and affordable for a 12-needle machine.

Carrie Bloomston of Such Designs had some cute, cute, cute stuff! These darling creatures are from her pattern that features the Three Little Pigs and the big bad You-Know-Who fingerpuppets. I'll post more about her after I get home, and will share a pattern giveaway with you. I’m bringing a bunch of stuff home to give away. Say a prayer that I can fit it all in my suitcases!

Quilt Market, Day 2

It was the first day that people attending Quilt Market could get out on the floor of the Convention Center and shop! This is what met my eye when I stepped through the door. Yes, there is often a lot of clowning around going on, even more so with Halloween right around the corner. This is Brandon Mably, who designs amazing fabric for Westminster Fibers.

Here are Barb Adams and Alma Allen of Blackbird Designs. I have loved their patterns and their fabrics for a long, long time! They have a new book that will be out soon called "Weekend" that features their new collection of spectacular blue, white and gray fabrics. I was drooling bigtime.

Here’s a designer who was new to me; Kim Gaddy is the designer at Buttons & Bees, and her patterns were so cute! Love the owls. She is opening a new quilt shop in Manor, Texas, within the next month or so.

The enormous fabric flowers twined around the poles at Daisy & Dell’s booth were amazing! And their patterns were darned cute, too. Wouldn't these look darling in a little girl's room? The pattern is called "Daisy's Garden: The Daisies." I think that I must make some.

These darling pooch products were made by my friend Faith Cleary of Dolce Amico. She has a brand new line of appliqued pet portraits for stockings and more. Faith did a DVD with Quilting Arts demonstrating how she makes her thread-sketched pet portraits earlier this month.

This is Faith's first Quilt Market; it was great to see her take this step. It takes a lot of hard work, determination, money and grit to have a booth at Market! 

Mary Lou Weidman is one of the most optimistic, upbeat people I've ever met. And it shows in her funny, whimsical quilt designs. She was at Market promoting a new book.

 

Cloud 9 Fabrics’ peacock fabric caught my eye. They produce lovely organic cotton fabrics, and the designs are fabulous. This is Michelle Engel Bencsko, their design and marketing director.

Alexander Henry Fabrics' booth was decorated for Day of the Dead, and it looked so bright and cheerful. Well, as cheerful as it could be with lots of these skeletons and sugar skulls hanging around!

I ran into friend and fellow C&T author Rayna Gillman walking the aisles. She gave me a sneak peek of her new book, which shows you how to use your coolest fabrics — those ones you made that you feel are too wonderful to cut up? — in quilts. I'm going to grab a copy as soon as it is out! (I tried to grab her super cool scarf from around her neck, too, but I didn't get away with it.)

Sisters Polly Minick and Laurie Simpson of Minick & Simpson design fabulous fabric lines for Moda, as well as patterns for quilts and hooked rugs year after year, often in their signature red, white/cream, and blue.

If you want to buy Moda fabric, take a seat!

Tomorrow at 11 a.m., I'm signing and giving away autographed copies of my new book in the Moda booth. Thanks, Moda! If you want a book, come early and get a ticket!

Here is artist Julie Komenda in front of a large painted and stitched piece she made. Julie was demonstrating how she paints on Roc-lon, a multi-purpose cloth. I bought some to try out. It is really neat. Julie is artist in residence at Weeki Wachee Springs in Florida, where you can see mermaids… or maybe even be one. Don't believe me? Check it out!

Now this is pretty neat! This screen shows the Twitter feed regarding activity at Quilt Market. Attendees who post on twitter and add #QuiltMarket to the end of their tweets show up here.

The special exhibits at Quilt Festival are always interesting. This are photographs from the Texas’ Anniversary Photo Exhibit by Wilma Hart, VP for Corporate Projects at Quilts, Inc.:

She took photos of landmark Texas buildings and PhotoShopped quilts into them.

This is Wilma (above) with some of her photos; aren't they fun?

I heard a lot of buzz about these cool clips (above) at Clover. They are used to hold the binding in place; you can either hand stitch the back of the binding, or machine stitch. Little marks on the clips help you make sure that you catch the edge of the binding on the back of the quilt if you are machine quilting it down through the front. And isn't that doll great?

Lisa Walton of Dyed and Gone to Heaven has a special exhibition at International Quilt Festival this year, and I can't wait to see it! I had dinner with Linda, Bonnie McCaffery and Sarah Vedeler tonight at the Four Seasons. Here is the chef preparing Lisa's spectacular dessert!

Goodnight, everyone. More tomorrow!