Category Archives: Dallas Modern Quilt Guild

katie jump what?!?!

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Last Friday I went to the Dallas Quilt Show with several good girlfriends. We met for a delicious diner breakfast and made it to the show just after it opened. I had a short wish list of goodies that I wanted to buy: a market tote basket and a curve master presser foot. I’m really trying to take a break from fabric buying but five booths into the show, I bought a fat quarter bundle of Amy Butler solids. Those pretty colors weakened my resolve. I was pretty proud of resisting the vintage quilty stuff at the next booth. Several of my girlfriends took home some really amazing stuff (Melanie’s quilt scraps, Monica’s vintage quilts) but I tried not to even look at the booth, knowing that I have four unfinished vintage quilt tops awaiting some TLC at my house already.

I did find my market basket, which was very exciting. These handmade baskets are from Ghana and a portion of the profits goes back to the community of weavers that makes them. They’re called bolga baskets and you can find them easily online (most of them are dyed bright colors). They’re ideal for your sewing room – I bought my first bolga basket at another quilt show in the fall and I use it to store pre-cuts and fabric stacks for future quilts. It holds a lot of stuff and looks pretty.

And it’s a good thing I bought that big old basket because there were even more fat quarter bundles that I could not resist.

quilt show goodies

Denyse Schmidt’s Katie Jump Rope and American Jane’s Peas and Carrots! Both of these bundles were priced at normal retail, not Etsy-OMG-are-you-for-real prices. If you’re searching for some hard to find fabrics, you must check out your local quilt shows. A lot of small shops don’t turn over inventory very fast and if they don’t have an online shop, the odds are very good that you’ll find some out of print goodies. (This quilt shop does have an online store with some Katie Jump Rope in stock.)

I was feeling so pleased with myself that I even did some sewing this weekend (I’ve lost my mojo recently so like Ron Burgundy it was kind of a big deal.). It’s a Union Jack block for Erica in the Ringo Pie bee.

union jack - Ringo Pie (Feb)

Can you tell that the blue fabric is 1930s bunnies? And the white fabric has tiny strawberries on it? I just wanted to point that out. ;)

thirty

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retreat

Today I turned 30. It’s an age that many women dread. Maybe I would have felt that way if I didn’t have so many friends in their 30s and beyond. These are woman with stories to tell. Women who make me laugh. Women who inspire me and teach me. I’m lucky enough to be spending this landmark birthday with many of them at my guild’s first annual retreat.

retreat

We are piecing, quilting, laughing, overeating, staying up too late, inspiring each other…

quilting love panes
And even though I miss my hubby, I couldn’t ask for a better way to spend my birthday. Four days of quilting and fabric talk is almost better than two weeks in Europe. Almost. ;)

a recovering blogger

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Some of you may know the drama of my blog getting hacked earlier this year. Most of my old posts were archived via Google Reader and I’m slowly trying to recover them. If you’re reading this blog via a feedburner, you may see a lot of “new” posts that are dated from last year. Sorry! Bear with me.

I’m really excited about the upcoming Dallas Modern Quilt Guild Retreat (detailed info here). There are still a few spots available and you definitely want to go if you’re near Dallas!  Retreats are so much fun. It’s really nice to get away for a few days with fellow quilting addicts and complete some of your WIPs and even learn new things. There are going to be so many of my favorite quilters there this year and it also happens to be the weekend of my 30th birthday. I honestly can’t think of a birthday weekend I would enjoy more. Plus this place is full service, which means no one has to cook or clean up! The owner says that it’s like having a wife for the weekend. ;)

Quilting Fight Club

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Some of you may know that I started the Dallas branch of the Modern Quilt Guild in February. I’m serving as the President this year and I am having a blast. I’m not the kind of person that would even join a club, much less start one so the experience has definitely taken me out of my comfort zone in a very good way. You can read about the guild on our blog.

Last Monday night we held our June meeting. It was very well-attended and I loved chatting with all the ladies about fabric and what they’re working on. When I came home, I went into the study to say hi to my husband. He asked me what we do at our meetings (he pictured us sewing one giant quilt around a wooden frame). I explained that we chatted about various guild-related topics, had a presentation about spring Quilt Market, and then had Show and Tell. As I’m telling him all of this, he starts smiling, giggling softy, and by the time I’m done talking, he is full on laughing.  His mirth is contagious so I laugh a little, too, and ask him what the hell he’s laughing at so hard.

Then he says to me, “It’s like Quilting Fight Club. A few months ago, you didn’t even know anyone who quilts and now you’ve got recruits, you’re training, you have mysterious meetings…You have an entire national network of quilters.”

[For those of you who've never seen it, Fight Club is a Brad Pitt/Ed Norton movie ] 

Quilting Fight Club? I’m not sure about that, but it might be kinda fun to call my guild friendship group the “Ass-Kicking Quilters.” No actual ass-kicking involved.