My sister, brother, husband and I ventured west last weekend to do some renovation work on my grandmother's old house in Central Washington. It was a great opportunity to see my family, do some good work...and sneak off to a quilt shop for a little shopping.
The long flight from New York to Seattle gave me time to do some hand stitching on my name tag for the quilt guild name tag swap. I didn't have time before we left to use the machine to sew the binding to the name tag, so I did it all the old-fashioned way. I sewed the back on the way to Seattle...
...and finished the front on the way home. I realized when I was in Washington that I'd forgotten to bring a safety pin to attach to the back. Luckily, I found a large one in one of the boxes of my grandmother's old fabric, so Jessica will have an heirloom pin on her name tag!
Here's the finished product ready for the swap at the guild meeting. In retrospect, I would have liked to make it a bit more modern, but I hope Jessica likes it.
Before we left for Washington, I was able to finish all the machine sewing on the quilt for my niece. My plan was to work on the house by day, then hand sew the quilt binding by night. There were a few evenings when I was more inclined to go to bed early, but once I started sewing, my energy picked up. I finished the sewing (including the label) on Wednesday night, so I had Thursday night free to spend our last night in town having a great Mexican dinner with family. I sent the quilt home with my sister and will post photos of the quilt as soon as I receive word that it has found its way to my niece.
On one of our many trips to the Home Depot in Moses Lake, we stopped at a quilt shop in Ephrata. How thoughtful of them to put their shop in my path!
The Fabric Patch looks like a small shop, but inside, it's like a rabbit's warren with nooks a crannies that seem to go on for miles. I picked up over a dozen various fat quarters, as well as yardage of several wonderful fabrics. I was particularly pleased with their selection of printed flannels. I haven't seen anything like these in shops near me, so I was happy to get two prints from Bliss by Valori Wells. (I find I'm often drawn to her designs).
The cotton wovens I bought didn't fit in my suitcase, so they're winging their way home in flat rate boxes with some fabric that used to belong to my grandmother. (Thanks to my uncle for gifting them to me.)
I made it home in time to make it to the Metro Mod Quilt Guild meeting yesterday, where I turned in my spring colors challenge block and the name tag for the swap. I received a lovely name tag made by Victoria of Bumble Beans, Inc. Unfortunately, Jessica was out of town this weekend, so I'll have to catch her at the next meeting to get her reaction to her name tag.
Now I'll patiently await the arrival of my boxes of fabric, and I'll keep the fond memories of a great week spent with family.
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