Snowy Day Fabric Purchases

Maybe you heard but Chicago got a little tiny bit of snow last Tuesday and well it sort of ruined my birthday plans and made for a not so happy birthday girl. Which is why we have Fabric Therapy and boy was it an expensive session. But it made for a much happier person the next morning...

I started my day (just before the snow began) at my favorite place... The Needle Shop...

                                      

Followed by an online visit to fabricworm because I decided that I deserved that half yard cut collection of Anna Marie Horner's Folksy Flannel... and of course more birthday bad news... it was sold out!!! Which in the end was good news. I decided that I'd much rather get the warmer tones in the collection because it will make a quit that is more my style.

I was only able to get 5 of the 6 prints I liked from fabricworm (all 1 yard cuts). Because I really wanted Diamond Mine in yellow which was sold out I headed to my pal google and had him find it for me. He lead me to a place I'd never visited before... Banberry Place. I found what I was looking for and then some. It seemed that they had a number of things that I'd had my eye on but are sold out just about everywhere else so I couldn't pass them up. Oh and free shipping on purchases over $100 (not that I would know or anything...) Ok so enough rambling I'll show you the goods.

Also until last week I had yet to start fabric collections, but now that I've caught the swapping bug and fallen hard for certain prints... I'm becoming a collector. My first collection is going to be Henna Garden by Sandi Henderson besides the three pictured above I have melon and a fq of turquoise I acquired in a swap earlier today. I also think I might try to collect all the FFA2 prints as I already have a number of them. Hmm maybe I'll just stop with what I have.

Ok since I ordered these last week it doesn't count as breaking my fabric diet this week. Hopefully I can get back on track and make some pretty things!

It's Monday!!

I love Mondays!!! For me it is the same day a majority of you know has "Saturday". But since the rest of the world is working right now it is always nice and quiet during the day and I can just do my own thing which is amazing!! I spent the early afternoon misbehaving. I had a little bit of an accidental fabric purchase. Fabric diet = broken. Yep that's right my face is covered in "chocolate" right now. But the important this is that I am happy. And I have good reasons too...

There is this great quilt shop in Chicago called Quiltology. I actually used to live 3 blocks from their old location. I've NEVER been! NEVER! Why you ask would I not make it a priority to visit a quilt shop I could walk to in a few minutes. Because their work schedule was the same as mine. Closed Monday and Tuesday and Noon-5 the rest of the week. I never even managed to make it in for a few moments right before work. Well I noticed the other week that they moved to new location. Earlier today I was browsing the internet in my pjs and I decided to check out their website to see where their new location was and was greeted with these words: "NEW SHOP HOURS." They are open on Mondays!! So I ran to my room threw on some cloths and was out the door. Seriously it was a little weird but it is all true.

A large portion of their selection is Kaffee Fassett and Amy Butler which for me both of them are hit or miss... and usually a miss. It has taken me a while to admit that I don't like Amy Butler because everyone seems to love her. I have a few of her prints and like them but if I had to put her on a like/dislike list... she would fall in the dislike column just to play it safe.

Sorry back to the point of this post my Quiltology story... they have lots of stuff I loved too! Including Kumari Garden which I have had my eye on. Since it would have been incredibly rude of me to stare at all the fabric for 20 minutes and I'd probably already made the shop woman uncomfortable by petting it (just a litle) well I just had to buy something. This is what I came home with:

The top two I needed well because I've never seen those particular dots before it is Woodstock by Isadora Phoenix (1yd) and the AMH Good Folks (1/2yd) I didn't have and it is going to be all gone soon! The middle is the Kumari Garden (all 1/2yd) and the bottom is Jenean Morrison Wild World (both FQ) which I just really liked in person. See all good reasons for fabric purchases.

So as long as I was out and about and misbehaving and had a freshly deposited pay check... naturally a visit to JoAnn's was in order. I actually was planning on buying the 3.5 square die for my Accuquilt (it was 25% off and no mom it wasn't one of the ones my b-day list) so I can make this quarters 3x6 bee blocks because you know a rotary cutter would just be too much work for me.

I also left with the new copy of Stitch. And because I love grommets (yes I love them) when I saw these new snap together plastic grommets in fun colors on a shelf I knew I had to buy some and find something to do with them. So I get home and open Stitch (no I didn't even look at a single page in the store) and what do you know the grommets are featured in the "new + cool" section.

That must mean I'm cool. So since I've been so bad today I'm going to spend the rest of the day cleaning and organizing all my precious fabric (trust me it is a disaster right now) I will return to flickr tomorrow (or possibly late tonight) with pics of things to swap... it is time to destash!

Oh right... GO VOTE... SYTYC... preferably for me!

Presents!!

I got several fantastic Christmas gifts that I forgot to share!

Before I get to the presents here are my holiday decorations. This is my small silver tree which is in red & black and in the living room:

This is my living room windows. I think the star lights might stay up year round now:

And my big silver tree in my craft room which gets decorated in my jewel tone ornaments from Crate & Barrel purchased many years ago:

These were some of the presents I gave:

Now on to those I recieved...

The first has been on my want list for a while. A new camera. I've been in need of a camera that takes crisp close-up pictures for all my craft projects. Since I usually just talk about the thinks I really want and fail to purchase them (probably because I'm off buying fabric) I hadn't gotten around to getting this like I planned to. Luckily Dan and Alan came to the rescue! Thank you so much.

Now here is a crappy picture taken of my new camera with my old camera:

Canon PowerShot A3100

And here is a nice crisp picture of my old camera taken with my new camera:

Olympus FE-20

Old Camera:

New Camera:

See why I needed a new camera. I could eventually get the old one to take a pretty decent picture but I would have to take about 20 pictures to get one good one. It was fine for landscapes and people shots but close-ups not so much. Anyway the new camera is a very welcome addition to my crafty lifestyle.

I feel bad putting down my old camera because it was a very generous Christmas gift from my boyfriend two years ago. At the time he got it for me though I wasn't really documenting things I made so close-up pictures were not a necessity for me. Going back to gifts this year, he gave me a fantastic crafty gift that I will not need to be replacing any time soon. An Accuquilt Go! Cutter!!! Now this picture was taken with my new camera but in very poor lighting (so it's not the camera's fault). You will notice Peanut & Lucky in the background enjoying their gifts.

And my final crafty gift is a mountain of fabric all half yard cuts from my mom, aunt and 4-year-old niece (my SIL took her to a craft store and she picked out some fabric for me).

Thanks for all my crafty presents.

Fabric: Stash

MANY WORKS IN PROGRESS

It was a great week to live in Chicago and be a crafter. On Friday I attended the International Quilt Festival. It was my first time going. I really enjoyed it. But I'm sad because after 8 years of being in Chicago they are moving venues and will be in Cincinnati next year. So I guess this was probably my last year in attendance. They had some beautiful quilts on display both new and antique! And they had tons of vendors for me to throw money at. Below are my fabric purchases:

The fabric on the left is going to be turned into some placemats for a friend. The green in the middle was just too cute to not give a good home. The newspaper fabric has dog articles on it and it will be used in one of my quilting bees and become a blanket for Peanut and Lucky. The black/white/gray/red fabrics are going into my stash I am starting to collect also for a quilting bee project. The black stripe fabric will probably go into the quilt I am planning for Jason. I can't find enough boy looking fabrics I like though.

These are two fat quarter bundles I got (both for $20 - great deal!) at the quilt show also. They are Amy Butler Daisy Chain. I'm not sure what the plan is for them yet... I just couldn't pass them up.

My next crafty event was yesterday. The Chicago Craft Mafia hosted a craft rummage sale of sorts. They accepted 32 sellers who were there to sell unwanted crafty items. I was hoping to find some washed up metalsmith who was letting their equipment go dirt cheap, so they could afford to buy booze... but alas not luck! If anyone know of someone like that I will trade booze for metalsmithing equipment. Back to the sale, to be honest there was a lot of crap there, A LOT, but I feel like I found the one gem...

You are looking at over 13 yards of Heather Bailey Freshcut fabric. It is out of print. And it is all mine! I bought it as one bundle... it was a good deal... a great deal... how much you ask? Well I'm not willing to give exact details. I prefer to keep my spending on items I don't really need private. But let's just say that it retailed for about $9/yd and I paid well, well under that price for all 13+ yards. There are a few full yard cuts, mostly fat quarters and a few large scraps. Who would let something this fantastic go? Granted I have zero plans for it at the moment, but I will come up with something.

If there is rehab for fabric purchasing you are going to have to drag me kicking and screaming. I'll probably steal the bed sheets and curtains in the facility just to get a fix.