A Passionate Quilter

Reno Quilt Show

The last weekend of June I attended this year's Quilting, Stitches and Crafts Expo at the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno, NV.

This show has been coming to Reno for the past few years, they offer tons of classes and lots of vendor booths for SHOPPING! I don't think I want to admit how much money I have spent there over the past few years!! :)

How wonderful for our community that we have such a terrific show to look forward to year after year. This year we even had Mark Lipinski as a featured teacher!

Here's a couple of vendor floor photos.

Log Cabin Quilt Kits

I was excited about one booth in particular. Jordan's Patchwork Quilts specializes in precut log cabin kits (both table runners and quilts).

Let me just preface this by saying, I LOVE quilt kits!! I love everything about them; the way they're packaged (don't they look like little presents?), the perfect color coordination (why can't I do that?), the fact that everything if packaged for you all in one little bundle!

Jordan's had tons of kits, mostly log cabin. Here you can see many of their samples. My Mom's in the background there chatting with one of the owners!

Finding a favorite kit to take home was not difficult. I chose a table runner kit (I already have too many quilt kits, I couldn't add another one!). The kit I chose was called Bali Batik Jungle!! Oh-la-la! A beautiful combination of creams, greens and browns! Gorgeous!

All of the kits included the pre cut strips (see above), borders and backing fabric. All you have to do is piece it! So Easy!!

So far I have pieced my blocks and here's what it looks like....

Don't you just love it!! Now I just need to add borders.

Here is a similar version in a very large quilt. I think this quilt sold me on the runner. It was just gorgeous!!

What a fantastic idea these guys have going. Not only can you buy their kits at shows but also in their ebay store as well. (www.stores.ebay.com/jordans)

Overall, I had a terrific time (so did my Mom). Can't wait 'til next year!!

Heather :)

New Fat Quarter Winner!

Unfortunately, I never heard back from our Fat Quarter winner so I had to choose a new winner.

Congratulations to

Jackie from Jackie's Stitches,

she is the winner of the fat quarters from Fabric-Chicks!!

Fabric Chicks in Minden!

Hours:

Tues-Sat: 11 am- 5 pm

Closed: Sun and Mon

Address:

1166 Annie Court

Minden, NV 89423

(*Just 5 minutes south of Carson City!)

www.fabric-chicks.com

Fabric-Chicks was born from owner Beth Watt's original partnership with Elinor Peace Bailey and her cloth dolls. After her husband's retirement to the Minden area, Beth and her daughter, Michelle, began selling fabric on Ebay and Etsy. As their business continued to expand, they started filling up their home with fabric and in 2008 decided to branch out into an OFFICIAL quilt shop.

Below you can see a photo of Elinor's fabric line.

Fabric Chicks loves modern fabrics and carries a beautiful supply. It's not uncommon for them to carry the ENTIRE line of fabric for as long as it's in print, often for as long as 2 years! They also carry popular Australian, African, 30's and a HUGE selection of Western fabrics and have a great supply of Halloween fabrics.

Fabric Chicks has a great play area for small children. If looking to rent some time on their long arm, they'll even throw a movie into the DVD player and let your kids relax while you have some fun!

Their longarm rents for $25/hr for the first visit. Included in this price is all the hand holding and assistance you might want. After this initial visit, it's only $15/hr to use it all on your own and it accomodates up to a King size quilt!

Some of the beautiful lines of fabric that they carry include designs by: Patty Young, Heather Bailey, Laura Gunn, Tina Gibbons, Kaffe Fassett, Joel Dewberry and Rob Apell's ENTIRE line of fabric. In fact, you will find the whole line for most of these designers. That's an incredible selection!!

In fact, when gazing up at these HUGE fabric lines it's wonderful to picture the endless design possiblitlies with so many choices from one designer.

Beth describes their shop as different from the typical quilt shop and that description fits in a very good way! They want to be a place for people to come and socialize and they offer endless opportunities for both quilting and socializing all at REALLY great prices!

As you can see below, they LOVE to embellish. Tote bag embellishments are a favorite and they carry a large line of rick rack, ribbon and lace. Rick rack is such a popular trim for quilts these days and they have a great selection!

If you check their calendar, you'll find lots of monthly quilting and socializing opportunities.

Here are some of their ongoing monthly activities. They also have regular classes so check their calendar.

1st Friday Freebie- join for $45 and each month when you bring in a finished block you'll get the next block free. A finished quilt for $45, what a great deal!!
Quilts of Valor- first Saturday of the month from 11am-5pm
Tuesday Sewcial- every Tuesday from 10am-2pm
Valley Chicks- third Friday of the month from 10am-12pm
UFO club- finish your UFOs on the first Sunday of the month
Not to mention the Doll of the Month and Block of the Month clubs!!

And guess what, if you don't want to haul your sewing machine down to the shop, they will rent you one for only $3.00!

Below is a picture of the current Block of the Month quilt. The pattern was designed by Fabric Chicks and the fabric is from designer Patty Young (yes, they have the whole line!). This is a beautiful quilt, you've really got to see it in person!

The first Friday and Saturday of the month they offer a $6.00 fabric sale. Fabric Chicks puts out one entire line of fabric and offers this fabric for this special price for two days only! You're saving more than $4.00 a yard!!!

As you can see below, they also offer a $6.00 "Show Special" bucket which can be found everyday.

Can you believe these deals?

Fabric Chicks also participates in the September Shop Hop for Northern Nevada. Don't miss this year's Hop, September 23rd-26th, 2010. Visit the shop hop website at: Sierra 2 Sage Shop Hop

And you CAN'T miss their famous bathroom! Too cute, Too fun. It's a must see (very pink as you can see below)!

I, of course, could not leave without a few new treasures. LOVE these fabrics! Thanks Fabric Chicks!!

You will just LOVE both Beth and Michelle. Stop by and see their wonderful shop and keep supporting our local quilt shops!!

Fabric Chicks Fabric Winner!

And the winner is...Sandi!!

Sandi, you have won the gorgeous Fabric Chick's fabric giveaway.

The winner was generated using a random number generator (in order to be fair)! :)

Sandi, if you will send me your mailing information, I will get this fabric off to you! Contact me at: passionquilter4u@aol.com

Thank you EVERYONE for commenting! My blog is just getting started but I so appreciated each and every comment. THANK YOU!!!

Heather

Fabric Chicks GIVEAWAY!

This weekend I drove down to the Fabric Chicks Quilt Shop in Minden, NV. I had a terrific time and can't wait to share with you my interview with shop owner, Beth Watts. She has such an AMAZING shop. So creative and so many different things going on there.

Beth provided us with a special giveaway. A collection of fat quarters in 8 different patterns. Representative of Beth's shop, these cuts are modern fabrics in a variety of colors.

Want to win them? Just leave me a comment and you'll be entered into a drawing for these fabulous fabrics! I'll pick the winner on Sunday, June 27th.

And please, check out the Fabric Chicks website and visit them next time you're driving through the Minden, NV area.

Tiny Ticker Tape Tutorial

Over at Sew Mama Sew, I discovered a really cute way to use up small scraps with a tutorial for making a Tiny Ticker Tape Quilt for dolls.

(It was actually based on a quilt from Crazy Mom Quilts- the original was a much larger version, as you can see in this link, and if I'm reading it correctly, Crazy Mom Quilts is actually the creator of this doll quilt as well.)

Since I have a 4 year old niece I decided to try my hand at making one!

Here's what it looked like before binding...

And with binding...

I gave it to my niece this weekend and she happily agreed to pose with it out in the sunshine.

She's so beautiful!

Fallon Quilt Show

A few weeks ago, my Mom and I got away to the Fallon Quilt Show in (where else?) Fallon, NV.

Only about an hour from Reno, we set off early in the morning and arrived just as the show was opening that Saturday morning. We weren't really sure what to expect since we had never been to this show before. The show is sponsored by the Nevada Quilt Guild, a guild representing the rural communities of Nevada. There is a LOT of wide open space in this state and only a few large cities (i.e. Reno, Las Vegas) so this guild supports the smaller communities in Northern Nevada.

As Fallon is a smaller area, the show itself, was small but represented the community as well as any large quilt show. There were a handful of vendors representing local quilt businesses as well as those who traveled long distances.

I was particularly "smitten" with an adorable shop called the Rusty Crow Quilt Shop. My Mom and I STOCKED up on Moda fabric. This is her going through piles of fabric on the floor!

Can you see her down there? :)

I bought a GREAT pattern at the Rusty Crow (in addition to plenty of fabric). Called the "Scrappy Nest", this is just the ultimate pattern for getting rid of scraps with minimal effort for an amazing finished project!!

Okay, this is a WAY cute pattern with great directions!! I love that she even inserts a sense of humor into the directions! ;)

You can see in this close up just how adorable this quilt really is!!

Just think how many scraps you could use up!

Shawn, the owner, is absolutely delightful! She is obviously extremely talented not only as a pattern designer but her booth was fun and brimming with "quilting eye candy"!

If you want to know where she's going to be next, check out this page from her website: Rusty Crow Show Schedule.

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The Quilts!

My Mom and I drooled over the quilts on display. She is a new longarmer (a proud Nolting owner) and, specifically, she was looking for quilting ideas. We were just blown away by the quality of the quilting! The more we focused in on the quilting, the more we saw the complex, quality of these quilts!

I've included a few of my favorites from the show.

This quilt was titled "Fancy That" and was made by Christine Carpiaux.

It's difficult to see here but all of those quilted lines you see fanning out in the quilt are HAND Quilted!!

This quilt was titled "The Cat's Meow" by Sandra Goodfellow.Because of the way the quilts were set up, I could only get a side view of this quilt but it was simply BREATHTAKING!

I loved her colors, loved, loved, loved them!

I noticed that this particular pattern was the subject of a Mystery Quilt Retreat and there were numerous quilts made up of this pattern at the show.

It was exciting to see all of the different ways this quilt looked based on the choice of colors and fabric!

I was amazed at this quilt although the name should have given it away, I suppose!

Made by Jan Reranzone, the quilt was called, "Cheater, Cheater, Cheater".

As you may be guessing, it was made from a Cheater Cloth but I SWEAR, it was impossible to tell!

Jan is a magnificent quilter!!

Thanks for stopping by!