Road to California–Day 2!

First off!! I have a very exciting announcement! I received an email that Scraps & Shirttails II is HOT OFF THE PRESSES!! YES!! I have ordered 10 cases to take care of the pre-orders, and they should be on my doorstep waiting for me when I return from Louisiana on Feb 1st! We’ll start mailing in the order that the orders were received!

So I’ll have BOTH Scraps II and Word Play Quilts ready to ship starting Feb 2nd! How’s that for a Ground Hog Day Surprise!?

Look at Wanda’s “Old Tobacco Road”!  She did her pinwheels wonky and I just love the wild variety of fabrics in her quilt!

Yesterday’s class was “Jared Takes a Wife” and it was a completely full class with 26 students! We had the best time playing with our fabrics and you should see the variety in the blocks here!

		Jared Takes A Wife 1-20-2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Randy arrived yesterday and has been the biggest help. The logistics of getting the trunkshow from the hotel to the lecture room was accomplished thanks to Sherry and her Jeep, and included my first visit to In and Out burger in the process!  Just make mine ANIMAL Style! Mmmmmm!

Today’s class is Blue Ridge Beauty and we are in for a barrel of fun!

There is a roundtable demo night tonight where all the instructors demo their techniques and sell their books and wares so it will be another busy day.

I haven’t even had time to take a GLIMPSE into the show yet!!

Breakfast time, gotta run..have a great day!

Road to California, Day 1!

I know it is day 2 or 3 for some of the long arm teachers—they started on Monday in many cases! But today was the first day for me and it is oh so exciting!

Today’s workshop was Sister’s Choice……and I really really love this beginner-intermediate class!

My room came furnished with brand new fancy brother machines, and I had a brother rep, Coleen with me the whole day showing us how to set it for that perfect 1/4” seam, how to use the buttons, bells and whistles.

At first I thought “MACHINES PROVIDED, OH NO!!” because that meant every single person in the class would be sewing with a machine they were not familiar with, and I thought it would cause nightmares, but it turned out to be really fun, and if any of the students decide to purchase their machines, they will really get a super deal!

I had students from as far away as Maryland, and even some from Texas, so this is definitely a quilter’s mecca when January gets the blahs! It’s a bright and sunny oasis in the middle of the winter!

The pic you see above was my glimpse of set-up going on from the quilt show office windows above the show. I had gone in there to ask some questions ((And to tell them to turn our a/c OFF because it was starting to snow in our class room…lol!)) and I couldn’t resist whipping out my phone and snapping this pic from the window. I can hardly wait until the show starts “FOR REAL” tomorrow!

Here are a BUNCH of pics I took of people’s blocks today. They were all turning out SO great, and I love seeing the different color themes!

		Sister's Choice 1-19-2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

They were all so great! I keep thinking I need to retire this quilt and make a new one because it is one that is on my guest room bed a lot and has been washed and slept under and washed again and hauled around and the fabrics are starting to fade, but every one tells me that they LOVE how worn and cozy it looks and that IS the best life of a quilt after all, isn’t it? So…I keep dragging it around. Maybe one day I’ll make another one, only NOT. SO. BIG! ((You don’t believe that, do you??))

Tomorrow is going to be fairly crazy. I’ve got  someone coming with a Jeep at noon, meeting me to move the trunk show from the hotel room to the convention center because my lecture starts at 5pm, and class is out at 4:30pm…..do you see a time shortage here?! Never fear, we will get it sorted out, and go with the flow!

I’m off to take a long hot bath. I’m trying to stay up til 10pm west coast time so I don’t go too sleep too early and wake up at 4am again, but I think I’m fighting a losing battle. If I do wake up, there will be more hexagons