Playing With Jacks Day!

Yesterday was the Playing With Jacks workshop with the Heritage Quilters in Wallingford, CT!

What a fun way to explore color, value, layout, variations, everything! Where there are lots of designs that make it hard to know if a Jelly Roll or Bali Pop will work due to the unknown nature of what strips are contained depending on fabric line, amount of lights/darks, variety, etc…This class is a GREAT one for them. We use the easy angle ruler so the 2.5” strips work for 1/2 square triangles…and the chains up through the center of each block only require 3 2.5” squares…so even short strips can be put to good use. We just had a great time!

I love catching pictures of the blocks in progress---first some units, then one block, then a few blocks, and by the end of the afternoon whole layouts are starting to happen and come together.

I love walking amongst the students and catching little snippets of conversation, and laughter and friendships being formed, strengthened, support, love, caring---Quilters are just amazingly resilient people who are THERE for each other. I could tell that this is a very close knit and welcoming group, just by observing all that was going on around me through the past few days.

		Playing With Jacks, Wallingford CT, 2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

I also did a bit of damage at the guild sale table……they were selling bundles of 20 FQ’s for $18!!

How could I not HELP the local guild fund raising efforts?

There are some real goodies in here, including some old calicoes I absolutely loved from the 80s & 90s. How old does a fabric have to be to be considered VINTAGE?!

And yes, even in this bundle….there was a sneaky piece of Millennium Y2K fabric that has now found its way back into my stash, after I swore I had used all that my fabric hoard posessed! LOL! I think there is a conspiracy to have me never be OFFICIALLY “out” of Millenium fabric….it goes right up there in line with the “lucky cows” !!

After the workshop, I was chauffeured down to Yankee Cloth in Wallingford—If you ever have a chance to go, DO! It’s a wonderful shop in a terrific old house in the historic area of Wallingford, and I’ve never been in a more welcoming shop where I felt like I was “home!”

My pics aren’t as good as the ones on the shop website, this was late afternoon and the light outside was all wrong for detail shots, but wouldn’t you like to come spend some time on this front porch? Here in the door way is my chaperone Sue, making sure I don’t get into too much trouble, and the shop owner, Nancy, who was as sweet as she could be!

The whole house/shop is full of all kinds of different fabrics, and I found myself up at the sale area unable to break away! I found some deals too good to pass up for quilt backs, and some pieces where I just had to take “what’s left on the bolt” because I couldn’t bear to leave it!

I absolutely LOVED the blue piece on the far left…and that checkerboard thing toward the right….that is going to be an awesome back as well. And the paisley? Who can resist a good neutral paisley! But I tell you what..I’m going to have to reign in my self control, or my car won’t be able to contain it all!

OH---got a funny call this morning from DH who says “How do I run this floor steamer?” Ummm, you put water in it and you turn it on and you wait for steam I honestly wish I was there to witness this! Even better is that I didn’t have to be there to do it! Thank you, DH for being there to hold down the fort while I follow my dreams. It means more than you will ever know.

Check out time is in 50 minutes, I’m packing my bags, loading up the car, and making my way toward Trumbull CT where I’ll be spending the next couple of days with the CT Piecemakers!