Festival (The Ultimate Shop Hop)

Saturday my BFF Amie and I loaded up and went to the International Quilt Festival.  Since another dog is not within the realm of possibility (Hey Bosco needs a friend)  I told hubby I'd like to do my own Christmas shopping this year at festival...on his dime.  He was more than happy to oblige.  So here's my haul...

 

First order of business was notions.  This is where you really can get good deals (financially) at IQF.  The fabric shopping is really just so-so on price but the selection is so much better.  It's like the ultimate shop hop...quilt shops from all over the country come to sell their goods. I got 24,000 yards of thread, some marking pens, olfa blades, spray baste, and other little notions I always seem to lose.

I DID buy a lot of fabric.  I know, I know...I said I want to buy on a project by project basis but this is something that is the direction I want to go in and it's also something that I can't get easily around here, especially not at that price.   There are also about 10 more yards that you don't see here of Moda Crossweaves that I got for almost half off.  Amie and I both want to start working in shot cottons so we split several half yards from the booths at festival to get a nice selection.  I can't tell you how nice it is to have a best friend who likes the same hobby and even fabrics as you.  I even got several purples Josie!!!  I don't hate purple ( I actually love and wear eggplant and I like dusty lavender & violet) but I really hate most purples you see in a quilt shop...y'all feelin' me on that?  It is hard to find pretty purples and true blues in a quilt shop, I think.    I am not a grape purple kinda gal, but earthier purples I can deal with.   I am so inspired by the quilts in the upcoming Kaffe Fasset book that I want to be able to run with that.  

I was lucky enough to get a contact sheet of all the quilts in the book and I am drooling over them.  I probably won't remake the exact quilts in the book since picking or writing the pattern is the part of quilting I love most, but I am so inspired by those quilts and I want to be able to have a stack of fabrics on hand to audition and not just order those on an as-needed basis.  PS, in the book they call the quilts by their OLD SCHOOL names.  The cover is a Chimney Sweep and my favorite Zigzag is just a zigzag...no chevrons in there.  That wins major points with me! 

Even though I can't use this fabrics til Christmas, they have gotten me really excited about creating again.  I started working on a pattern or tutorial (not sure just yet).    I was going to do a free tutorial but Amie saw the mock ups in EQ7 and said it should be a real pattern in various sizes.  We'll see.  It feels good to be back in the saddle again!