You know it's a good day when....

.....you leave your house in the morning and the trunk of your car is empty. 

You return several hours later with a trunk full of Marcia Derse bolts!

The making of a green glass door

Of the four patterns I had at spring market, my favorite is green glass door.  I actually drew this design shortly after we opened--over 5 years ago!  It took this long for me to get together a great grouping of green fabrics, make the quilt and write the pattern.  That's one of the funny things I have found about designing and publishing patterns--often designs that we sketch out take years to come to fruition. 

Anyway, starting a second sample of green glass door is one of the first things I did upon returning home from market a few weeks ago.  This time, I decided to make it in blues.  It always starts with some sort of inspiration for me...in this case, a collection of blue bottles I have sitting on a windowsill in my studio.

Then, a stack of fabrics.  It never hurts to have way more than you could ever use!

Then I dive in and start cutting pieces, one at a time.  Although I usually like to cut multiple pieces at a time for the sake of efficiency, I make an exception for this quilt because I want to make fabric placement decisions as I go along.  As I cut, I place the block centers on a design board.  A big part of the success of a green glass door is having an even dispersement of large/small, dark/light, funky/non-funky prints.  I want to make sure that I do not cut too many of my favorites, which could make the quilt less interesting,

I also like to make sure to include some really random fabrics--fabrics that I bought because I loved, but did not necessarily have a plan for.  Like this print with the chairs...chairs with birds!  So random and so fun!!

Sometimes, things can get a little messy on my cutting table during this process. 

Once I have cut the centers, I start cutting strips for the frames and pinning them up on the board with the centers.

Once I think I have the frames and centers set, I start to sew them all together.  It's a lot of fun, really.   And I like how the process of making this particular quilt differs from our other quilts.

Anatomy of a Quilt Market Booth

We are back from Salt Lake City.  The dust has settled.  I have unpacked my suitcase and done all of my laundry.  I have put away all of the cards and pamphlets that we picked up in a "spring 2011" file (which I may or may not open again...) and I have checked and answered my email which I did not have access to while we were away.

Being back at home, it all seems like it never happened.  What we worked so hard for over the past couple of months seems as it could have been a dream.  But no worries, I have pictures to prove otherwise.

When you arrive at the convention center, your booth looks like this:

You turn the corner and just hope and pray that all of your boxes that have been sitting in storage for a couple of weeks are there, all in one piece and with everything in them.  In our case, they were.  And we immediately began unpacking and setting up.  For the next couple of hours, Janine and I worked at setting up the booth.  We have, by now, gotten this down to a science.  Janine stands on the tables and hangs the blue curtains and then the quilts while I hand her the pins and the curtain hooks.  (We scrounged around for a few shows to get those curtain hooks.  We used to pick them up off of the floor as we were leaving shows until Christy, one of our designers, thought to ask one of the workers at a retail show we were doing.  He actually gave us an entire bagful, just like that!)

Little by little, the booth takes shape.

The last details to be taken care of after the quilts are hung are the lights and the sign.

Then, we go out into whatever city we are in to find some flowers.  We have kept the tradition of having flowers in our booth ever since our first market, when my quilting group sent us a huge bouquet for good luck.  In Salt Lake I looked in the phone book and settled on The Rose Shop.  After a quick phone call, I discovered that store in question was located in a mortuary building not far from where we were staying. We all trucked down there (Sean, Maggie, Janine and I), and, seeing no particular signage, marched right through the front door....and into a wake!  And then proceeded to ask someone who looked official but who did not work there exactly where we could find said Rose Shop.  It was a little embarrassing.  But, we did manage to find the shop located in the back of the building and they did an absolutely wonderful job on our floral arrangements.

For the next three days, we took turns hanging out in the booth and walking around taking in the sights.  If you were there and came to see us, thanks for stopping by!  If not, we hope to meet you sometime soon.  We had a great time in Salt Lake City.  Our new patterns were very well received.  And we are excited to spend part of the summer making some new samples of our new quilts!

Hats for Uganda

Growing up, there were always projects at various stages of completion around our house.  My mom usually had 2 or three 'big' things she was working on in her sewing room, like a dress for one of us (or herself if she should happen to find a few extra hours) or a quilt or even drapes.  In fact, looking back on it, my mom knew how to do everything!  Anyway, aside from the bigger projects she was working on, there was always some hand piecing, needlepoint, handmade ornaments or some knitting laying around to fill those spare moments in the car, waiting at dance or play practice or even while watching a movie.  One of the things that continually impresses me about my mother is her sheer desire to create things all of the time--even if she's tired, or has her grandchildren crawling on and around her, or is interrupted by something infinitely less fun than what she's working on--like making dinner.  I'm pretty sure I inherited my love of all things fiber from her.  She and my grandmother used to take my brother and I shopping when we were little and we rarely passed up a fabric or yarn shop.  In those days, Sofro fabrics was actually inside the mall--can you imagine if you could go shoe shopping and stop at your favorite quilt shop on the way out of the mall??  That's almost as good as looking at fabric on your laptop in your pajamas.  And both can spell trouble if you are not given to restrain yourself around fabric and yarn.  My brother and I would invariably groan on the way into the fabric store saying "you are going to be in here FOREVER!"  and my mother would just chuckle, knowing that even five minutes in a fabric store would seem like forever to us.  At some point, however, I started paying attention at these stores and even wandering around and touching all of the fabric--a habit I still have to this day.  And before I knew it, I had my own stash of yarn and fabric growing in my closet, which I had to move over to make room for my prom dress and collection of Nancy Drew books.  I also started a collection of baskets full of projects that fill my time when I am not piecing a quilt at my machine.  Thanks to my mom, one of those projects is now making a few little hats for orphans in Uganda.  One of the ladies in her knitting group has a friend who has a friend (you know how that is...) who visited St. Mary Kevin's orphanage last year and has plans to go again this Christmas.  Of course everyone is anxious to help in anyway they can and one of the things she knows the children like is hats!  Boys and girls both have to cut their hair short to avoid lice so they wear these hats.  My mother, of course, has already made a number of them.

For some of them, she used patterns she had laying around her studio.  But she designed the little orange and blue cutie herself....

In the midst of all of the preparations we have been doing for market, I am still going to find the time to knit a couple of these simple hats.  I am sure that I can handle a Christmas deadline (I am actually laughing as I write this because the truth is, I might not be able a Christmas deadline but I am certainly going to try)!

I'm in!!

It's official....my new studio is now open for business. A few days ago, our contractor left out the back basement door, and I came down the stairs with my rotary cutter in hand to start working...at long last.  There are still a few finishing touches that need attention--like changing out the hinges to match the doorknobs (I have discovered a new love in redoing our basement.  I am obsessed with doorknobs!), grouting the shower in the new bathroom and hanging some sconces and overhead lights.  But even with these last things undone, it is complete heaven to work down there.  And the best part is that it has been raining non-stop here for the last week or so and I do not even have to think about water coming in because of the drain tiles we had installed last November.  An unfinished basement is one thing, but water pouring in around your longarm frame is quite another story!

The first project to be tackled in my new space was to finish my last quilt for spring market, which is approaching at breakneck speed.  Janine came so we could do some tag-team sewing.  I know I have mentioned team sewing before but seriously--try it if you have a deadline and any willing and able body to iron seams for you.  You won't believe how much you can get done in an evening!  We sewed for hours and things got a little messy....

People wandered in and out to see what we were up to and even Maggie gave us a hand!

I love this quilt!  I have been wanting to make it ever since I drew it shortly after I first started designing. It's called Green Glass Door--so named after a game my sister Anna used to play as a kid.  I had a lot of fun collecting the fabrics for this quilt.  I made sure to have some random prints like green peppers and chairs.  They are all framed with green solids.

And a quilt with random fabrics deserves a random backing....like this fish print!

All of my market quilts are now at the quilter's---sadly, I do not have the time to quilt them myself.  But it is a tremendous relief to have them all done--and with a couple of days to spare.  I am not quite sure what I will do with myself!

Happy Easter!

Have a beautiful Easter Sunday! 

 I hope your Easter Basket is full of fabric.....

Southeast Wisconsin in 8 hours

On Thursday, we did a lecture and trunk show for the Lake Country Quilt Guild that meets in Delafield, Wisconsin.  We love going to different quilt guilds and talking about quilting.  First of all, we get to meet a ton of new quilters in the process, and second of all, we get to take advantage of some face time in the car to talk Blue Underground business.  We got a little lost when we got off the highway...but that only adds to the fun.  Delafield is a super cute town!  The Lake Country Guild has great quilting spirit-- we had a lot of fun with them and their guild meets at 9:00 AM so we had some time to bum around our favorite hang outs after the meeting.  That of course started with lunch at my mom's!  After lunch we went to two of our favorite quilt/fabric shops in the area:  Patched Works, Inc. and Bigsby's Sewing Center.  Both are on Watertown Plank Road in Elm Grove.

Janine and I are hardly ever known to pass up a fabric buying opportunity.  We love the fact that we can find completely different fabrics at each of the quilt shops we frequent even if they are down the street from each other!  Both of these shops rank high on our 'favorites' list.

Bigsby's carries many of Lonni Rossi's fabrics (printed by Andover).  Of course I had to zero in on the green section--I don't think I will ever get over green--it really is my favorite color.  I have a ton of green fabric, I've made a respectable amount of green quilts, and if I didn't wear so much black even all of my clothes would be green!

They also have a great selection of buttons.  I am loving the fact that they organize them in a rainbow palette.

And if you are feeling over burdened by the number of bolts you have chosen to buy from, do not worry!  They will wheel you over a sewing chair to relieve your stress...

I started a collection of Lecien and Lecien-type fabrics on this shopping trip.  They are not my usual bright colors but I have a specific project in mind.  I want to make a wall quilt for the new bathroom in my soon-to-be finished studio.  I chose a tealy-grey paint color called arrowroot from the Martha Stewart collection at Home Depot.  I cannot stop thinking about how great these fabrics would look with that paint...In fact, I thought about it the whole time I was sewing a quilt for market today!

As soon as I can move into my new studio (which could be as soon as Sunday evening!!!!!), this is going to be the first stack of fabrics to go on my cutting table.  I might not be able to sew them right away, but I can at least look at them while I am sewing other things!