Oregon!

Polly and I are back from our trip west. We had a fabulous time despite our very long travel day yesterday, which had delayed flights, sick infants, and last but not least..... a matronly seat companion who sang, talked to herself, and clapped all through the flight. Yes, travel isn't quite as glamorous as you would hope.

Oh, enough of the travel whining. Let's start talking about Holly Hill Quilt Shoppe! At the risk of upsetting many, many wonderful quilt shop owners - I will take a risk here and state that Holly Hill Quilt Shoppe is the best shop I have EVER visited. Ever. Make sure to stop there if you are ever in the area. You can lose yourself for hours, and while you are at it, make sure to take a class there. You will be treated wonderfully. Here are a couple of photos of the classroom (not the shoppe).Look at the happy applique students. Yes, "happy" and "applique" in the same sentence. We did one day of needle turn applique and then one day of rug hooking and the 3rd day we just worked on our choice. It was fun, relaxed and just a great workshop. Speaking of being treated very well, here is the gift basket that greeted each student.

Jan and Brian and their extremely competent staff went all out.

I didn't get any pictures of the shoppe as I, er....well.... I am not competent. Check out some more pictures on Holly Hill's blog here.

Thanks to everyone involved, staff and students. We would go back in a heart beat - and it looks like we will. Keep checking the blog for an announcement.

We like our students and they seem to like us. They gave us great tips - the most important one was where to stop for ice cream on our drive down through Oregon. They were right! Peggy's at the Rice Hill exit was THE place for ice cream.
More tales of Oregon tomorrow. Now on to unpacking, laundry, and opening tons of mail.

Laurie

Strip Smart Quilt Book Winner!!

Go on over to Kathy's blog and see who won books and rulers! Thanks for visiting!!


Laurie and Polly

Happy Father's Day

We hope you are spending it with your Dad, or your spouse and children. It's a beautiful day here in Ann Arbor and we just got back from a Father's Day Brunch at Zingerman's Roadhouse. Zingerman's won the James Beard Award AGAIN this year. Well deserved. If you are ever in the area- make sure to give yourself a treat and go.

Polly and I are getting ready for our trip to Oregon in a few days. We both will teach at Holly Hill Quilt Shoppe in West Linn Oregon and then I will assist Polly at a rug hooking workshop in Eagle Point Oregon. I am teaching a block from our soon to be published book. Don't worry - I will post lots of info on that as soon as I can.Hint... the book is the quilt that is in the lower left hand picture and you will remember it as the one with all the berries that I worked on last summer.

Speaking of Father's Day, it reminds me of kids. Which reminds me of a conversation Polly and I had a few months ago. Basically the nature of kids and their intrinsic personalities. We were discussing kids and their different personalities and how their "nature"is pretty clear, even as toddlers. You can educate, discipline, nurture kids all in the best possible way and that will ensure them the skills for life, but their basic nature is what it is. A worrier is a worrier. A free spirit is a free spirit. All you parents know this to be true.

What does this say about Polly and I?? Well, all I will say is that once Polly got her first job as a teenager, her first purchases were home dec items for her bedroom. Once a decorator - always a decorator. Me?? All I will tell you is that my favorite toy as a kid were paper dolls. Loved them!My favorite thing was cutting them out, more than actually playing with them. Cutting out the clothes and organizing them. Sometime during my childhood, "punch out" clothes for paper dolls came into being. THAT was a sad day. Remember Betsy McCall??I came across this picture yesterday on Pinterest. That picture yesterday took me on a sentimental journey, aided by the internet, trying to find my favorite paper doll. I found her here.Wendy and Her Wardrobe!! Wendy was a bit different than other paper dolls. Instead of clothing to cut out - there were pages and pages of fabric swatches printed onto paper and you used a clothing template (the blue shapes above) to MAKE her clothes. There were pages of wool tweeds and cotton calicoes. I bought every Wendy Paper Doll book at the local drug store and spent the next couple years looking for more in every store I went into. I was obsessive about fabric way back when. I'm so glad that my parents put up with my Wendy and Her Wardrobe obsession. Who knew.....

Laurie

Winner!!!

Thanks everyone for playing along. The winner of the American Banner Rose Fatquarter™ bundle is Alicia


Alicia - email me here and I will get it out to you asap!

Laurie

Glorious June

Pay attention, people.....we have a lot of material to cover today. Lets start out with a picture from Gibby's and my walk this morning.It's peony season here in Michigan. My favorite flower. Yard after yard had jaw dropping blossoms on display. The pale pink, heck all of the pink, are my favorite. After our walk I went to the Ann Arbor's Farmers Market. It's also strawberry season.Some of these went home with us. We are going to have strawberry shortcake tonight for dinner. What else you ask? Nothing else. Just strawberry shortcake. We'll have protein and vegetables tomorrow. These babies are ripe and ready right now, and these are the real deal. Not like the beautiful strawberries found at the supermarket (that are lovely outside and bitter and white inside) - these are ruby red all the way through. The season is short and I must take advantage.

These were also in abundant supply at the market, but alas, I have no green thumb.What else?? oh the Detroit Tigers are in first place and what else?? Take a look at this.Yes, 100 quilts in 100 days. Read about it here.

Oh, and if you happen to gander over on the left - it seems we have passed the 500 mark on our followers. Thanks everyone! In honor of that, make a comment here before June 17th, midnight and you could win a fat quarter collection of American Banner Rose.
That's not much time. We'll get this out to you before Polly and I fly out for a trip to the west coast.

Laurie

Strip Smart Blog Hop!

It's been an odd week, filled with inconveniences and frustrating starts and stops. It started with a 4 hour delay on the tarmac in Fort Myers, Florida. There was an afternoon spent in the hospital awaiting tests that proved, that despite a few scares, that everything was A-ok. A quilt top that was sent to the machine quilter was found to be, well.... a bit WRONG once we studied the pictures. We are awaiting it's return so it can be corrected. There were a couple of good things: Bill got to spend a day on the set of The 5 Year Engagement, a movie shooting here in Ann Arbor, and he was paid to do it; and we were asked to join the Strip Smart Blog Hop.
Today is our day! Thank you Kathy, for asking us. How could we not be delighted! Our Clermont Farms fabric is looking pretty good on the front cover. Kathy named this quilt Fat Man's Squeeze. You'll have to get this book to know why. You will want this book no matter what. It uses the Quarter-Square Triangle ruler and makes quick work of Jelly Roll™ strips into quarter square triangles.

Just sew two Jelly Roll™ strips together, press to the dark, and use this handy ruler.
In no time, you will have enough to make Fat Man's Squeeze and lots of other quilts.
It just so happens that I designed a quilt independently of this book, and my quilt uses quarter square triangles. Our dedicated assistant Leigh Ann used this ruler and it sped up the process. Look for this quilt in an upcoming issue of American Patchwork & Quilting. Thanks, Kathy for the ruler and the book.

Make a comment on this post and Kathy will pick a winner for your own copy of the book and ruler. AND...... there will be a grand prize drawing, so make sure to visit all the blogs on the hop.

June 10 - Pam Vieirra McGinnis - PamKittyMorning!
June 11 - Laurie Simpson - Minick and Simpson - Right Here!
June 12 - Tara Darr - Sew Unique Creations
June 13 - Joan Ford - Hummingbird Highway
June 14 - Linda Lum De Bono - Linda Lum De Bono
June 15 - Elizabeth Scott - Late Bloomer Quilts
June 16- Lissa Alexander - Moda Lissa
June 17 - Vickie Eapen - Spun Sugar Quilts

June 18 - Camille Roskelley - Simplify
June 19 - Debbie Field - Granola Girl Designs

Thanks!!

Just One Star Update

Remember when we asked you to make some star blocks for the Just One Star Project?

We made lots of these....
And then we all mailed them to Moda Fabrics to be made into these.....
Well, boy did we! Moda asked for 1800 blocks to make 100 quilts. At last count, they received over 12000 blocks with many more packages not even opened up yet. The best guess is that instead of the planned for 100 quilts - it's going to be closer to 1000 quilts. Uh, they all won't be made for the Flag Day deadline, that's for sure, but they will all be made eventually.

Thank you everyone! Thanks especially to Moda Fabrics who donated the fabric and especially to Lissa Alexander and Susan Stiff who spearheaded this project. Some blocks and accompanying fabric is making it's way to me and I will do my part putting some of these tops together.

Thanks everyone!

Polly and Laurie

It's Been Awhile

Time flies. Especially when your sister puts you to work. I just got back from South Florida. Polly and I were working on several things. This was a photo shoot on the beach in Naples. Not of me, or my feet - thank the lord - but some pictures of our stuff for an upcoming book. How hot was it? Hot! Damn hot. So hot that Polly, myself, and the photographer were hopping around on the sand. And we were wearing sandals. I quickly ran into the water to cool the piggies off. Maria, our photographer got some great shots before we all burst into flames.

What else did we do? We discussed, doodled and tried to figure out our next fabric collection by studying antique fabric scraps. I think we're almost there. Just a few more finishing touches. Caffeine proves to be invaluable in this endeavor. We also ate out each night. That is how we reward ourselves. This was what we saw when we ate in Old Naples Sunday night. We were tempted to borrow it for a joyride, but good sense prevailed. Now that we are back in the home/work mode - look for more frequent blog posts. In fact, I am scheduled for a blog hop on Saturday.....The Strip Smart Blog Hop

June 10 - Pam Vieirra McGinnis - PamKittyMorning!
June 11 - Laurie Simpson - Minick and Simpson - Right Here!
June 12 - Tara Darr - Sew Unique Creations
June 13 - Joan Ford - Hummingbird Highway
June 14 - Linda Lum De Bono - Linda Lum De Bono
June 15 - Elizabeth Scott - Late Bloomer Quilts
June 16- Lissa Alexander - Moda Lissa
June 17 - Vickie Eapen - Spun Sugar Quilts

June 18 - Camille Roskelley - Simplify
June 19 - Debbie Field - Granola Girl Designs

Nice fabric for the cover quilt, eh?

Laurie

Because It's June!

Well, just because. I am enchanted by the orange costumes against the blue of the sky and the water. Yum. I have been pinning a lot of this color combo on Pinterest lately.
I think an orange and blue quilt is in my future. Here's hoping you have a wonderful June filled with color, cool water breezes, and of course - dancing sailors.

Laurie