New Toys for ME!

Having spent two of the last three evenings in quilt shops, I suppose it was inevitable the Sweat Shop would gain a few new additions. I swear I have no willpower! Sometimes I read Vicky's confessional blog posts about how far she's fallen off the latest fabric diet and just shake my head and feel a little sorry for her--of course, I can't feel TOO sorry for her since she has all that lovely fabric. But really I probably have less willpower than Vicky--I think the main difference is that I don't even TRY to do the fabric diet thing. Then there's the second big difference--so far my kitchen cupboards hold . . . well KITCHEN stuff, not fabric!

And speaking of Vicky, she MADE me go on over to the FQ Shop and buy some of Minnick & Simpson's new Winter line. These are the wonderful designers of the Prairie Paisley yumminess and I think I'm probably destined to buy some of every line they design in the future. But Vicky megged me on this one, that's for sure. From now on, I think I'll have Kimberly Jolly send Vicky my fabric bills! And while I was button-poking with the best of them, I poked a button that added to my order a pattern called Winter Charms by Late Bloomer Elizabeth. Here are my It's-Totally-Vicky's-fault goodies (that's a layer cake of the Winter fabric):

If you like these, you can get your own--just go over to the FQ Shop and tell them to charge it to Vicky!

Okay, and that's not even what I started writing about--the two-quilt-shops-in-three-days-and-boy-am-I-getting-a-big-credit-card-bill blog post.

Monday night at Bear Paws and Hollyhocks. Maybe I should first tell you that I resisted a paper mache Firecracker Girl figure that I've been VERY tempted to buy. Not impressed? Well, it made ME feel a little more virtuous when I left the store without it! But here's what I didn't leave the store without:

The first photo is a jelly roll from the Ruby's Flower Garden by Kathy Schmitz, and then there are two charm packs from Hemming House by Brannock and Patek. I also bought some of this toille-like Christmas print:

Tonight at Quilter's Corner. First, the thing that made me feel like the evening was a good "bargain" in the long run--I won a door prize! I had my choice of several things and I picked the "mystery bag" which this year has generally been donated UFOs from the Thimbleberries Club leaders. I opened the bag to find an already-pieced fall tablerunner in "vintage" Thimbleberries fabrics, together with the fabric for the backing and binding that had already been cut and ironed. Can I hear a wooo-hooo from the crowd?! Here's a photo of much but not all of the runner which was WAAAAY too long for anything but a panoramic shot, but you get the idea:

And the stuff I purchased. Two charm packs of the Thimbleberries Christmas line, Christmas Punch.

For a long time, I've been enchanted with the stitchery designs of Bronwen Hayes, but they're hard to come by here in the U.S. Finally I got my hands on one of her books without having to pay shipping from Oz!

A couple more Schnibbles patterns--totally because I'm thinking of you guys and not for me at all! Because you know what I said the other day--as I make these Schnibbles patterns, I'll be doing drawings to give the patterns away right here on this old blog! So these probably don't really count, do they?

And check out this pattern:

This quilt is quite different from any I've made before. As I was purchasing the pattern, one of the shop owners who had made it told me it was paper pieced. Well, I don't paper piece, but it's not a very intricate little block, so I can either try the paper piecing or just do it using templates.

Okay, I think I'm done. I'm going to have to stay home, now, and play with my new toys. So it's up to all of YOU to stimulate the economy, okay? 'Cause I'm about stimulated out!