A Starbucks Kind of Day

AAA finally came yesterday, loaded up the van, and drove off at 10:45 a.m., which meant I managed to get on the road to run my errands around 11 a.m., two hours late, as the thermometer was somewhere in the high 80s and climbing. I picked up the mailbox keys and then headed to the nearest Starbucks for a small attitude adjustment. Refreshment and liquid energy in hand, I hopped back in the car and headed to one of our quilt shops in the area, Stitching Station.

Yes, I found a few things I couldn't leave the store without. I know many of you have been eyeing and buying fabric from the Holly Jolly line, and since I couldn't let all of you get ahead of me, I splurged on a jelly roll and a charm pack as well as a fat quarter from another line. I really like the print in that fat quarter and it looked nice with the Holly Jolly fabrics, so I thought I'd get it. Do I know what I'll do with these? Nope! I have visions of the braid quilts that Sharon has been making as well as an idea for a log cabin top, but whether I'll finally settle on either of the projects is a mystery right now since I have a lot of other projects to work on this weekend. I suspect I'll need to get a bit more of this fabric depending on what I finally decide, but at least this is a start!

When I wandered over to the pattern section in the store, it was quite a treat to see patterns by bloggers I "know." I couldn't pass up Elizabeth/Late Bloomer's cute Halloween applique pattern, although I can't imagine finding the time to get to it this year. But you never know! It was just too cute to not buy! And although I didn't buy any of her patterns, I saw several of Little Miss Primitives' patterns for her Raggedy Old Annie dolls. Cute patterns, but I have to keep stopping myself from wandering into other crafty areas for right now--I have too many quilt projects in progress and it's waaay too easy to get distracted! These are two fairly new designers whose patterns I haven't seen very often in shops, so it's fun to see them getting more exposure.

After the quilt shop, I stopped at Blockbuster for some DVDs to watch while I work on some applique in the next few days. I somehow managed to come home with SIX! I really was only going to rent four, but when I went to the register, I was told I could get two free older movies, so I picked up the second and third Harry Potter movies. I think I'm probably one of the last people on the planet who hasn't been totally immersed in Harry Potter, but believe it or not, I've only seen the first movie and I haven't read any of the books. So now I have plenty of DVDs to entertain me while I do hand work.

After that, the grocery store, which took a long time and cost a lot of money, but I rewarded myself with yet another Starbucks iced latte. If not for me, I'm sure Starbucks would go under. Oddly enough, I was flipping through channels last night and saw that Biography had a story on Starbucks, so I watched that. For some, it's Harry Potter; for me, it's Starbucks! I'm a total groupie! I told my husband, by the way, that after the fiasco with the van and having started the whole thing with the darn mailbox keys, he owes me 27 Starbucks iced lattes. I sure hope he remembers that on his way home from work tonight.

Driving home from the grocery store at 2 p.m., the temperature was about 100 degrees and I thought I just might die until the A/C finally kicked on a couple blocks from home. Then I had all the groceries to put away, and after that, a little nap was in order. One thing led to another, and by the time I finally made it into the Sweat Shop, it was 9:30 p.m. The first day of vacation that wasn't! I hope to do better today--maybe I'll have something to show you all tomorrow.

Compulsion

Do you ever feel like you’re being drawn to something, somebody, or somewhere? I was sitting at my desk at work this morning when I started to hear the voices calling to me. "Come to the quilt shop, Kim. Come to the quilt shop. We’re waiting for you. We have lovely things to show you. Lots and lots of lovely things." Of course I told them to shut up and leave me alone, but they persisted, as they often do. And, as is often the case, I was helpless to resist and forced to heed their siren’s song.

Once the lunch hour arrived, I threw off my Dictaphone ear piece, grabbed up my purse, and sprinted for the car, thereafter breaking several speed laws as I headed toward the quilt shop. (I’m pretty sure that breaking the speed laws wasn’t MY doing but rather the magnetic pull exerted upon the car.)

When I arrived at the quilt shop, I learned it wasn’t just me the voices were calling this morning. There I ran into another quilter I know. She had been babysitting a grand kid this week and was feeling sick today. Until her husband came home, that is, and took over the babysitting duties; then she made a miraculous recovery. And, in celebration of the miracle of good health, she too felt a need to visit the quilt shop and give thanks.

No, I actually didn’t buy a whole lot as it turned out. I picked up a different shade of blue thread for quilting the monster, a couple packs of Thimbleberries charm squares (the Christmas line), and a quilt magazine. And since it’s my birthday month, I received 15% off my purchases. But I did spend a nice chunk of time breathing in the scent of fresh fabric, touching and petting this and that, and feasting my eyes on the wonders that surrounded me. Too bad I had to ruin it all by heading back to work, but the weekend is almost here, and I can hardly wait!

By the way, I shamelessly copied the quilt shop photos from Nicole’s blog. She did a nice review of this particular shop, and I thought you’d like to see where I was. If you click here, you can read Nicole’s post.

Tired of Sad!

I don't know about you, but I'm tired of sad. I'm probably as tired of writing about sad stuff as you are reading about it. So let me tell you about what I did today.

In my "normal" life, the perfect weekend is one where I can live the life of a hermit--drive home from work on Friday night and not have to leave again until Monday morning. Of course, weekends don't always work out that way, but when they do, I'm happy as a pig in you-know-what. I spend my time quilting, watching some TV, reading books, reading blogs, writing blogs, cooking, etc. So here I am with the rest of the week off work--a great opportunity to indulge in my hermit existence, right? Well, I got to thinking about it, and I kind of thought that if I spent three days hanging around the house, under the current circumstances, I just might start feeling even more down about life. So what could I do instead? Well, it just so happened that today was the first of four days of our annual central northern California quilt shop hop--Quilt Rush. Did I want to do a little shopping? You betcha! It seemed to me that time spent driving would be the perfect opportunity for a little reflection, and time spent shopping would mean I wouldn't get to feeling too sad and sorry for myself.

Last year, my good friends Patty (from Florida) and Kairle (from Utah) came to stay and "hop" with me, and we had a wonderful time. In fact, I've done the "hop" every year since it began--I think the first year was 2000, so this would be the eighth year. I had decided a month or two ago that this year, I'd skip it. But here I was with time off and no commitments until Saturday when my brother comes to visit, so I decided I'd visit a few of the local shops.

My first stop was at Bear Paws and Hollyhocks--not one of the Quilt Rush shops but one of four shops hosting a separate hop. (Last year, Kairle, Patty, and I did both hops for a total of 20 quilt shops and about 650 miles in two days!) Not only is BP&HH the shop I spend the most time (and money) in, but for the hop, all fabric was 25% off--couldn't pass that up! Here are the few little things I couldn't manage to leave the store without:

Next, I drove a bit south of Sacramento to Country Sewing Center in Elk Grove. This shop is one of my favorites, but I don't visit it very often because it's about a 40 minute drive from my house and they're not open on Sundays. Again, I managed to find a few things to buy (that bundled fabric is a kit--it goes with the pattern to the right):

Heading back to Sacramento, I stopped at Quilter's Corner (another regular stop for me) and Tayo's. I managed to be a bit more thrifty at those shops, although I absolutely had to splurge on the woven FQ bundle at Quilter's Corner. (That photo at the top of my blog was taken of one of the displays inside QC.)

My last stop of the day was at a quilt shop not too far from home, Stitching Station in Roseville. In honor of the hop, they handed out a couple "freebie" patterns (top row, far right and far left)--they really have a great selection of patterns at their shop. They also had a great selection of discounted FQs, so of course I had to bring some FQs and patterns home with me. Oh, and I won that little Moda needle case on the bottom center--my name was drawn during their hourly drawing:

Originally, I contemplated doing the northern loop of shops tomorrow, which would take me by the town where my mom lives and would give me an opportunity to stop by and visit with her for a bit, but I think I've had my fill of driving, shopping, and goodies. It's still a possibility, but I think it might be the hermit act for me tomorrow--I'll just give my mom a call and chat a bit. I also have a house that's accumulated quite a bit of dust, dirt, and odds and ends that aren't in their proper places, and as much as I hate doing the cleaning, a clean house always makes me feel better. Today I also managed to drag myself around the grocery store before I finally headed home, so that "chore" is taken care of. I had to laugh because I bought a pizza to bake later this week, and when I got it home, I found it wouldn't fit in my side-by-side fridge--so it was pizza for dinner tonight! Oh well, after all the running around, I didn't feel much like cooking anyway.

But blueberries were on sale, so I bought some. Maybe tomorrow I'll bake a cobbler or something equally scrumptious and tempt you with pictures. Maybe I'll finish the piecing on my appliqued Jo Morton quilt top and share a photo with you. Maybe I'll end up with a clean house and feel like I'm a little more in control of my world. And maybe I'll play with some of the goodies I bought today! Happy quilting!