It was a bit of a whirlwind trip. Nancy and I drove up Friday night with a Burgerville stop, and got to hang out with Michelle, Brittany, Kaci, Rachel and Cherri for a glass of wine and some fabric-shop-hop show and tell. Saturday morning, I did my book event at the Pendleton Woolen Mills booth, which was great – thank you to everyone who came to say hi!

Then, Nancy, Brittany, Michelle and I walked the show for another five hours of awesome treasure hunting – the four of us brought some good things home. Here are my finds, roughly in the order I snapped them up. I started with this fabulous plaid waterproof laminate tote at the Pendleton booth, which held everything else I got all afternoon.

And I could NOT resist these Sublime Stitching sew-in labels, also from Pendleton (if you’re in Portland, they have them at the WMS in Southeast). Genius.

I bought a yard each of the new ice blue and fresh green Pearl Bracelet from Island Quilter,

assorted yards and half-yards of Lotta Jansdotter Echo prints from Heartway International,

a beautiful 8.5″ x 11″ card of 42 vintage pearl buttons, “carded between 1945 and 1955 in Pennsylvania,” from Betty Henry,

two yards of this darling Tammis Keefe holiday reindeer reissue from Michael Miller for a tree skirt (can’t remember the vendor but will look for the receipt and try to update!),

and a pezzy mono-color jelly roll from Sandy of American Jane herself. She was so nice and so happy about the reissue, and I was so excited to get some of this fabric!!

Then, I got some very special trims and ribbons from Nifty Thrifty Dry Goods. I fell in love with the scissors ribbon, and needed the bluebirds too (I already have them in pink), plus the tiny red-and-white trim and the measuring twill tape. Then I saw a $9 package of 3 large shank-style milk glass buttons – very nice, but not my button style – with this darling scanned “baby pearls” label.

Since my daughter is a Pearl and I love pearl buttons so much, I asked the owner if she had any other buttons or trim packaged with this same vintage image that I could buy instead. She cut the label free of the three buttons, handed it to me and charged me 50¢ for it. So sweet of her! I will definitely be shopping with NTDG again soon.

I also got to meet Angie from The Quilting Loft, who is lovely! I fell for a gorgeous sample of this Indygo Junction dress in her booth sewn in a Lotta print, so I got the pattern, plus some adorable dot laminate, a yard of Valori Wells’ birch trees, and a yard of the Melody Miller typewriters.

I got this celebration print from Pacific Fabrics (plus two things not pictured – some large, unphotogenic placemat blanks that I’m going to try out with patchwork this week, and a beautiful vintage-button embroidery pattern they’d sold out of but are shipping me this week, no extra charge).

Two and half hours and another Burgerville stop later, we were back in Portland in time for the big game I’d DVRed to watch with my nephew who was in town this weekend (hi Julian!). Now I’m trying to decide what projects get what fabrics, in between finishing my Craft Hope tote bags and Think Outside the Block bee blocks, and dreaming of a PMQG –> Seattle ferry-powered shop hop weekend with friends…

If you are also sewing littlest warriors tote bags for Craft Hope (or making hats) and want to ship them together, or share photos, that would be great! Thanks to everyone who has contacted me or commented here or at PMQG. I will try to mail out Friday so they arrive in time, and would love to add yours (I’ll gladly cover shipping). Please email me over at portlandmodernquiltguild at gmail.com if you want to team up!

It took me awhile to finish my name tag (you can see a couple dozen awesome ones from February’s meeting over here btw!), because I couldn’t figure out how I wanted to write/print/embroider West Coast Crafty. I was dreaming of Gocco, but finally went super-simple with a lovely turquoise Sharpie from Collage.

Loving my 2012 craft project journal from Ex Libris Anonymous…

Finished name tag! I used blue Pearl Bracelet from Lizzy House for my main section and binding-tape lanyard, and yellow Peacock Lane from Violet Craft for my pennants, and the back. I embroidered my name, stitched down my bias tape, pinned the pennants in place, and then used Pellon 71F heavy interfacing for it instead of batting, stitched around 3 sides, trimmed and carefully turned it, fully fused it on the back, and then turned the raw edges in on the bottom and top-stitched the perimeter.

I’m confident there’s a prettier way to add the pinback than invisible thread, but oh well. I like the back and that cheery yellow!

At the February meeting (which was completely awesome and included a stellar talk by Kathy Miller and a Cotton Couture color card for each of us!),

I got to wear my finished Lisette market skirt. Hooray! I bought the Denyse Schmidt fabric at JoAnn at the end of January, started cutting and sewing it at the Fabric Depot All Day Sew and stitched the buttons on the day before the meeting. I really like this pattern.

Here are my thoughts:

1. I made View B which I think is super cute, but it’s short. Really, really short by my late-thirties’ standards (I think 18″) so I “hemmed” it with folded twill tape right over the raw edge, instead of losing any more length. When I sew it again, I’m adding a couple inches to its length for sure!

2. The six pieces (front center + sides, back center + sides), look REALLY similar on your sewing table. I notched them all (thank goodness) and was still struggling to figure out which were front, back, side, center, anything. Don’t unpin them all at once (oops).

3. Choose big, striking buttons for the plackets. I really loved how that defined the skirt style along with the neatly top-stitched panel seams. It’s really cool how the plackets also create an avenue for a belt, tie or scarf, like stylish belt loops.

4. This is a nice efficient pattern that will give you good-sized scraps for patchwork – yay – or… a headband! I sewed a headband to match and I really love it, on days where my messy hair is kind of driving me crazy it is a nice polished feeling. If you’d like to make one too, I love Caitlin’s tutorial, I just adapt it a bit for my love of vintage and excessive amount of long, thick hair.

Ok, last sewing thing! I’m really excited for our PMQG field trip to the Sew Expo in Puyallup, Washington this weekend! Nancy, Brittany, Rachel, Kaci, Cherri, Michelle, and I are all heading up to check out the show, the first time I’ve been in 10 years. If you are going too, I’m doing a book signing for both Modern Log Cabin Quilting and World of Geekcraft at the Pendleton Woolen Mills booth on Saturday from 10am-12noon, please come by and say hi and get a free quilt block or magnet kit. I’d love to meet you!

I will mail a box of my log cabin quilt kits to the shop on Monday to give away to any customers who wanted to come to the event, or pick up a copy of the book over the next few weeks. I’m also so happy to report that Angie has kindly offered to host a trunk show with lots of the book projects next spring, once The Quilting Loft moves to their lovely new location. So we’ll plan a make-up party for a few months out!

Again I’m so sorry to cancel at the last minute, but I’m really looking forward to the spring party – huge thank-you to Angie and the Quilting Loft for being so understanding. Happy weekend everyone!

Please stop by if you’re free! I would love to say hello and talk quilting with you, and I will definitely do some fabric shopping while I’m there…

Huge thank-you to Angie at the Quilting Loft, Katie of the Seattle Modern Quilt Guild, Megan, Kristen, and Blair for helping me set up something fun in Seattle. We are making a weekend mini-vacation of it and I can’t wait! Hoping to take a ferry (Pearl’s favorite thing to do there), visit the Olympic Sculpture Park, see some buddies and go to the art museum…

If you go:
MLCQ book party
The Quilting Loft
2601 NW Market St. Seattle, WA 98107
Saturday, 10/22 from 1-3pm
Free!

I first met Kathy at the 2009 Oregon State Fair when I got to try felting at the Pendleton booth – it was really fun! I wrote more about it then, but here are a couple of my photos…

Each person got to choose from beautifully dyed hanks of Pendleton wool and spindles of yarn for their mini-felting adventure. I would absolutely love to take the whole class!

If you go:

Felting for Young Crafters taught by Kathy Monaghan of Pendleton
Friday (#3021B), 2:30 – 5:00 pm/Sunday (#3021D), 11:00 am – 1:30 pm
Sew Expo, Puyallup, Washington
Kit includes: multi-needle felting tool, Pendleton carded wool, needle felting base, wool fabrics, wire armature, and instruction sheets ($20)

Along with my regional picks for out here, Julie Schneider handled the East Coast, Amanda Mauer Taflinger covered the Midwest, and The Wondercraft spotlighted the Southwest – there is some awesome crafty stuff around these days, to say the least!

I’m also very happy to be posting weekly at Geekcrafts.com again, and I just fell in love with this sweet little amigurumi R2D2 pattern by Janama on Etsy. I need to get a refresher course from the super-talented Linda and start crocheting again…

Thank you, Venus! Thank you, geekcrafts! I have one more writing-related announcement tomorrow that I am super excited about as well, more on that whenever Pearl lets me have a little more laptop time.

I’m part of a panel on Teaching Your Craft on Friday (2:45-4:00) and leading a discussion on Craft Activism on Saturday (1:15-2:30). I would love to see you at either one, or at the panels I’ll get to attend the rest of the time! We’re also planning on dim sum, a Bainbridge ferry ride, a park picnic, and a visit to the big beautiful public library.

Many thanks to Megan for her fantastic blog post this morning detailing a whole slew of great places to eat, shop, hang out, and enjoy yourself in the conference neighborhood. I don’t know Seattle well enough to confidently run around on my own (after a mere 13 years of visiting from just south) and her tips and links are super inspiring.

Hope to see you there!!

p.s. If you are into photography and looking for some new things to try, I wrote up my five favorite photo-related things lately over at CRAFT: for the July Bazaar round-up: Big Huge Labs, Photobooth Finder, Blurb books, Photo Transfer Fabric Sheets, and Qoop Calendars (here’s the September 2010 page of ours, featuring my teeny little Pearl in a big covered wagon at the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in Baker City). Happy picture-taking!

She has a list of all the stores that carry it nationwide if you’re looking for it, too. It’s also on her site and on Amazon.

Here’s the rest of the display of her cool colorful stuff… I snapped up some fun things!

Here’s my favorite project I’ve made with Kathy’s Crafty Chica line — an embellished collage piece for my Day of the Dead altar (how-to here on CraftStylish).

I used her Crafty Chica paints, glitter, cards and glue (along with rhinestones and a small blank canvas) to make the collage — more about it all here.

I had one more cool friend’s-crafts-sighting at the store too:

Yay Amy! I wish I were in Seattle right now…

Here in Portland, we are in for a treat tonight: Linda will be at Powell’s at 7:30, talking crochet and signing copies of Crochet Adorned! You can also check out this interview with her on the Oregonian’s knitting blog, and her live segment on this morning’s AM Northwest show — and she took this lovely photo of her book while visiting the Rose Garden yesterday. So pretty.

I’ll be writing more about her beautiful book tomorrow with some photos from her event…

And tomorrow night August 14, Ryan Berkley has a fantastic art show, Creature People, opening at Schmancy in Seattle!

I wish I could make it in person, but luckily for those of us not in the Evergreen State there will be plenty of online awesomeness to admire.

And all weekend, Handmade Nation is showing at Cinefamily in Los Angeles! Woo hoo!

Check out the Cinefamily site for lots more info on the gift bags, giveaways, book signing, mini-craft fair, and more!

If you go:

Linda Permann at Powell’s, 1005 W. Burnside St, Portland
Thursday, August 13 at 7:30 pm

(and at Yarn Garden, 1413 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland on Saturday August 15 from 1 to 3 pm)

Ryan Berkley at Schmancy Toys, 1932 2nd Ave, Seattle
Friday, August 14 from 6 to 9 pm

Handmade Nation at Cinefamily, 611 N. Fairfax, Los Angeles
Saturday, August 15 at 12 noon and 7 pm
Sunday, August 16 at 3, 5, 7, and 9 pm

We started out by cutting squares of fabric (I picked a lively, tiny vintage print) and prepping them for petal-making. I love that the raw fabric square is almost exactly the size of the finished flower — crafty alchemy!

A quick press with the mini-iron later, they were ready to fold. (Diane’s book has wonderfully clear step-by-step photos and instructions — these are just a few snaps of my process as we went.)

Folding the first petal felt like magic! I love origami and using fabric instead of paper was a really cool experience.

And in just a few minutes, I had eight of them pinned and ready to join! A neat stitch and pull later, they formed the sweetest flower-petal circle.

Then it was time to choose the center button (I am into buttons, and the red moonglow round was just the thing) and hot-glue a little circle of fabric down to cover the back.

I love my little flower! It took me a few days to decide what to ornament with it, but Diane looked awfully cute holding it brooch-style with her pretty new dress… so that’s what I did, too.

I’m excited to make some flowers in different sizes and colors — maybe some tiny bright ones for hairclips, and larger and summer-ier colors for brooches or stitching right onto a handbag. Kanzashi in Bloom illustrates so many possibilities for projects to make with the flowers, as well as invaluable tips for choosing fabric and deciding on details like centerpieces and petal shapes.

You can check out lots more kanzashi excitement at the book website, and in the flickr pool of reader projects! And if you’re in Seattle this weekend, Diane will be at Urban Craft Uprising today (Saturday, August 1), showing everyone how to make kanzashi from 12:30-1:30 and then signing books from 2-3 pm. I’ll be there too, and would love to see what you make! The projects from her Twisted event last week are so charming.

And then she’ll be back in Portland for another book signing at Powell’s Books downtown this coming Tuesday, August 4th, from 7:30 – 9:00. Locals, be sure to mark your calendars!