What a Great Day!!!

What a fun day we had.... Vic, Paula, and I got to the store early and hauled in all of Paula's precious cargo (THE QUILTS!!) We hid them in the stock room to be shown later that evening at her Trunk Show.

The gals started arriving.... one by one... until the room was FULL and we were ready to get started. Vic and I hung out in the back of the room and worked on store samples while the sewing machines began to hummmmmm...... (I love that sound...don't you?) Paula introduced us to a new process of making our half-square triangles. It's called Spinning Stars! Wow... do we love these bad boys. We will be ordering them for the store. You're gonna love them! Talk about perfection!! Each half square triangle is perfectly pieced together and fits into your block like a "dream". Soon they were on their way to making their first block.....

We had all color combinations in the room and EVERY ONE OF THEM WERE AWESOME!!

Our sweet Thelma Henry (pictured above) finished first.... YEA!!! Thelma - good job...heck...she was the last one to enter the classroom and the first one to make a block. I told the room she was a "whizzer" at sewing and "BANG" she proved me right!! GOOD JOB THELMA!!

Look at this wonderful blue & brown color combination! Isn't it gorgeous! Thanks gals for coming from Tampa to be with us! We enjoyed having you here!

The entire group squished in together...showing off their blocks!! Congratulations gals..they are awesome!!

While Paula's students were working on their blocks, I was piecing a new quilt ! It's a copy of an antique bow tie quilt. When I was thinking of a name - I immediately thought of my Grandpa Rawley... we always called him "Pop Clyde" (his first name - Clyde). He was the best grandpa... he was thin, handsome, and neat as a pin! When hugging him he always smelled like Old Spice and Juicy Fruit gum...two of his favorites. When he got dressed up I remember him wearing bow ties. That's how I came up with my quilt name - "Pop Clyde's Bow Ties"!! I can't wait until it's finished. It's in the color palette I love the most "dark and dirty" - the primitive reproduction look.

Vicky was also working on one of our new patterns. Full of feminine soft florals - "Grandma Ruby's Scrap Basket" is surely going to be a beautiful - simple - fast quilt! I can't wait to see it quilted and bound! It's going to be popular...I can tell!!

Grandma Ruby was married to our Pop Clyde. We spent many summers swimming (they always lived by Shriner Lake) and ice skating in the winter...so much that we knew our ankles would break. Isn't it just the best to have childhood memories that will stay with you forever? I still miss both of them to this day. Grandma would spoil us and make our favorite foods when we visited... home made chocolate cream pie and yummy fried potatoes ... we loved them for breakfast! She was the best cook in the world...but oh my... was she a messy cook. I think she dirtied every dish and pan in her kitchen with every meal she made!

Soon our sewing time ended... class was over... BOO HOO!!! It's now time to get the room ready for the trunk show. I was going to vacuum and have all of the thread, scraps and pins picked up and I said to myself - "What the heck for....these gals know we've been sewin' today.... they won't care!" So... we set up more chairs, got Paula's quilts in order for her presentation and went to dinner! It's all about the food you know... and speaking of food... yes we had yummy, yummy dessert breads from Fresh Market...

Paula told the history of each quilt as Vicky and I held them up for her. We soon found out that our arms are NOT in good shape. Wow ... those quilts were heavy! It could be from due to them being so LARGE! Of course... that's what I love to... BIG quilts.

The group loved Paula's presentation... she's a great story teller and brought many laughs and giggles to the group! Too soon the trunk show ended. It was time to visit and shop a little.

What a great day... Paula is a delight and a great friend. I'm so proud of her and Mary Ellen and Marcie... they've been in business a little over 4 years and they have a super website business, over 35 patterns that are sold world wide, and now Paula is designing fabric for Marcus Brothers. That's pretty darn wonderful!!!

Paula is now on her way to Louisiana... she has two teaching engagements and 2 trunk shows. Then she's taking some time to visit with her daughter... We will meet again in just a couple weeks at the Philadelphia show!.... We're travlin' fools... but we must "make hay while the sun shines"!

Chat with you soon... and Sew a bunch today!!

Gloria