Friday Adventures and a First!

I had planned on a bit of cross border shopping on Friday morning and was disappointed by waking up to rain but decided to press on.  First stop was at Joann Fabrics in Bellingham to look for Quilt Folk issue 4, no luck.  Onto Trader Joe's to pick up Christmas treats for my mom and a friend.  Onto Mount Vernon to Calico Creations to see if they had the magazine but no luck.  Last stop was into La Conner.  I had checked my Instagram feed and Sylvia Pippen had announced she was opening her store that day.  Who Ho! I was going down anyway so decided to find it.  But I forgot to write down the address and went up and down First Street several times before I found parking and went into Country Lady and happily she pointed across the street and showed me where the shop was!

 Sylvia and her friend Mary Ann were busy arranging things and the shop is delightful.  At the end of the building with river channel views out of their windows.

Love this bird sampler

                                                       

 So much to look at it's quite overwhelming.  I met Sylvia in Summer 2016 when Anna Bates of Woolie Mommoth Blog was on one of her Quilt Roadies adventures.  If you go to her blog for August 2016 you can find the two part video that I shot of Anna and Sylvia in her studio at home.  Or you can go to her youtube channel and see what other adventures Anna. G and Enzo have been on.

 The space is well organized with patterns and samples to see and enjoy.

 I love this one.

 I've toyed with buying this one.

 Some Cyanoprint combined with Sashiko stitching.

 Love all these delicate orchid designs.

 Pink wool tulips, I may have to buy just this block when she makes it available.

 A touch of Christmas in Sashiko.

 I love the movement of jelly fish as they float about.  This kit came home with me.

 This one also called my name.

Another lovely flower sampler.
                                             
 This is a wool kit of her flowers, the wools are exquisite.

 Sylvia and Mary Ann figuring out their new software.  Turns out I was their first official customer!

 Just outside the front door was this wonderful glass piece.

Love the bridge over the channel.
                                       

 On the way in I noticed a flock of snow geese in a field and on the way back stopped to take pictures.

 Fortunately it seemed to rain hard when I was driving and almost stopped each time I got out of the car.

 This is my purchase of the pattern, turquoise Sashiko thread and some of Sue Spargo's new wool thread to try.

 On Friday night I pulled some fabrics for an Instagram Wonky Star exchange.  One of the gals wants black on black fabrics, the flash lightened them significantly, I've darken them but not quite enough.

 Decided some tools of the trade are needed for making the centres and star points.

 Had fun pulling different brights.

 Even have some scraps that will be worked in.

 The multi-coloured stripe I used in a fish swap and the grunge fabrics play nicely with it.

 I made my star points from scraps of down the rabbit hole and the red on pink dots was from my Christmas tree swap.  I played with different centres before sewing it up. This centre was the background on my Cow Jumped Over the Moon quilt.

                                           

Thought the measuring tape fabric would be cute.  Most people want white on white so that's where I started.

 This centre was from Happy Days.

 Fish.

 Pencils.

 I saw one gal make a min star for the centre and wanted to try it out.

 All white points.  I have several white on white, challenging to photograph and not get cream.

 This is what I ended up with, I'll probably keep this one but I like the look of the mini star but lots of seams to deal with.