Week of June 27, 2008

This is my initial foray into blogging and I hope everyone will find it educational and interesting. My passion is quilting and I love to design, teach and travel. My business is now 6 years old and has provided me with opportunities and experiences I never dreamed of, as well as challenges and deadlines I had never had to deal with. I hope that by sharing some of these experiences, you will learn along with me and be entertained at the same time. I also love to cook, entertain and do needlework and these topics will come up at times in the future. I also plan on passing along quilting tips, information on great shops and shows I visit and provide links to sites that I think you might find interesting.

I refer to my trip to Spring Quilt Market in Portland this year as the good, the bad and the ugly. The good was I had time to visit with shop owners, fabric designers, fabric reps, and guild representatives about teaching and lecture opportunities. The bad was I did not feel the traffic was as heavy as in past markets. The ugly was I had no brochures or books for the first two days due to my printer not following through with their commitments. I believed their promises and wound up missing the normal sales opportunities. It was frustrating, but we slogged through. I was pleased with the way the booth turned out and shops loved the fabrics I used in the quilts I displayed. I am including pictures of the booth. I am spending the summer mailing brochures to shops and working on new quilts in new fabrics for shops to display for the various events they are hosting this summer and in the fall. I also use the new quilts for my lecture/trunk show for guilds. I will be teaching classes in some great areas of the country in the next year. Be sure to check my itinerary on the website to see if I will be in your area. New designs are rolling around in my head and comments on this process will appear in future writings.

There is always the need to spend some time away from the business and June was perfect for cleaning up my flower beds and herb garden and getting new plants set before our typical 100+ degree days set in. I started Yoga classes and find that has helped control stress and free my mind’s creative flows. I think I have a touch of A.D.D. and find myself starting on one project and then wandering off onto another before the first is finished. I do my best thinking in the middle of the night or while driving and decided I need a portable tape recorder to keep track of my “great” ideas before I forget them (safer to use in the car at 70 mph rather than trying to write notes).

Come back to visit. Plans call for weekly updates and photos.

Debbie