All SASPARILLA yardage (cutest line ever by October Afternoon) is on sale for $7.25 per yard. We also have Sasparilla 5" Stackers for $5.00 and rolie polies for $16.00.
TOO CUTE TO SPOOK is also on sale. 5" stackers are $5.00 and rolie polies are $16.00. These prices are only while supplies last and our SALE ENDS OCT. 31st.
Okay readers, I recently ran across this article written by Mary Fons and it as a MUST SHARE for me. It explains quilting and just some of the many reasons that I love this craft. It makes me happy -- I work in a world 5 days a week where people cannot get along -- so they hire lawyers to help them work out their differences. The people who come to our shop and classes are there because they want to be, we make new friends, we bond, we share lives and stories and our quilts touch all those who receive such a special handmade gift with so much thought, time and effort put into them.
So to my friends who have received a gift because of a loss of a family member, a new birth, a new marriage, to sons who have quilts to be reminded of home and that I love them, to people I have donated quilts to help with a fundraiser, or someone suffering from an illness such as cancer .... this story is for you. I am sure it will touch your heart as much as it did mine.
You can't wrap a baby in an iPad
Unless I’m at a cocktail party hosted by quilters, I am usually the only quilter at a cocktail party.
When I talk about what I do for work, someone will invariably say, “Sorry — did you say you’re a…quilter?” I nod and say yes and then two things happen: first, the person cocks their head and goes “Huh!” and then, “My auntie used to knit, too.” Sometimes I gently explain the difference between quilting and knitting, sometimes I just ask about the auntie.
If you’re not a quilter, you probably don’t think about quilts very often. You know what they are. You maybe had one in your house as a kid. You don’t know that we take umbrage when you to refer to a quilt as a blanket (please!) and you have no idea that the business of quilting kicks up $3.6 billion dollars annually — that’s just in the States. But that’s all perfectly okay. I don’t know about programming in Ruby, nothing about the Blue-Footed Booby (okay, that rhymed), or how to fix the sink. We all have our work and stuff we geek out on. Quilts, for me, are both. I traffic in them; you don’t.
But then…
Then a quilt comes into your field of vision and I can tell you exactly when it happens: when there’s a baby coming. When there’s a marriage. When someone is real, real sick. Unlike the Blue-Footed Booby, quilts arrive when they are needed and what I insist upon, what I know is true, what I make sure to say at any cocktail party, be-quilted or otherwise, is that quilts are still needed, still relevant by virtue of what they are. Quilts are love, manifested. Put another way:
You can’t wrap a baby in an iPad.
Technology is galloping away with us all and I’m riding bareback with all my quilter friends who, you could argue, are more digitally connected than other hobbyists — we have pictures of quilts to share, online bees; the entire Modern Quilt Guild “movement” was born online. But all the binary code on the planet can’t comfort a baby like wrapping it up in a quilt. Another example? Give a newlywed couple a handmade quilt and watch death rays emit from the eyes of everyone else at the shower — the crystal fruit bowl from Tiffany’s and the Kitchen-Aid mixer might as well be crap from the Dollar Store. You can’t beat a quilt with a stick. They’re magic. They’re irreplaceable. They’re also positively American, at least when we speak specifically of patchwork quilts (as opposed to whole cloth or fancy boutis stuff from Europe, and they can keep all that.)
Hey, I want my own MakerBot. My smartphone, myself. In the Venn diagram of “Nerdy,” “Creative,” and “Friendly,” “Quilter” is smack in the middle. Besides, we like buttons and stuff. But what gadget — and while we’re at it, what work of art — can you wrap up in, sit on, barf on, wash, cry under, make a tent out of, mop up stuff with, hug, throw, wad, rip, repair, and then give as an heirloom? I’d guess there’s probably just one answer to that question.
And so we still make quilts. We still do. And we will for a long time because try as we might to wriggle out of it, we’re still human. Humans need comfort and joy and to me and my fellow grieving, joyous, aging, newborn, and just plain chilly humans, a quilt is just the thing.
Olie has been working like crazy and we have great news to share -- we now have our own website! That means you can see what we have new (and old) and order online. We are excited and happy as we are growing bit by bit -- thanks to our wonderful customers. You can find us at olieandevie.com ;o) We will be phasing out our Etsy shop little by little. We still have a few more new products to add but will have them added in no time.
We are continually getting new products in, we just added yardage with the fabric lines Sidewalks by October Afternoon, Midwinter Reds by Minick & Simpson, Honeysweet by Fig Tree, Sunnyside by Kate Spain and Giggles by Me & My Sister Designs. We are starting to split at the seams and are loving it!
Midwinter Reds by Minick & Simpson
Precuts also available
Sunnyside by Kate Spain
Precuts also available
Honeysweet by Fig Tree
Precuts also available
Sidewalks by October Afternoon
We will also be adding a couple of new quilt kits and some fat quarter bundles in the next few days so stay tuned for more information...
