Pittsburgh!

Off I went to my first Quilt Market.  I had a fantastic and exhausting time and will do it again.  It was a tough call for me, deciding whether to go or not.  It's the traditional opening of my little cabin on the lake from its winter sleep.  My sister and her family did it for me which was great but I was sad to miss that tradition (although it sometimes includes dealing with mouse droppings).   

It was a good decision to go though. I saw lots of new and continuing trends...animals, especially birds, stags, and cats...more "hand drawn" and painterly design...fabric designers doing more than just designing fabric - creating beautiful patterns, expanding into embroidery kits, needlepoint, wool applique and felt... there was a lot of colour - the teal explosion continues, and I think radiant orchid is all but done, I don't remember seeing any of it.  I also saw more shades of grey).

I'm thrilled to report that I finally found fabric that’s been a bit tricky to source in Canada (hello Echino and Yowa).

The big buzz of the trade show was the launch of Cotton + Steel after all the build up in social media and the sneak peaks it was great to finally see the design and colours, I thought it lived up to the promise, and then some.  

The highlight for me was the conversations.  I met lots of people and had lots of fun chats, some of them planned, many spontaneous.  I met with designers, distributors, bloggers and other retailers.  It was fun to hear their news, to talk about what's coming and to bounce ideas off each other.  I have a few fun things in the works that I'm excited about so stay tuned for beautiful new fabric and a few fun products coming soon.

Sewists are a very generous and enthusiastic community.  I'll be back.

Pictured above are Tula Pink and her brother (sorry, I didn't get his name) - the Moonshine collection is coming

Joel Dewberry - the Birch Farm collection is coming

Alison Glass - I'm trying to find these awesome new wool projects she's working on, bear with me

Rashida Coleman-Hale - of Cotton + Steel fame and the creator of my favourite prints in that new collections.  Hers and many of the others are coming 

Faith Jones and Lee Heinrich of http://www.freshlemonsquilts.com/ and http://www.freshlypieced.com - excellent blogs and they are also the authors of Vintage Quilt Revival, an outstanding book for quilting knowledge, patterns, and tutorials with easy to follow instructions and illustrations

Carolyn Friedlander - of Architextures and Botanics and has stunning new patterns, now in the store and just getting posted

Katarina Roccella - the Indelibles collection is coming