Road Trip to Ocala, FL

I am a member of the on-line Sunshine Quilt Guild that makes quilts for children’s charities.  I have met several of the members in person when they traveled or stayed in Florida (one from Michigan and *V* was all the way from California!).  It is such a treat to meet people that you only chat with on-line.

Well, one of the members that is here from Michigan (we had met before) and I ran up to Ocala, FL yesterday to meet another member that lives there.  It was a pleasant drive up the interstate for about an hour or so and *B* and I caught up on our recent vacations and I even gleaned a few quilting tips (just a hint - she’s a great quilting resource for patterns and what’s on-line).

After we got to Ocala, what a good time we had.  It was like three clones, we had so much in common!  Quilts, quilts, quilts galore.  We met at one Ocala quilt shop, Peggy’s Heirlooms of Tomorrow, ate at Panera Bread, and continued on to another quilt shop, Tomorrow’s Treasures.

The Arbor inside Peggy's - Good Luck was to be found here!

Tomorrow's Treasures was a real Treasure!

*J* (that we were meeting for the first time) is charming and has a lot of energy and personality.  She was showing us around that day, going out to dinner with some other folks, then heading out to a quilting retreat the next day.  Whew!  I had to go take a nap just thinking about it – tee hee, hee.

In addition to her own and charity quilts, *J* makes sample quilts for classes and patterns sold at the first quilt shop and I was in awe of her work.  These are just a few of her projects on display there (there were plenty more):

J made this Shadow Box quilt

Another quilter started this and J put it together and finished it up

J made this gorgeous batiks table runner

I had taken along a picture of the 30s Reproductions that I had cut into 4 ½ inch squares this past weekend and was thinking of buying a few FQs to fill in the missing colors (like oranges, yellows, a touch of red or larger scale fabrics).  Between the two shops, I found just what I was looking for plus a nice fabric on sale for the backing:

The backing isn’t 30s but it will blend well and I’m betting that a little girl in Costa Rica or Guatemala won’t quibble about it!

And, of course, I made a few impulse purchases.  Hey!  It was a day of fun …

Couldn't resist this sign for my sewing room!

*B* gave us both small knitted gifts (the rat!).  In addition to quilting and sewing projects for sale at art fairs, she knits.  She’s a real over-achiever!  I wish I had been smart enough to get some photos of the show-and-tells.  *B* makes lots of different kinds of things, including table runners, to show and *J* had a Baltimore Album type quilt almost finished that was awesome.  When we were in the shops, *B* was looking at batiks to make a bedspread – I hope I didn’t drool over her cool greens and rust reds …

All-in-all, it was a wonderful day and now I’m inspired to get up into the sewing room and get some work done.  Gotta finish off those 30s.  More on that later, I hope.

PS  Blogger changed and I had to update my template – I had hoped for a slightly lighter background, but I’ll be working on the colors and how to use the new blogger over the next few days.