Our First Basket Donation has Arrived for our Give-Away Basket from Sue Bleiweiss!!

I am so excited to get the mail these days! Besides the awesome things that keep arriving for market I am starting to get some goodies from friends and colleagues! One of the best things about this industry is how wonderfully supportive the women are to each other! I am so blessed to know some of these amazing women. The first addition to our goodie bag is from Sue Bleiweiss! Sue is a designer, art quilter, author, organizer, motivator and blog facilitator just to mention a few of her many talents! I was blessed to get to know Sue this last year as she invited me to join in on some great projects she was working on. She started the Artbox last year where she brought together some awesome artists for the Artbox adventure. It was a place where the public could buy boxes of art from a variety of artists for a good price and collect a variety of one of a kind pieces of fiber art. It was a huge project and she facilitated the whole project from designing the website, monitoring the site, sales, clients etc. It was a great success and we really appreciated all she did.

Lil Miss Cutie Patootie is so excited to add these wonderful gifts to your gift basket!! I also own a piece of Sue's amazing fiber artwork shown above, but that is not include, nor is Cutie! ( a new pattern in my new pattern book?) LOL 

She also started the Sketchbook Challenge, an online sketching and journaling blog that I am happy to contribute to that has monthly sketchbook challenges. She also is just finishing up a fund raiser called " Kick off your Shoes" to raise money for the Barbra Streisand Women's Heart Center at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles. These are just a few of the amazing things Sue has done in her spare time this last year. All that and she managed to write a few articles you might have seen in the latest Quilting arts magazine! She is amazing and I am so happy to know her! She has sent us her book called " The Sketchbook Challenge" filled with sketchbook ideas from some wonderful artists! But that's not all! She included a sketchbook so you can start your own sketchbook and fill it with your own art! Please take a few minutes to visit Sue's website and see her art, or visit one of the blogs she is overseeing and thank her for her generosity! She spends all this time so that we might benefit from her generous spirit through knowledge, charity and exposure to the talents of others. thanks so much sue! You can find her on Facebook too! Thanks Sue!
Don't forget to leave comments, here and on FB! Until next time! I have more!!!!

- Desiree

Back from Market and on to my CREATE Class!!!

We had an amazing time at Spring Market in Salt Lake City. The city is beautiful and I enjoyed taking photos and painting while we were there. My newest quilts were a hit and I loved seeing all the art quilts at the show. It left me very inspired and motivated to get busy.

my newest patterns were received very well by everyone and I have lots of orders to get out, I just finished shipping today.  The art quilts in the show were beautiful, lots of new methods that always peek everyones curiosity.  Then we were on to Zion, wow, another beautiful spot and the weather held until we left and the rain started coming down.  

I now am excited to be getting ready to teach at the CREATE weekend retreat in Costa Mesa. I have been getting my blocks ready and I made my students name tags today, fun fun! All ready, even had time to play with my new copic markers and created a new quilt!!! Marianne inspired me with her beautiful sweet peas she brought over at our last sketching meeting.  We started a sketching blog for the sketch group, I am calling us the Sketchy 5150's, or crazy sketchers! Come over and visit our new blog.  

Home again, Home again Rigga jig jig

Every time we pulled in the driveway after any length of time my mom always said those words! There is no place like home filled with all the things and people you love the most. But.... Spring market was amazing. I am still reeling from all the activity and excitement. I have so many wonderful ideas and things brewing in my head, I hate to waste the time to sleep.  The fabric line was very well received and I am hoping that Houston will be even better. I am going to start working on a book and another fabric line. phew Oh and then, just on a fluke I entered a contest for a big gift basket. I only glanced at it since I never win anything and thought to myself, that's big so I will enter this time. LOL I got an email that I WON!!! OH MY GOSH, I can't believe it so now I am waiting to get it in the mail, I will post more pictures when it arrives. 

On Saturday, I left the show early so I could spend the rest of my trip with a friend and her family. I got to meet her mother, Bev, who also does amazing artwork and quilts. She wins ribbons and in the short time she has been quilting she has made tons of quilts!! She put me to shame. I also got to meet Gail's wonderfully warm and hospitable family, who let me share their home with them. Living in southern California we only have green because we irrigate but there it was green and lush. We sat outside her beautiful home and overlooked a koi pond and lush yard that went down to the lake. Such fun, they served me a amazing breakfast Sunday after church and then Gail and I went site seeing . We made our way to the sculpture gardens and Dick Blicks Art store! I brought home more goodies.  Here are the pictures from my trip to market and my mini vacation afterwards! Thanks Gail!!!