At Spring 2010 market, I featured my Ruched Baby Quilt as the bakground for a free applique owl pattern.

I received such a wonderful response, I have put the quilt and applique pattern together as an E-Pattern.

If you would like to purchase this pattern, visit The Quilt Pattern Shoppe -Patterns!

The Owl Family free pattern is available on the website.

Is there anything more wonderful than soft baby toes?  Everytime I was tempted to update the Britches & Bloomers cover, the JCD girls and I nearly came undone!    How could anything be sweeter than our little hugging barefoot girls? 

But, it did get sweeter.  I am so excited to have wonderful fabrics to sew the models for the new cover.  This photo has been in my mind for several years.. waiting for the right circumstances to remake the delightful pattern cover of  Britches & Bloomers. 

 The Little Flower Pocket Top looks so good with the Britches, and I couldn’t resist showing more fabrics using the owl pattern.. Sew many choices!  I am sew excited to be using my Baby Business and In the Nest fabrics by Benartex, and my little granddaughter, Ava and her cousin, Lyrik for this brave step. 

I can’t wait to show the new cover all finished!

To download pdf pattern, click on image. 

To view fabric swatches used in this pattern, visit www.benartex.com, Fabric Gallery, In the Nest & Baby Business by Jackie Clark.  Visit my website for more free patterns & helpful hints using my new lines.

Shop Owners,  visit Shop Owner Ideas for fast, fun ideas to promote and display these fabrics. 

Download complimentary Border & Bind Baby Quilt tags, kit your fabrics and label! 

I am anxious for 2010 Spring Market, just around the corner.  This darling top with fun flower pocket is so quick and easy – it’s my newest pattern, sewn up in my newest line of fabrics from Benartex.  I can’t wait to show you more!

My fabric swatches came!  We have been working with Benartex Fabrics to design this wonderful line and up ’til now, it’s been on paper.  This week, the girls and I got to see the prints on fabric for the first time!

We squealed, we oohed and we ahhed.  There were fabrics everywhere!  It just looks so beautiful!  It has been such a pleasure working with Benartex on this project!  I just  could not be any happier with the colors, the detail and how quickly this has all happened.               

We each have our favorites already!  Look at all the choices!  This purple and green argyle fabric is darling.  I can’t wait to get yardage of thes fabrics and start sewing models for Spring Quilt Market!

I am working on a free downloadble quilt pattern to use with the new line.  Seeing the fabrics all together like this makes the combination of colors/prints  for the design easier.  This alphabet fabric comes in two color ways, one more suited for boys, the other for girls.  It also has numbers and punctuation symbols!  I can’t wait to personalize a quilt with a name.

I had the opportunity last weekend to join my friend, Lisa of Picket Fence Quilts (here in Wichita) at her annual quilt retreat.  I got the fabric swatch samples earlier in the week, so I took them with me and had a chance to make a couple of small projects.

The pattern I used was Little Scraps from This & That.  It was agonizing trying to sort through my odd shapped swatches and then CHOSE the combination to use.  I wanted to use them all!  The project was fun and I added some lavender inside to make the notebook holder freshen my purse.  I made one for Steph and Bev.

Faux Crochet Granny Square fabric!  I have displayed this baby afghan Tamara Gonzales, my sister made and carried it to market after market – finally it made it’s way into my fabric line.  Tamara really did a wonderful job on the stitches and her work really looks lovely in cotton cloth.  Check out Tamara’s blog with Leisure Arts, Tamara’s Take  for all kinds of crochet ideas.

All I can say is that I am so excited, so grateful, so pleased!

There are a lot of talented, hard working gals in this industry!  I am especially in love with the exciting tutorials that are available online for new sewers!  Visiting the websites of shop owners I met at market, I fell in love with the tutorials that one shop in particular was doing.  The gals at Missouri Star Quilt Co. have done an awesome job of teaching, entertaining and encouraging sewers.  I was thrilled with this tutorial given by Jenny on creating blocks by sewing fabric into tubes:  Click on the link to view.

http://tutorials.missouriquiltco.com/list/?p=748

I have been trying to visit the websites of all the gal’s who handed me their cards at Market.  I remember thinking how sweet and wonderful it was that the shop owner had her daughters with her at School House.  These young ladies had it going on!  I loved finding their tutorials online!  I thought their efforts were exceptional and the site was very organized!

I have always avoided the angles and cutting, the tiny piecing that seems so intimidating.  If it weren’t for a class that used Quiltsmart Foundation, I am sure I would never have accomplished this lone star quilt.  You don’t have to make the cuts, everything folds and is stitched just so using the pattern.

I think classes, sharing information, good teachers, encouragement are all priceless in this industry!

 Tiffany of Creative Smocking, one of our fabulous distributors took some time to catch up with me at market.  Tamara, Steph and I carried our Junk bags (Steph and I brought two each so we could accessorize) and by this time in the day, we were all just tired. Tamara was so sweet about carrying one of Steph’s bags, (she had been toting a baby afghan around in another bag).  As soon as we sat still long enough, Tamara was crocheting! 

While we rested, Tiffany shook her head that she couldn’t believe she wasn’t wearing or carrying one of the products she sells – and faster than you know, Steph was emptying out the junk bag Tamara had and offered it to Tiffany to carry.  It was close to the end of the day on our last day there and we couldn’t pass up the opportunity for one of our distributors to carry our product!  Tamara couldn’t believe we were going to get all her stuff squeezed into our already full bags.

  Thank you, Tiffany for your kind words, getting the bag back so quickly and being such a sport.  We enjoyed the laughs and friendship!  Thank you, Tamara for being an even better sport and giving up your bag at the last second.  Shameless self promotion? – You betcha, a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.

And sometimes a girl has to take stuff away from her sister.  Tamara did an awesome job detailing our trip and has some fun photos of herself with all the celebrities we saw at market.  Check out her posts.

I had a wonderful time at Fall Quilt Market this year.  I was joined by my sister, Tamara and local quilt shop owner of Picket Fence, Wichita (316-558-8899), Lisa Johnson and Stephanie, of JCD.  We took the Cowboys and Quilts tour and visited some delightful shops in different cities near Houston, followed by a tour of working ranch, George Ranch Historical Park. 

I thought the tour was well put together and the quilt shops did a wonderful job sharing what works for them in their individual shops. The shops we visited were The Feathered Star, The Quilter’s Emporium and The Quilters Cottage.   Steph and I carried our Junk bag, and Bling bag (made from Junk bag pattern).  The four of us also eagerly picked School House presentations and learned a great deal.

I don’t know how much Tamara will write about this trip, but since blogging for Leisure Arts, she has become quite a crochet celebrity! 

These ladies are from Missouri Star Quilt Co., a mother and her lovely daughters sat next to our group in one of the classrooms.  So friendly and full of ideas and talent! 

Tamara, Steph and I visited Moda’s Booth and loved this idea.  We got to pick our sign and this was for Bev. who wasn’t able to come.

I was very happy to have a sample of the Junk Bag displayed in Moda’s booth!

Part of the fun of Market is seeing friends and visiting.  We traveled to Houston only to run into Kansas friends, local quilt shop owner, Charlotte of Charlotte’s Sew Natural  and her beautiful daughter, Lily.

 Lani of  The Quilt Shoppe  webstore posed for a quick photo with me.  I have always enjoyed visiting with her and her husband, Sam.

Our freinds from Pine Mountain Designs Holly & Sandy had a lovely booth with some fun children’s quilts.  It was wonderful to see them again.

This is the design wall in my sewing room.  It holds projects I am working on, prototypes of patterns and samples that are being interviewed.  Right now it is loaded with junk bag examples in all kinds of color variations.  The bag that is on the cover of the pattern was made using Moda fabrics and will be on display in their booth at Fall Quilt Market.  I am not setting up a booth this fall, but instead get to booth hop, take the quilt store tour and go to School House.  I can’t wait to visit with everyone – it’s so hard to do the visiting when you have to focus on the booth.   I am planning to set up a booth at Spring  Market in Minneapolis.

Happy, productive, awesome market wishes to everyone!