The Washington Quilt

The fabric from this quilt came from the 2007 Western Washington Quilt Shop Hop. I started working on the blocks slowly back then, and have gradually added to the stack over the past 2 years. I used some of the patterns from previous shop hops, substituting the fabric from those other years with the Washington themed fabric from 2007. I pulled together enough fabric to fill in the sashing, boarders, backing, and binding from post shop hop sales. This quilt was fun because I had to learn how to do paper piecing, the blanket stitch, and English paper piecing.

Now it's living on the back of our large living room couch. Yes, the kitties tried it out while I was still sewing the binding on. They approve!

Above - English paper piecing

Below - paper piecing

2009 Quilt Shop Hop

The Western Washington Quilt Shop Hop was once again last Wednesday through Sunday. My mom and I visited 13 shops on Wednesday, and another 7 on Thursday. We visited shops in Lynden, Bellingham, Anacortes, Everett, Bellevue, Renton, Des Moines, and some in between.

The shop hop included about 60 stores in the state that created 8.5" blocks from a collection of fabric designed just for this event. Each shop uses 3

pieces of fabric, one of them a coordinate of their choosing that is not part of the collection. We both liked this year's fabric, but weren't crazy about the main flower and butterfly print. One of the first shops we visited (Fourth Corner Quilts in Bellingham) had used the collection and added several bright prints of their choosing, which we loved! We bought a few half yards there to split and make our quilt with.

My favorite shops were:

• Forth Corner Quilts, Bellingham
• The Quilting Loft, Ballard
• Quiltworks Northwest, Bellevue
• Keepsake Cottage Fabrics, Bothell

One of my goals on the shop hop was to find enough sock monkey fabric to make a crib set with. I knew this would be difficult because that line of fabrics came out about 4-5 years ago. I ended up finding enough, picking up different pieces at about 6 different shops. Some of them were even on sale!

I also found the following exciting fabrics!

Paddington Bear & Eric Carle's Brown Bear - The Paddington fabric was half off and perfect for some other Paddington fabrics I've been accumulating slowly for a kids quilt. The Brown Bear fabric will work well for a baby quilt gift.

Anna Maria Horner Flowers - I've had my eye out for this fabric for a while as well. It's from an older line of Anna Maria's fabric, but it will be perfect for the couch throw pillows I'm planning to make!

And lastly, I found some cute patterns!

(Can you believe this is my 50th post?!)