I am just not good with deadlines

Deadlines and me are not friends.  For someone who is generally well organized and for the most part punctual, I often find myself stymied by deadlines.  I know I tend to procrastinate, but I am also often weighing WHICH deadline do I adhere to and which do I let slide.  My calendar for the past two weeks has been jammed including but not limited to. . . .

• work (my day job),
• a trip to Cincinnati and back for a convention and family visit,
• a night of Bunco with the girls,
• a set of swap blocks to complete and mail off
• a tax class at the local community college,
• a guild presentation on EQ6,
• an EQ7 class at my local quilt shop,
• a Late Night sewing evening at my local quilt shop,
• an all-day Retreat for Sylvia’s Bridal Sampler BOM,
• an all-day UFO sewing day with my small group,
• another Guild Presentation on “Setting Odd Blocks,” and
• a 4 day retreat in Houston

This week I have

• a Charm Tote class on Thursday night
• a BOM for my guild
• the next Tulip Tiles BOM
• another 5 sets of swap blocks to complete
• and Bus Trip to the Quilt Study Center in Lincoln, NE on Saturday, and the next week
• a 4-day class in Salt Lake City, UT on how to use my HQ16 mid-arm sewing machine.
• not to mention an Aug 4 deadline for 2 quilts which will be published in a magazine next year, for which I have only had a month’s notice.
• oh. . . and did I mention my day job?

Ok, so maybe the trouble isn’t so much with deadlines but with being over-booked!  I do have a calendar on which I organize my life, but it is pocket size and it may well be that I need a larger one to get my schedule life sized.  What I really need is a wife!  You know, someone to take care of all the details that I am to busy to deal with.  I really think most professional women need a wife, or a secretary, or an assistant, an editor, a driver, a receptionist and a fashion consultant.  I already have a husband and a house keeper, but somehow that doesn’t seem like enough!  LOL!  At least I got one thing done today after I got home form the airport, read all my mail, unpacked, took a nap, walked the dog, gave the cat her pill, made supper and waded through a pile of email.

Let me present . . .without further ado. . . this month’s FREE Tulip Tiles BOM installment  "Block 8 Sashing.”  I know you have been waiting for this because it is the element that ties the whole quilt center together.   If you have all the blocks, setting triangles and corner triangles completed you will be able to assemble the whole quilt center with this month’s block instructions.  Block 8 will be available for FREE for 2 months, and then will be available for purchase on my website after September 20, 2010.  You can download the pattern and instructions for Block 8 on my Block of the Month Page.  Click the Page Tab at the top page.

Reeze

First time vending at a quilt show. . . and so much more!

The weekend before last I had my first gig as a quilt show vender.  WOW, talk about a learning curve.  It was a great experience and I had a blast selling my patterns and EQ products.  I was even able to make some great connections with local quilt shops and guilds for some classes and lectures.  Altogether it was a wonderful time.

Now as to my booth, I have a lot to learn in this department.  The display of patterns and quilts worked ok, but I need a better way to display some of my wall hangings.  There are just so many and I want them to all be visible!  I had a tent and lights inside the tent, and found that to be a little dark.  I don’t think I will use it next time.  Here is a picture of my booth!

My sign left something to be desired, especially since I had to clamp it onto my tent awning with big honking clamps!  LOL

The display of EQ products in the back was nice and several people liked looking at the program on my laptop.  The quilt on the easel in the front left really worked to showcase my signature Morning Glory Pattern, and I sold out of those patterns the first day!  Whooo hooooo!  The second day I put my quilt pattern that was featured in Keepsake Quilting catalog on the easel and that really got a lot of attention (and sales) for that pattern too.

But the real attraction of the booth, you can’t exactly see to well in this photo, is the Make-and-Take table at the far right.  I think it shows up better in this next picture.  I set up a little table with  a bin full of beads and charms and directions for making a key chain or scissor fob. 

For $3.00 they could sit in my swirly office chair and make their own beaded fob. The project was inspired by the fact that I had three bags of alphabet beads that I purchased for a project and never used.  I thought this would be a great way to get rid of those beads by having kids put their names on beaded key chains.  Also,  I thought it would be a good thing for parents to pay $3.00 for 15 minutes of baby sitting while they looked through my booth!  Little did I know that it would be the parents and grandparents who sat in my chair and made key rings for all their friends, neighbors, and grandkids! It was hysterical.  I sold a ton of these things and it really got people to stop and visit my booth.   Here is picture of a few that I made as samples.  People really went wild over these, and the result is that I was invited to vend at other quilt shows, with the proviso that I “bring those cute bead thingies!”  LOL

This week I have been working on 2 new designs that will be published in QUILT WORLD magazine next year.  I have to get them done by August 4, so I have been totally under the gun and that has kept me at my machine lately.  I can give you a sneak peak of the one I am nearly finished with.  It is a small wall hanging with a wintry background of frosty tumbling blocks and an unexpected red carnation appliqué motif.  There is a picture of the quilt in a different colorway on the left margin of my blog under current projects.   I revised the applique quite a bit for this quilt and offer it as a winter quilt with the January flower of the month.  I think they will be publishing this in the February edition of QUILT WORLD next year.  I have really had fun making it, and used Marti Michell templates for the tumbling blocks.  WOW did that ever make them easy to do!  Special thanks to my friend Barb for teaching me how to use them!!

Now back to stitching down applique!  I promise to try to post more often, but July is a really busy month for me.  Hope you enjoy the show!

Reeze