Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Las Vegas Quilt Shop Hop - the final day

After Larry's conference at the Venetian was over we headed out past Hoover Dam to the new Hualapai Sky Bridge to spend the night on the reservation. On the way out of Vegas we stopped in two lovely, very different quilt shops.




















Quiltique was very bright and modern, with white walls and lots of beautifully displayed quilts. They were a Bernina dealer (yeah Bernina) and one of their display quilts showcased the most amazing machine embroidery I have ever seen. Each block was thoroughly embroidered, as were the borders. It was very lovely. I would have loved to have taken pictures of it to show you, but Quiltique has a policy of "no pictures"! I was very surprised. This was the first time I had ever run into that! Most stores are eager to be showcased on any blog (free publicity anyone?) or are simply so friendly that they are happy to accommodate us happy snappers. Anyway, their reasoning was that someone could steal the idea or pattern for one of their displayed quilts from a picture on my blog and, therefore, allowing pictures was just too risky. I thought it was funny. I can't imagine anyone trying to recreate a quilt using a fuzzy picture from my blog. lol Especially since the pictures I post tend to reflect the most elaborate designs and intricate detailing (like their machine embroidered quilt - try to recreate that one from just a picture!) It was a very nice store with a lovely selection of fabric, but they lost points with their attitude. Before he was stopped, Larry actually took several lovely general pictures of the store, which don't showcase closeups of any particular quilt, but out of respect for their policy I'm not going to post them.


















I managed to find lots of stuff to buy, including these lovely batiks (of which they had a fabulous selection). I decided to make one of my bag patterns in black and white and red, so I'm all set with these three bold fabrics. I just love how they play off of each other.


I also bought this silk collection for a neat little clutch purse. This silk collection is called "Silk Adaptation" by Mary Jo Hiney Designs. It contains seven 7.5" x 10.5" silk fabric pieces. I just fell in love with the color mix - all those beautiful bluey lavenders!




















They really had lots of great little fabric collections for sale; I couldn't resist them at all.
This beauty is called by the unlovely name of "Grab Bag" All 22 pieces are handpainted and 100% cotton and at least 4.5" wide and 21" long. "Grab Bag" is a product of boldoverbatiks.com. I'm not sure just what I'm going to do with it, but it certainly will make a spectacular "something"!


















Fiddlesticks was a tiny little shop a few miles out from Las Vegas that was just crammed with goodies.





















The ladies at Fiddlesticks were exceptionally friendly (you know, normal) and had worked wonders within their small space. While we were there they were massively busy putting together quilting kits which would be presented each in their own old-fashioned tiny little suitcase. They were trying to get them put together for a class that was coming up or a quilt show or something, I don't remember. I didn't care for the quilt itself too much (Larry didn't get a picture of it, so I guess he wasn't attracted to it either) but the presentation in the little case was just darling!





















Somebody does lovely little flying geese (see above). I wonder if they used Thangles? Probably not since more than 2 fabrics were used.




















I found lots of stuff to buy here too. Some more batiks, including this 2 1/8 yard piece of pink flowers on blues in the remnant bin for only $8.91. What a great deal. I was afraid it was mismarked, but she just rang it right up. I honestly can't think anymore what I intended to do with the fat quarter of bug fabric. I must have had some plan and I'm sure it was ultra cheap, but for the life of me I don't know why it came home with me!





















This concludes the Las Vegas Quilt Shop and Wedding Chapel Hop! It's been a slice!

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