Day in Downtown Arts & Crafts Festival Oct 26

If you are going to be in the Fuquay-Varina, NC area, stop by the "Day in Downtown" An Arts & Crafts Festival on Main Street

My quilts and other items will be for sale at Torrey Hill Inc, Handmade Arts & Crafts at 216 S Main Street.

Here are a few of my items you may see there.

Day in Downtown

Saturday, October 26th from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Main Street in Historic Downtown Fuquay, NC.  

If you can't come to the festival, please visit my Etsy shop!

Mary

The Year in Review

It's been a busy year! December 31 seems like a great day to look back on the quilts I made this year.

(If you click on the pictures, it will take you to my Gallery of Quilts.)

 

I've made custom quilts, purses and decorative items for some wonderful customers and friends. This was my year to start making tee shirt quilts and remembrance quilts (out of children's clothes and Grandma's fabric). As you'll see at the bottom of my pictures, I also "branched out" and made purses, coffee cozies, coasters, and lots of other goodies. For the holidays, place mats, a table topper, coasters, window coverings, and on and on :)

This fall, I also started my web site MaryMansonQuilts.com and my Blog. What an adventure, learning the ins and outs of posting and blogging!

Holmes Fine Gifts invited me to be their Guest Artist at the November 4th Friday - Dicken's Holiday in downtown Fayetteville, NC. This was such a great opportunity for me to showcase my quilts, and offer my holiday items for sale.

 

This has been a wonderful year, and I'm looking forward to 2013!

Happy New Years!

Mary

 

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Straightening Up & Reorganizing My Quilt Studio

Instead of a New Year's Resolution -- I've set myself a goal to straighten up and re-organize my quilt studio by the end of the year!

Checked off the To Do list --

• Packed up all the Christmas fabric (well, almost done).  I was determined to use up my stash of Christmas fabric this year. After coasters, place mats  purses, bags, and several quilts and bed runners, it's about 1/2 what it was -- of course I had to buy some fabric on sale but I have a lot less! Take a look at my Quilt Gallery to see some of them!

• Organized all of my accessory, purse and bag making supplies. One of my discoveries this year was purses at thrift stores.  They are inexpensive, and I found new ones that had never been used.  The handles, zippers and trim can be used on my items which saved me a lot of money.

• Got rid of all of the plastic bags I was going to use "someday", and went through some OLD projects I was never going to finish, and either put them back into stash, or let them go.

• Now, to straighten up my stash!  I use shallow plastic bins, and have one for each color.  Some of the solids, and unusual items and multicolored florals go in their own bins.  The fabric on the table in front is new fabric I got for Christmas (love gift certificates!!)

I may do some furniture re-arranging too.  When I've gotten things all organized, I'll post a picture of the entire studio!

Still busy making good stuff!

Between making several quilts for customers, and getting ready for the 4th Friday Dickens Holiday Celebration in downtown Fayetteville on November 23, I've been busy!

During the Dickens Holiday Celebration, I have been asked to be the featured guest aritst at Holmes Fine Gifts (Holmes Electric), where I will be displaying and talking about my quilts.  Quilts in different sizes and styles will be available for purchase, as well as decorative items and accessories.

Here are a few examples of the things I've been making.  Less than 2 weeks!

This bag is nice and large, with several outside & inside pockets.  It's quilted and reversible, using pretty Christmas fabrics. I'll also have other purses in different sizes and fabrics.

Coffee cup "cozies" and cosmetic bags are always useful and make great gifts.

Insulated curling iron/flat iron travel cases (some with matching cosmetic bags) will also be available.

These place mats with coordinating napkins are so pretty.  I quilted a holly pattern on the "ribbon" area, if you look closely you can see it in the photo.   Several sets in different fabrics.

I also have made a few Christmas bed runners,   They are about 30" wide, and fit almost any size bed.  Each bed runner is a different, unique design.

Back to the sewing machine!!