Monday, January 30, 2012

Back from California and New Kits

John and Kate are back from Ontario, California and the great Road to California Show.  There were lots of quilters and they got to visit some with our vendor friends, but it was BUSY in the booth; that is a good thing.  The bad thing(s) were that the cash register died an untimely death somewhere on the long trip down and so did the radio credit card swipe machine.  Poor Kate had to use one of the old fashioned card imprint machines while a new radio swipe machine Fed Exed its way to the hotel.  But things calmed down after that.


The kits that sold well at Road were the Woodsy colorway of "Carnival" and the plaid "Floating Cabin".  You can see both of them hanging in the booth in these photos Kate took one morning before the crowds arrived.And, just in case you are interested, here are links to the kits in our catalog.
"Woodsy" Carnival Pre-cut Kit, 48" x 60""
Closeup of "Woodsy" Carnival Pre-cut Kit


Plaid colorway, "Floating Cabin" Pre-cut Kit, 39" x 46"

John's quilt "Piano Rag" was included in an exhibit at Road, "All That Jazz", curated by Ricky Tims; very appropriate for the theme.  Here are all the exhibited quilts from Ricky Tims' website  All That Jazz

Friday, while Kate and John were vending and I was happily doing bookwork in the Billings office, the furnace repair guy came to replace a motor (I believe) on the elderly forced air furnace.  After a few clanky minutes, he reappeared to tell me that he needed another part which had to be ordered and that he had disabled the furnace as it wasn't safe now.  Well, that would have been tolerable if it had been in the 40s or even the 30s but it was TEN BELOW ZERO and we had 8 inches of snow.  I had to buy three quartz heaters to keep the pipes from freezing in the office and shop over the weekend.  The new part has come in and has been installed and Kate says it is now toasty in the office.  Toasty is better.

Kate has just finished piecing a cute and clever pre-cut quilt kit for Valentine's Day.  Watch for our newsletter in the next few days for a look at it; there are limited quantities and you have time to get a good start on it before Valentine's Day flutters in.

Take care
Brooke