A Drive-By Check-In

I am back from a trip to Cleveland to visit my mother. She was in the hospital for a few days about a month ago and I wanted to see for myself that she was recovering appropriately. (She is.) The trip also coincided with my 40th high school reunion, which was a lovely bonus.

I packed carefully for a week away and prepped an English paper piecing project to take with me. Unfortunately, about halfway across Idaho—I flew out of Seattle because it was much less expensive than flying from Kalispell—I realized that I had left my EPP project sitting at home on a table. I picked up a small embroidery project in Spokane and took that with me. My mother has a sewing machine and I kicked around the idea of getting a jelly roll and making a quilt, but the embroidery sufficed.

Cleveland is not exactly swimming in fabric stores. I am a bit spoiled by having four Joann stores in the Spokane area and one here in Kalispell, as well as several Hobby Lobby stores. Cleveland has two Joanns and one Hobby Lobby. I visited a very nice little quilt store on the west side of Cleveland, and my mother suggested we make a trip out to the Murray Hill neighborhood on Cleveland’s east side to shop at a store called Bolt and Spool. B&S is a beautifully-curated store with a great selection of apparel fabrics and some quilting supplies. I got enough navy blue Robert Kaufman Arietta Ponte for a pair of Jalie Renee pants and a yard of Liberty Tana Lawn for a Déclic top for next summer.

The owner packed my purchases so nicely:

The sewing machine zipper pulls came from The Quilting Bee in Spokane. They will be a great addition to some upcoming projects. I also picked up this book:

I cannot start any new wool embroidery projects until I finish my squash and chicken embroidery projects, however.

I may have more to show later this week as I get unpacked and sorted. I am heading back soon to Tacoma for my coat class with Ryliss Bod and my trouser-drafting class with Kenneth D. King and then poof!—October will be over. I don’t have a podcast episode today because I just couldn’t make it happen. The weather here has been warm and sunny but that is supposed to change this week. I need to finish putting the garden to bed today. Winter is coming.