Wednesday and Thursday before retreat...

OK, I am finally getting around to posting about the retreat and Jen coming to town! I know that you are all excited and to make you contain your excitement a little bit, I will not be posting everything all at once. I am going to see how long it takes to put this post together and then will decide if you will get a Friday post or if I am going to go and watch TV. What can I say? I am a brat and us brats can do what we want! :D

On Wednesday, I ended up leaving work late because I had things that I needed to get done in order to have the 5 day weekend I so desperately needed! I also wanted to pick up a few things and straighten the house one last time before Jen got here. I was pulling into Joann's to pick up a few things that I needed for a portable design wall (Hasn't been assembled so I will show when that is completed) and I ran into Judy who had just finished shopping. I twisted her arm and made her come back into the store with me to get the few things that I needed and she was telling me how excited she was about the retreat and how close it was. She was also very excited that Jen was coming to town and wanted to know where we were going to shop the next day.

I finished gathering my supplies and left Judy and ran home. I ate something fast and finished cleaning the bathroom floor and then vacuumed again and put the vacuum away. I was still very anxious about when Jen was going to get here so I decided to work on a BOM block. I think that I had already pieced the fabric with the Thangles and cut the HSTs apart so I just needed to iron the triangles and assemble the rows and then the block. I got the rows pieced together and then I heard a noise and looked out the window and Jen was here! I wasn't expecting her for another hour or so because of the time when she said that she had gotten into Indianapolis. I ran downstairs and out the front door and gave her a big hug before ushering her into the house and to the bathroom.

I have to say that Jen was exactly what I had expected and we got along great from the moment she got here! I was so excited! The dogs were equally excited to have someone else here that they could torment. And torment, they did! Max likes to get a little frisky with guests. Lucky Jen - he got frisky once with her head and once with her arm! Then, when I reprimanded him, he looked like he was ready to cry and very guilty!

I think that Jen got here around 10:45 and we were up until 1 or 1:30 chatting and laughing. She showed me the spools quilt and it just looks so awesome in person! And I got her little gifties and I think that she liked them. She posted pictures on her blog. Before we went to bed, we decided that we would get up around 8 and get ready to go eat at IHOP and then start shop hopping. I took the dogs into my room with me even though Jen said that they could stay with her. That was a mistake - they kept watch on the door all night listening to other signs of life on the other side. Luckily, they didn't bark and I was still able to sleep!

Thursday morning, I heard Jen moving around and I got up and took the dogs out. When I went back upstairs, she was sitting in the middle of the spare bedroom looking at my stacks of fabric. I showed her some of my UFO's and we talked about a couple of techniques that I have tried and classes that I have taken. We got ready and headed out to IHOP. I was starving and ate most of my food that morning. I meant to take pictures of the food before I ate it to send to people who had to actually go into work on that day, but in my rush to stuff my face, I forgot. I did get this picture of my empty plate.



Mmmmm... It was yummy!

After we left IHOP, we went to Best Friends Quilt Shoppe, which is the shop that I refer to as mine. It's where I have taken all of my classes and everyone in there knows me! I hadn't been into the shop the entire month of March because of a certain tiny blip on my radar (otherwise known as George who shall not be mentioned again) and apparently more people missed me than I realized! Most of the people who were in the shop were working and they all said hi and asked how I was. It was nice to be missed!

As Jen looked around, I shopped for some fabric to make a purse kit with to donate to the Retreat raffle prizes. This is what I came up with.



It is very pretty fabric and I was hoping that I could win the kit and make the purse for myself... because the fabric that I actually have in the house right now is doing such a good job of just sitting and not being made into the purses that they were meant for. :) Oh well, I could always just have it for when I can get to it, right?

That was all that I found at Best Friends. Jen got a few things and we left and headed to Stitches.

I told Jen a story about the store before we got there. The last couple of times that I had been in the store, I had been with Judy and some of the other ladies from my Guild small group. The store has a basket of chocolates and candies by the cash register. The first time I was there with Judy and the others, I kept eyeballing the chocolate and trying to figure out what flavor Hershey kisses they were. I remember seeing the 'R' and something that looked like an 'L' and an 'A' and kept trying to figure out what flavor they were. For some reason, I assumed that they were garlic - really, I can't tell why this is what came to me, it just was. I picked up a piece and thought, "Well, I like chocolate... And I like garlic... So this should be good." And then I read the tag and it was CHERRY! Seriously, I have no idea how I got garlic, but I breathed a sigh of relief and unwrapped the chocolate and ate it and laughed. The store owner asked what was amusing and I told her and the ladies I was there with and she started cracking up. I of course passed out garlic chocolates to everyone and we enjoyed them. The next time I went in the store, the owner remembered that and we laughed again.

OK, so back to Thursday... We walk into the store and Jen goes one way and I went to the cash register. The owner greeted us and asked how we were and I grabbed the kisses and tossed one to Jen and told her to have a garlic chocolate. The owner cracked up and said that she remembered me and asked if I was shop hopping again and we had a good laugh. She was very friendly and asked lots of questions about what we were doing and couldn't believe that Jen and I had just met because we were finishing each other's thoughts without really saying much.

I ended up getting this fabric at this shop and a pattern. The pattern is in the next picture because I think that the fabric that I got at that store will look awesome in a quilt using the pattern. In this picture, the fabric on the left is one that I got because I love the design and the colors and I got the one on the right because I am going to use it in Spencer's bug jar quilt as shelves under each row of jars.



After Stitches, we went to Aunt Ruth's. I hadn't been in this store since just after they moved it up the street from where it had been. At that time, they were still organizing themselves. Now, everything was in it's place. The fabrics in the store are great, but sometimes the customer service is a little lacking. The ladies on Thursday were concentrating on one customer and it wasn't either of us. But they did like Jen's Miranda bag and asked her a lot of questions about it. I found a stack of 1/2 yard cuts of fabric that were very well put together. I added another 1/2 of a coordinating fabric and called it done. And this pattern is what I got at Stitches, but it will look great made in these fabrics.



After Aunt Ruth's, we went to Sew-Ezy, but Jen didn't see anything that she had to have so we got out of there fairly quickly. Just a once around the stores and that was it.

Our next stop was Fabric Shack. This is one of my favorite stores because it has entire lines of fabric, not just 1 or 2 fabrics from a line. We went crazy in there! I wasn't looking for anything specific, I was just hoping that we were going to be able to stop at the Village Family Restaurant for pie afterwards and I hoped that the better I was in the store, the more likely I would get my way. :)

I had been looking for this neutral fabric with the gold dragonflies for a couple of months. I had seen it at Best Friends and meant to get some for a project that the ladies in my Small Group wanted to do as a group project. We all put in $5 and got charm squares that coordinated and we were going to use to make a Little Charmers table runner. I just needed more neutral and wanted to use this. I am very glad that I found it! The rest of the fabric in this picture is the charms that we had from the group.



The other fabric that I found was Star Wars fabric. I made my brother, Matt, a no-sew fleece blanket a couple of years ago that was mostly orange and this should match that nicely. I got enough for 2 pillowcases.



While the lady was cutting my fabric, Jen kept looking and found this fabric. I just had to get some to make pillowcases for Mary Beth. She is going to be 50 this year and I always tell her that she has worked at our company longer than I have been alive!



Once we checked out, it was time for food and luckily, we were so close to the restaurant, we just had to stop! I was a happy camper! We ate our lunches and then it was time for pie! Jen got Blackberry (I think) and I got peanut butter pie. Again, I had to take pictures to send to the poor fools stuck in the office at work!





And for those who might not believe me, I did end up leaving some of my pie behind...



After we ate, we headed to Joann's. Jen pulled out her TomTom and decided to show me just how irritating and snippy this lady was. I did not like her at all! Especially after she scared the crap out of me with her 2 mile warning! So we decided to see how long it would take before she got ticked at us by not following her directions for a few miles and turns, but she still wouldn't call us morons. I was disappointed! Jen even tried to change her from a polite setting to a be-yotch setting and nothing worked. But we had a good laugh on our way to Joann's.

We looked for some fabric and I got some fusible fleece for the purse kit. We also found some good flannel that was on sale and picked up some more fabric for pillowcases. I got this crab fabric for anyone who might need it at the Retreat. It turns out that I just have trouble reading, I guess. I thought on my first look at this that the fabric said, 'keep the clap,' but it says, 'keep the claw.' I guess that claw fits better, but to me it still doesn't make much sense... Cute fabric though.



There was also some clearance fabric that was an additional 50% off and they had this adorable fabric in it. I had to get some to make myself some pants because I am magically delicious! :) It's cute flannel fabric regardless!



We picked out this fabric for the borders for the stash pot pie quilt. I am happy with the choices.



And we found these adorable Evil turtles in the outside decorations area. We immediately thought of Regina!



I liked this little guy the best though.



And lastly, my favorite fabric - the What Would Jill Do fabric! I got enough to make 2 pillowcases and Jen took what was left on the bolt, but by that time, it was What Would Jen Do fabric! I just love this fabric! Because of the colors and because of the Jill part!



Once we left Joann's, we ran to Office Depot to pick up the last of the supplies that I needed for my design wall and then we came home to release the hounds. They were happy to see us! We took pictures of our loot and Jen started blogging while I made dinner. And then I had to start packing my stuff up. I ended up packing up as much as I could and stacking everything by the front door. The last thing we did was cut up fruit to take with us so that I could have a healthier snack for the weekend. I think that we were done with that around 1:30. We didn't end up getting to bed on Thursday night until after 2 AM. But we were having a blast!!!