A Hometown Gem

On Saturday, March 23rd Dawn and I had the privilege of attending the opening day for Mimi Dietrich's Hometown Girl exhibit at the Maryland Historical Society in Baltimore MD. This is a year long exhibit featuring the designs and works of the fabulous Mimi herself, and it is certainly not to be missed!

Mimi welcoming the full auditorium to the opening

The program was kicked off with words from Mimi, starting with the first quilt she ever touched and followed her quilting history to her discovery of Baltimore Album quilts and her love of teaching quilters. It was amazing to see the auditorium filled with quilters, family, and friends. The talk was followed by a reception with wine and cheese and then we were onto the quilts!

Even the wine bottles were celebrating our "Hometown Girl"!

The exhibit features three galleries of quilts, an interactive "Build a Quilt" Lego station, and a video of Mimi. As a quilter, this exhibit is a must see. Mimi and the Historical Society have put together an incredible exhibit.

 

It was a truly enjoyable day; full of laughter, friends, and of course the quilts. The exhibit will be open for an entire year, and we highly recommend going to see it!

Just a handful of exhibit visitors!

Dawn and I caught up with the Hometown Girl herself!

...We'll definitely be going back again!

Enjoy the Day!
~ Heather

Happy 2019 & Happy Birthday SWD!

 
Note our New Year Holiday Hours ~
We're open tomorrow (Monday, December 31st) at 10:00 a.m. - but will close early at 3:00 p.m. so our staff can celebrate and ring in the New Year!

We're Closed on Tuesday, January 1st and will re-open regular shop hours on Wednesday, January 2nd at 10:00 a.m.


January has always been a special month for SWD. In January 2009 Spring Water Designs was born with a blog, Etsy Shop, and our first pattern publication of Rootin Tootin Cowboy Quilt in Quilt Magazine...so we are actually 10 years old! ...Can you believe it!
Time was spent over the next few years with over 60 quilt magazine and fabric company publications that kept us busy ~ and even one little quilt made it to TV showing up on the Fons & Porter's Television show :) You can read about many of these over on our Blog.
During that time www.springwaterdesigns.com web store was born and we started shipping quilting fabrics and products all over the country, and began vending at local quilt shows. Then in 2012 we became a Handi Quilter Retailer, and had to search for a brick & mortar home for our shop. In 2013 we signed a lease and Bob & I set out to turn the space into a quilt shop. Our doors opened in January 2014 with a soft opening of Spring Water Designs Quilting (making our brick & mortar shop 5 Years old now!), and thanks to the support of our many quilter friends and kindred souls, we've been sharing our love of quilting and needle crafts in our little strip on Gerwig Lane ever since :)

...Whew, just looking back at all that makes me a little tired ~ But it's been a fun ride so far!
We're heading into 2019 with grateful hearts, and the blessings of so many friends that we've made in the quilting world, and goals to continue to move forward into our next ten years!

With that in mind...We're having a whole month of Birthday Sales!

We want to share the fun and give back to all our supportive customers. So starting with this week ~ Wednesday, January 2nd - Wednesday, January 9th All pre-cut Loose Fat Quarters throughout the shop are only $1.00 each! Plus all regularly priced Notions & Books are 25% off
And join us on Saturday afternoon, January 5th for Free Demos on how to use the AccuQuilt GO! Cutters. Learn about the cutters and their features, and how to quickly and accurately cut fabric to save you time and money!
Demos are Free of charge and will be on-going between the hours of 1:30 - 4:00 p.m.

Keep an eye out each week for different sales and Birthday Fun throughout the month!

Some upcoming things to jump in on (click on the links for more details) ~

All of our Clubs are continuing with fresh new products and inspiration in the New Year, and we have a few new Block of the Months that have a few spaces available in them! We have many Classes on the January calendar including Longarm Rental class dates, HQ Owner's Boot Camp Classes, Use your Stash Class with Suzzie Schuyler, plus...


A new session of Beginning Quilt Piecing starts on Tuesdays beginning with January 22nd at 1:00 p.m.

Join Heather Kojan on Saturday, January 19th between 10:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. and find out all the details about the upcoming Chase the Sun Quilting Cruise being sponsored by Spring Water Designs!  The Cruise dates are January 10 - 19, 2020 ~ Nine nights to the Southern Caribbean! ...In January!

Heather will share about the project & quilting classes she will teach onboard the ship, and share some of her quilts.  It's a great time to come and meet Heather and learn more about her and her amazing work :)

This is open house style and there is no charge, so come on out any time between 10:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. on January 19th and see Heather's quilts and learn about our upcoming fun :)

Click Here for more information about the cruise and to download a flyer!


Then we have an amazing opportunity for a Thread Painting Workshop with Joyce Hughes on Friday, January 25th from 10:00 a.m. - 4:00.  Register right away to save your seat in this amazing class!

Then save the date for Support Your Local Quilt Shop Day on Saturday, January 26th where we'll continue our month of Birthday Sales plus we'll hold Free Demos throughout the day!  Watch upcoming emails this month and our website for information on all the happenings throughout the month!

We want to wish you all a Happy, Safe & Healthy 2019 full of good friends, and living in the moment...and lots of time spent with fabric and thread in hand ;)

~ Dawn & the SWD Staff
Call us at (410)381-0695
Email us at springwaterdesigns@gmail.com
www.springwaterdesigns.com

...We've Missed Blogging ~ Let's Try This Again!

It’s now time to end our apparent Blog Hiatus. As many of you noticed, we’ve been having technical difficulties with our blog, and while it’s still not quite back to 100%, we are absolutely thrilled to be able to use it again! (Three cheers for Paul C!)

 ...So what are some of the things we've we been up to since our last post?

Out of all the entries in the AccuQuilt Contest, Heather’s AccuQuilt Block design won an Honorable Mention! We hope she keeps designing and can’t wait to see what she comes up with next!

Spring Water Designs received the Handi Quilter Way Award for the 4^th year in a row, and the Handi Quilter Top Sales Award for the 3^rd year running!

Quilts Around the Bay Shop Hop had a successful Second Year, and the shop owners have started planning Year Three for March of 2019!

Spring Water Designs formed a team (SWD Quilters for a Cure) to participate in the National Multiple Sclerosis Society’s Walk MS fundraiser. SWD Quilters for a Cure raised over $5,000 in support of research and treatment provided by the Society to the Multiple Sclerosis community. Once again, we offer a huge thanks to all our donors, we couldn't have done it without all of the support!

We also had the honor of hosting the HandiQuilter Truck! For our Truck Event, we had the fabulous Diane Henry teaching a weekend of classes with a classroom outfitted with HandiQuilter’s new Amaras!
 

      
Between all of that, we vended at several quilt shows, had many classes at the shop with amazing teachers, Clubs, Free Studio Stitch-in Days, and shared lots of quilty connections with old and new friends...We even added a new little future quilter to our family ~ Charlotte Grace was born last month! Ashley, Bobby & their fur babies are all doing well, and enjoying getting to know Little Miss Charlotte :)

We're looking forward to all the new experiences to come ~ Stop by the shop, or connect here on the blog or our Facebook Page, and share what you've been up to with us!

Enjoy the day!

~Dawn

It's Time for the AccuQuilt Block Contest!

(We pause here on the blog tonight for a little Proud Mama moment...) 

Every year AccuQuilt holds a contest where their fans design quilt blocks, and have a chance to win lots of goodies, but the coolest prize is that the winning block gets put on large sign outside of the AccuQuilt offices and headquarters. The entries are voted on by the public, and the Top 10 Blocks are reviewed by AccuQuilt and their Guest Judge (This year it's Eleanor Burns!).

This year, my daughter Heather has entered a block design!  You can vote for her block Here

Heather's block, named "Flying Together", is pretty cool!  I really like the vibrant colors and the flying geese coming together to meet in the middle.  (What a nice theme for a block this year, right!)

We love playing with blocks, and how you can get such different looks by just rotating a single block in a quilt layout :)  Here are just two versions using Heather's block:

This block lends itself to so many secondary designs by using different sashings, cornerstones, or an alternate block in the setting.

If you are voting in the AccuQuilt Block Contest for the first time, you may get an email with a confirmation link before your vote will count.  Once you complete that step, you should be all set ~ you can vote once a day within a 24 hour period from now through September 5th.

...We're hoping everyone will keep voting every day to keep Heather's block in the Top 10 ~ so if you like Heather's block, please take a second to go vote for "Flying Together"!

Here's the Link to the block one more time, or you can click on the photo of her block above.

Enjoy the Day!
~ Dawn

A Happy Surprise at the Fair :)

My blog has been idle for quite some time, after getting busy with the day to day running of a quilt shop ~ and I have some repairs to make to the blog as well (You might notice that the header isn't working so well, but we'll get that fixed again).  But I've missed the blogging, and have been wanting to get it going again, so this seemed like a good post to start sharing with...

This year, for the first time, I decided to enter a quilt in the Howard County Fair...and much to my surprise, these goodies were hanging on it when the girls and I went to the fair mid-week to check it out ~ I was hoping it might get a ribbon, but did not even imagine that it'd get a collection of ribbons!

You might recognize this quilt from it hanging in our shop.  It was my version of the Quilts Around the Bay Shop Hop quilt this year for the Bay Life theme that I made for Spring Water Designs.  I thought this one would be the perfect quilt for a Summer Fair Adventure (and a good kick of for the travels this quilt may take)

I designed the Terrapin and Loon blocks (the top two on the right column), and I designed the setting for the quilt.  The other blocks were designed by shops participating in the shop hop.  I did all the machine applique and machine quilted this quilt with a combination of Free Motion Quilting on the blocks, ruler work on the sashings, and computerized quilting on the borders on a Handi Quilter Avante. 

Here is a closer look at some of the blocks.  The Horseshoe Crab was from Delaware Sewing Center in Dover DE.

 The Star Fish was designed by Prints Charming Quilt Shop in Fulton, MD.

The Flying Geese block was from Blue Hen Quilt Shop in Newark DE, the school of fish from Serendipity in Dagsboro DE, and the Blue Crab from Quilt Vine in Trappe MD on the Eastern Shore.

...The Loon block with the Bay Bridge was the Bonus block designed by me for Spring Water Designs. 

 The Heron was from Tomorrow's Treasures in Crofton MD

 The Monarch Butterfly from Hoppin Bobbin in Aberdeen MD

...and our Diamondback Terrapin block I designed as our official Shop Hop Block from SWD. 

The first Quilts Around the Bay Shop Hop was last March, and it was truly a blast.  We are in the planning stages for the next Quilts Around the Bay Hop that is scheduled for March 2 - 11, 2018, and the theme for next year is Stars Above the Bay! Keep an eye out for more details, and a special joint shop collaborative event September 22 - October 1, 2017 :)  You can follow the Quilts Around the Bay Facebook Page to keep up on all the information, and we'll be keeping you posted in our newsletters and a link on our website homepage as well.  We're so happy to take part in this Shop Hop with such a wonderful group of shops and amazing business owners.  I'm learning so much from them and enjoying getting to know them on a personal level...and that makes this quilt all the more special to me :)

I'm also proud to say that another quilt that I had a small part in won a ribbon in the Howard County Fair this year too ~ Margaret Frederick's amazing Wool Folk Art quilt won a Blue Ribbon!  You can see photos of Margaret's amazing quilt and handwork details in This Post on my blog.

I'll be posting more regularly here on the blog...I promise, so keep checking back or follow through your blog reader. 

Enjoy the Day!

~ Dawn

A Bit of Inspiration for your Day :)

Recently I got to spend some time quilting on this lovely wool folk art quilt made by a customer.  I just love it, and marveled at each and every block as I worked on it ~ so much so, I just had to share some photos :)

The quilt maker, Margaret shared with me that it was a labor or love done in collaboration with her mother, Pat who did some of the embroidery and cotton fabric applique on it.  What a special work of art :)

You can see this lovely piece in person soon ~ Margaret says it will be shown at the Milltown Quilters Show April 27th thru 29th here in Columbia Maryland at the First Presbyterian Church of Howard County.  Information on the Quilt Show can be found Here on the Milltown website.
~ We'll be vending at the show too, so stop by and say Hi when you come!

Perpetually Hexie Fun

Here at Spring Water Designs, we love a good take along project. That’s one of the reasons that we are so excited about Katja Marek’s new quilt along. Perpetually Hexie uses monthly paper packs and Katja’s New Hexagon Perpetual Calendar.

Guidelines and monthly information will be sent out by Katja, so make sure you stop by her website as well to stay up to date with the project.

Our own Heather is taking part in this quilt along. She was inspired by our collection of 30’s fabrics and is using those for her hexagon wreaths each month. Here you see one hexie unit.

Starting to assemble the wreath!

She is also using various whites for her background. 

The block is finished by appliqueing the wreath to the background.

We’ll show her progress as she works on hers throughout the year.

We are getting the paper packs from Paper Pieces and have them in the shop as they are released, and we also have the calendar that you will need in stock. Call the shop or stop in to join in! (410)381-0695

Enjoy the day!

~ Dawn