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

...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 Tuffet Time at SWD

Have you seen the Tuffets that are all the craze now?  We'll we've been having Tuffet Classes at Spring Water Designs and they're very popular, whimsical, and just a little bit addictive :)
These Red Tuffets were made by Mary and Carrie.  They were made with Essential Gems strip packs, but any strips or scraps can be used.

Here are a few "sights and sounds" from some of our recent Tuffet Classes where some unique little gems have been created...

Every one is so different and special ~ we're having so much fun seeing all the different creations come alive :)

We have one more Tuffet Class scheduled for this summer on Tuesdays, July 26th & August 9th.  Carrie will help you sew your Tuffet cover at the first session, and then put it all together in the second.  We also have the Tuffet Pattern, Foundations to make additional Tuffets, and we'll put together a Hardware Kit for you.  Contact us if you have any questions, and come spend some time in our studio creating some Whimsy of your own...
After all... as Willy Wonka quoted ..."A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men" :) 

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Need to Suppliment your Stash for the Mystery?

Have you taken part in the annual Bonnie Hunter Winter Mystery Quilt before?  If you're looking for some pure sewing fun this winter, check out Bonnie's Blog Quiltville's Quips & Snips!  Every year Bonnie runs a Mystery Quilt project starting with the first clue the Friday after Thanksgiving, and releasing another clue each week for about six weeks until it's finished!  If you sew along each week making the clues, you end up with a wonderful quilt at the end :)

Bonnie has given the color clues out ahead of time, using paint chips as reference to what she is referring to, so you can go through your stash and start gathering up your fabrics.  It's meant to be totally scrappy ~ the more fabrics the better!  You can visit Bonnie's blog post to get full description of the colors and how this all works...and then check back on Friday for Clue #1!

 

 Just like year, we've gathered some fabrics in our shop that coordinate with Bonnie's paint chips.

I'm liking this year's colors, and can't wait to see what Bonnie does with them ~ and of course I'll be playing along ~ I can't miss out!  ...Even if I can't get it all finished soon, I'll print all the clues and have my project box all ready to pull out when I can ~ and of course they make great Leaders & Enders :) 

So if you need to supplement your stash (and I have spied some people in the shop with paint chips lately), come in and pick up a few cuts to go with your fabrics :)

We're closed tomorrow for Thanksgiving Day, but will be open regular hours on Friday & Saturday, and are having a Great Black Friday/Small Business Saturday Sale!

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Are You Up for a Mystery this Summer?

We've set aside three Saturdays this summer at Spring Water Designs for the Magical Mystery Tour...aka Mary & Heather's Excellent Adventure :)

Each of these three classes are stand alone classes, each with it's own mystery quilt project to make ~ you can come to one or all of them!  The first Mystery class was last Saturday, and each of the adventurous students started with different fabrics after being given clues about value/colors and such...

They were told what to cut, and given some cool tricks on how to sew and cut quickly...

To make Half Square Triangles eight at a time, and tips/tricks on squaring them up quickly.

 ...Everyone was guided in the construction of blocks...

...And then the Big Reveal!  Heather and Mary each showed their version of the quilt.

Mary even had a mini version to show :) 

And Marcia shared her finish with us from the class!

Everyone had a great time on their "Excellent Quilty Adventure", and after all, that's was a Summer Saturday is for...right!

We have two more classes on the Magical Mystery Tour this summer, one this month on Saturday, July 18th, and the last one on Saturday, August 15th.  We still have a couple spots left, so if you'd like to jump in you can check them out Here or call the shop to sign up.  The classes are from 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m., but then you can stay and sew on your project all afternoon until we close :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn