A Quilt Show Celebration

I became a member of the Calico Quilt Guild about 13 years ago and I have learned so much over those years from some amazing women.

Dusty Majors founded the Calico Quilt Guild in 1986 and this past April, we celebrated our 30th birthday.

Every other year, the Calico Quilters puts on a quilt show over Memorial Day weekend during a local event called Mule Days here in good ole Bishop, California.

If you happen to be in town, or just passing through, that weekend, please stop by. The show will be at the Methodist Church on Fowler Street, Saturday 10am - 5pm and Sunday 10am - 2pm.

We will have:

• Quilts on display
• Two different challenge blocks made by guild members
• The first challenge is to see if you can guess the title of a song by what is depicted on a quilt block.
• The second challenge will show how guild members celebrate Inyo County or our favorite aspects of our home, which is celebrating 150 years this year.
• A mini raffle
• A marketplace where you can purchase handmade goodies
• Demonstrations on various quilting techniques
• Live music provided by one of our guild members
• Homemade cookies
• Coffee, iced tea and lemonade

We also have two opportunity quilts that you can purchase tickets for and one of them will be raffled off to one lucky winner at the show (you do not need to be present to win and we will ship a quilt if you live out of the area). All of the proceeds go to local scholarships that we give out to graduating Bishop Union High School seniors.

We also make quilts for wounded soldiers and we will be displaying some of the quilts that will be sent off after the quilt show.

Quilts of Valor from the 2014 Quilt Show.

Also on display are stockings that we make for the babies born at Northern Inyo Hospital between Thanksgiving and the New Year. Each stocking is large enough to fit a baby inside and they get to travel home in holiday style. In 2015, we had 42 babies born during that time!! The most in our 30 year history.

Here are some of the photos from our 2014 Quilt Show:

Marketplace

2015 Opportunity Quilt

Mini Raffle

2014 Challenge

2014 Challenge Winner

This quilt shows all of the various things the Guild does.

This quilt is made from the first blocks ever made by the Calico Quilters in 1986. Each member signed her block. Most of the members have since passed away. This quilt was given the name the "Mother Quilt" and it will be on display this year.

Paper Piecing demonstration.

Life is Getting in the Way

I didn't realize that it has been almost a year since I last updated this blog. Oops. Sorry about that. Life has certainly been crazy right now. I haven't really had the time or the creative push to get new inventory items in my shop, so I've decided that until I can get quite a few new items created, my shop is on vacation.

Once my quilt guild's quilt show is over, I will have a lot more time to create items for my Etsy shop. I'm working with creating more items made from recycled books. One is taking old children's books and turning the covers into an e-reader holder. I'm really excited to figure that out.

I will do my best to stay more up-to-date on this blog, but you can always check out Facebook as well as I seem to be on there all the time. Thank you for understanding that I needed a break for a while. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at acraftywitchetsyshop@gmail.com or message me on Etsy. Thank you.

I'm Registered

I have officially registered for the CHOC Walk in the Park 2015 at Disneyland. If you would like to donate, please visit:

http://choc.convio.net/goto/caitlyanna

To reiterate my other post, I will be donating 25% of my profits from May to October. Any and all donation are greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Mother's Day

Celebrate Mother's Day with the perfect gift.

Starting today until Mother's Day, May 10th, take 15% off any purchase $5.00 and over with the coupon code "MOTHERSDAY2015" at checkout.

CHOC Walk 2015

My family and I learned about the CHOC Walk in 2012 when we arrived late in Anaheim, CA and couldn't understand the amount of traffic on Katella Ave, Ball Rd and the other surrounding streets around Disneyland. My cousin explained to us that it was a 5K charity walk Disneyland does every year to support the Children's Hospital of Orange County (CHOC). 

Knowing that we would be in Disneyland for six days in October 2013 to celebrate three family members birthdays, we decided to support CHOC and Disneyland and participate in the walk. It was great and so much fun. Why not participate every year? I'm up for it. 

I decided this year that I would donate a portion of my Etsy sales to CHOC. From May 1st to October 1st, I will donate 25% of my sales to CHOC. Once I can officially register to walk (I have to wait until sometime in May), I will share the link if you would like to donate as well. I'm excited!! I will never argue any reason to go to Disneyland and CHOC has helped the daughter of someone my brother went all through high school with.

New Felt Cup Cozies

Last month was a crazy, hectic month with the death of my grandfather and my birthday trip to Disneyland but I managed to add some new felt cup cozies. My mom and I love making these. They always seems to take on a life of their own. I will be adding more to my shop later this month.

New Items

So I took a break from my Etsy shop to regroup and come up with some new things and even redo some of my older things. I ended up taking six months off and now I'm ready to focus on this again. My biggest motivation is the fact that today was my first day being unemployed. That's right, I decided to quit my job to focus on other things that I really want to do with my life. My Etsy shop is one of them.

One of my newest items is a different approach to my cup cozies. While I love crocheting them, I wanted to do something else as well. So I started searching various things on Etsy and Pinterest (I really need to stay off these sites) for inspiration and I decided upon felt. Felt doesn't need a finished edge because it won't fray like fabric will. I still recommend hand washing them just because that's what I do, but I don't see why you couldn't. I would just be careful because they could shrink or the color can bleed.

My mom has also been busy creating more of her felt pincushions that sell great at craft shows. She loves making these. Anything that will allow her to hand embroidery, she will do it. The possibilities that she comes up with are endless.

I hope you enjoy the new stuff, as well as the old stuff that is still unique. Enjoy.