We Hopped and Shopped

Hi Everyone,

Thursday was a long, but really fun day.  I left my house at 6:30 in the morning and didn't get home until 9:30 at night.  We went to four of the 6 shops on the hop and then had an unexpected stop near Richmond.

This was our route.  Over on the left side, halfway down, you can see the red marker showing our start/finish point.  We headed down and across the bottom of the map to Warrenton, NC.  It took about 3 hours to get there.  The next shop was about 40 miles back in Virginia at Boydton.  We had lunch there, as well as visiting the shop.  Then we journeyed for another hour and a half the the third shop in Crewe, VA and then a shot hop to Rice for the last of the shops.  After Rice, we traveled nearly straight east to Richmond.  We had supper there and then headed home.

This is the first shop:  Quilt Lizzy

It is a fun shop, chock full of Moda and lots of precuts.  Look!  They have all of Grant Park (one of my favorite lines by Minick and Simpson)

They also have two long arm machines and will happily quilt your tops for you!  Here is a picture.  There is lots of bright light in the shop, which I really appreciate.

Even with all of the great fabric, I was really trying to be good and not buy much.  My purchase at this shop was limited to this:

The Add-An-Eighth ruler.  The rest of the items were prizes and gifts.  For the hop, if you traveled in a group of 4 or more, and had some way to show that you were part of a group (we wore our guild cards as name tags fastened on our shirts with paperclips) they everyone in the group got a prize at each shop.  At Quilt Lizzy, we received the blue clip-on lanyard.

We took this picture at Quilt Lizzy.  I love it!  We are having every bit as much fun as it looks like.  My favorite thing about this shop is it's owner.  She is a real fun lady with a wonderful attitude!

It was a bit of a short drive to the next shop:

The Quilter's Nook in Boydton, VA.  This was a pretty small shop.

Our prize for being in a group was a certificate for $15 off any class.  That was really generous, but she figured out that since we lived so far away, we probably wouldn't take a class, so she gave us a fat quarter, too.  Here I found two pieces of fabric that I couldn't live without.

They are on the left, and my free fat quarter is on the right.  The cute mug package was a free gift you got if you made a purchase.  Inside is a kit to make a small bird quilt--so cute!  As part of the shop hop, each shop was having drawings on the hour.  We were there pretty early on in the hour, but we were ready for lunch, so we went next door to one of the two local restaurants.  We all had stomboli or calzones and they were pretty yummy.  When the hour mark came up, one of the girls took all of our tickets and went back to the shop to see if we had won, but none of us did.  (If I'm remembering correctly.)  We hadn't won anything at Quilt Lizzy, either.

We finished in Boydton and proceeded for over an hour to Crewe.  Along the way, we saw some evidence of construction and then traffic halted.  We were sitting there behind several cars and we could just make out a flagman holding a stop sign.  I speculated that we must have to wait for a pilot car.  After a bit of waiting, we finally got moving.  Sure enough, when we got back to the normal highway, we saw the pilot car.  Two of the girls had never had that fun experience before and hadn't really ever heard of the concept of "pilot car."  I grew up in South Dakota (home of 2 seasons:  winter and road construction) and lived 4 years in Alaska, so I am well acquainted with them.  But I'm curious.  How many of you have ever had to wait for a pilot car?

We finally got to the next shop, Rose Patch Creations.

I entered and all of my restraint went right out the window.  Image a quilt shop filled with all of your favorite kinds of fabric!  This is it for me!

Look at all of these red fabrics!  I was in Heaven.  This doesn't even show all the Civil War reproductions in the front part of the shop.  We had a great deal of enabling going on in this shop.  We were all clustered around the cutting table, "oooing and ahhing" over everyone's selections and then getting some cut for ourselves.  It was really fun.  And one of our group won the prize here, too!

This is my purchases from that shop.  Just a warning:  they take the "rose" theme a bit to heart and scent the shop like roses.  It wasn't so bad inside, but our purchases transferred the scent to the car.

It was another short drive to the final shop.

This is Lib's Place in Rice, VA.  It is full of fabric, but also yarn, scrapbooking supplies and gift items.  You can't really tell from the photo, but it is in a fun building that is reminiscent of an old country store.  Hanging over the railing of the shop was this gorgeous quilt.

Isn't it lovely?  As I got a closer look, it was surprising to see that it was tied, not quilted.  It actually added to the "antique" look of the quilt.

I found things at that shop, too.  See the great patriotic fabric that is sort of "cut your own jelly roll?"  I haven't seen that before, so I got some.  I think it will be neat to cross-cut the strips and use them for binding. The tan fabric is covered with stars.  One of the other ladies won the drawing here!

By the time we finished here, it was after 4.  We set off toward Richmond.  On the outskirts, we encountered this:

A wonderful Hobby Lobby!  We don't have one in our area and I knew there was one in the Richmond area, but I didn't dream we would be going right by.  Needless to say, we stopped!  They have lots of craft stuff and great fabric, but also a huge selection of decorating items and furniture.

Luckily for me, they already had Patriotic items out.  They always have a great selection.  I found these two things which needed to come home with me.  The base of the gnome says "God Bless America."

After Hobby Lobby we stopped for a nice supper and then drove the rest of the way home.  It was a wonderful day filled with friends, fabric, and fun.  What could be better?

Have a great day!
JoAnne