Stop staring and start sewing!

To market! And a give away!

I'm absolutely scrambling to finish one last skirt here.  My flight leaves in 10 hours and, as usual, I'm last minute frantic.  Quilt Market is this week and the best part is it's in Portland, my home town.  I have to give a presentation on my book in front of dozens of folks and I'm not ready for that either.  But, oh well.

I'm happy to take a second to show you some of the stuff I've been up to and give you a chance to win something amazing.

Here is a closeup of the combination of fabrics in my skirt made out of my friend Bari J. Ackerman's gorgeous new Bijoux collection (in stores now!).  The colors are so rich and the fabric is incredibly soft, like lawn.

And here is my skirt and Bari's skirt.  They are both from patterns in my book The Essential A-Line.  Hers is the Contrast Pleat pattern (pg 79) and mine is the Contrast Layer pattern (pg 60).  Cute, right?

 

And look at the great give away Bari is having!

 

Bijoux has started shipping to stores, so soon you'll be able to add a little bit of her to your life. But right now, this very moment, you can enter to win a giveaway! Bari is giving one lucky winner a bundle of 10 Bijoux fat quarters. This giveaway has a quick turnaround, so be sure to enter right away. You'll have 24 hours to enter, and I'll choose the winner, randomly, on Thursday.

This group of blogs has already had their drawing but please visit them to see their beautiful creations made from Bijoux, and be inspired.

May 8: Melanie Dramatic
May 9: Sew Much Like Mom
May 10: 100 Billion Stars
May 11: I'm Doing Stuff
(mother's day, no stop on the 12th)
May 13: Imagine Gnats

 

Check out these blogs the rest of the week for more chances to win a gorgeous bundle!

May 15: Mommy for Reals
May 16: Olive and Ollie
May 17: Pile O' Fabric
May 18: Sally's Angel Works
May 19: JM Maxman

Back with a winner soon and then lots of great pictures from Quilt Market (it's going to be great!).

The post in which I ask for a favor....(quick)

Quick!

 Run over to Stash Books Blog to win a free copy of my book!  Only 2 more days!

That wasn't the favor.  This is...

A couple of years ago I took a portfolio of my designs to quilt market in the hopes of snagging a contract with a fabric manufacturer.  I was thrilled to tears when I recieved a contract nearly 2 months later.  I was not so pleased when they changed their minds and I had to chase them down to find that out.  Fortunately I got a real contract for a book at the same time so that helped comfort me and keep my busy for awhile.

Well last week I happened upon this contest on the We All Sew site.  I figured "what the heck" and submitted some of my original designs and a few I've played around with.  The grand prize is a chance at a fabric contract and a stunning new Bernina 710.  Frankly I want the machine more than the contract but don't tell anyone.  I wouldn't mind winning the running up prizes which include Kim Kight's wonderful book A Field Guide to Fabric Design (but since I already have it I would share it with one of my blog readers and it's a great book!) and some cute patterns.

Anyway, this contest has brought out my fierce competetive side and I thought I would ask for help in kicking some pants over there.  All you have to do is re-pin my picture (using the links on each of them below).  If you want to delete it next week after the contest is over my feelings won't be hurt one bit.  The contest ends in two days.  Thanks for playing along!  I promise I won't ask any more favors until next time.  :)

Here's the link for this one:

 

And this one:

 

And this one:

 

And this one:

 

And this one: (which may be my favorite)

 

And this one:

 

And this one:

 

And this one:

 

And this one:

 

What do you think?  

Thank you!  Jona

Hey Duvet! It's curtains for you....

The 3 winners of a signed copy of my book (hot off the presses) are Flavia, Eleanor, and Gill.  Congratulations!  If you didn't win this time you can quickly run over to SewStylish and enter to win their constest for my book (nice folks).  If you still don't win they are shipping quickly from Amazon right now.

I'm slowly moving forward on my home spruce up here and I just made a big leap by finally getting around to making new curtains for the front rooms of my home.  This room is now the dining room (it used to be a dark, depressing tv room).  I want it to be fresh and breezy in here (so when folks walk by they will look in the window and ask themselves "How did she get her dining room to be so fresh and breezy?  What is her secret?").  The secret is a cute, reasonably priced duvet from IKEA (and a little fabric from my stash).

 

Here are the old curtains (which are now in storage as the Christmas-Valentines curtains).  They are nice but they sure draw all the attention in the room and I don't want that.

 

Here is my new, lighter look.  I used a queen sized duvet from the Fjalltag collection at IKEA (this print was in and out of the store so fast I'm glad I snapped it up when I did).  I'm in love.  My new curtains are soft looking but not bland.  They are a nice golden yellow and I love the way the sun shines through them.

 

I'm still trying to decide if I'm going to paint that sideboard a lighter color or not.  Any ideas or opinions would be greatly appreciated.

I'll share my process of converting that duvet to curtains pretty quick here.  It was super simple and I think you'll be inspired.  I hope you're having a great week!

My best give away ever! My book (signed)!

I was thrilled to receive a box of my books from my friends at Stash Publishing the other day!  I'd completely forgotten that it was in my contract so what a treat.  I'm thrilled to be able to share 3 signed copies with you. Seriously thrilled.

Here are some of the beautiful pictures from the book.  I'm so grateful for the beautiful cover and set photos done by Tea Ho in the San Francisco bay area.  Dreamy.

The book has shipped out to all online booksellers and should be showing up on the shelves at local book and fabric/craft stores pretty quickly here.

Just leave a nice comment after this post and I'll draw 3 winners later this week!

Oh, and I'm finally figuring out InstaGram so join me there (I'm jonagiammalva) and here's my flickr group for my book (c'mon over and show off!), here's my blog facebook page, and I'm trying to get better at tweeting so you can find me there too (@fabritopia).  I think that's all (oh wait! Pinterest!).  :)  I'm so not joining Vine, in fact I'm not even going to go look at it in case I'm tempted.  Have a wonderful week!

Bringing a little order to my life

I've spent the past couple of months sorting through every last thing in my sewing inventory and trying to make some sense of it all.  I got rid of yards and yards of fabric that represented so many good intentions but it was time to be honest with myself and pass it on (to other people with good intentions, ha!).  I'm not a very organized person by nature (it really taxes my brain) but once I find something that works for me I can usually keep it together.  I was looking at some before/after rooms by Candice Olsen (I love her!) and it hit me....drawers!  I really needed my stuff out of sight but accessible.  Enter IKEA (again). 

I found these new shelves called Bitrade.  They are not on the website for some reason but are like the Expedit shelves but smaller (and only 29.99 each).  So I bought 4 and stacked them.  I love them.  But I think my favorite part is the two 6-drawer units underneath.  They are the Malm drawers and I love the fact that they are so plain and sleek (it brings a little calm into my crazy, multi-purpose room).  I'm planning on moving it all to another wall (when we re-do the floors) but here's how it's working now.

 

Fabric, books, and things I love.  All right there looking cute and orderly.  Sigh.

Check this out!  This stuff used to be oozing out of my old storage "system" and I hated seeing the mess.  Now everthing is neat and available in these Skubb fabric storage bins.  It's heavenly.  It took me forever to sort and organize this stuff but it was so worth it.

I've still got a ways to go in this room but I'm so encouraged and inspired by the progress that I can handle the still messy areas because I know they are temporary.  Yay!