Tag: quilt festival

quilt market · Rose Cards · villa rosa designs

Our NEW VRD 12 Quilts of Christmas Rose Card Quilt Pattern Collection, A Giveaway, and MORE Quilts From International Quilt Festival in Houston

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Hello Quilty Friends!

Happy Thursday to you!

Sorry for the very long title this week, but we have SEW much to cover! Buckle up and enjoy the ride!

12 Quilts of Christmas

I am super hyped to show off our NEW VRD pattern collection — the 12 Quilts of Christmas!!! We debuted this collection at Quilt Market and Quilt Festival and folks were really excited about it. We’ve been working on this project for quite a while now and it’s so so exciting that it’s finally available. I wanted to show it off last week, but we weren’t quite ready yet.

Release the confetti and the balloons!

Signal the band to play!

Here it is!

Get you 12 Quilts of Christmas collection HERE

Let me tell you a little bit about this collection. It includes 12 brand new Rose Card patterns for the holidays from your favorite VRD designers. You can see the individual patterns included in the collection in the image, above.

You will find —

1 set of place mats (Dinner Party), 2 table runners (Color Mittens and Poinsettia), 2 Gnome quilt blocks (Gnomie and Gerome), 1 wall quilt (Chili), 5 larger quilts (Wreathed, Baking Day, Gifted, Into the Trees, and Hot Cocoa), and 1 panel quilt (Homecoming). That’s a great variety of projects which are also classic VRD patterns which means they are fast and fun!

Featured designers in this collection —

Heidi Cook

Molly Cook

Tamara Cook

Melissa Milligan

Orphan Quilt Designs (moi)

Running Doe Quilts

Sewl Sister

Villa Rosa Designs (Pat Fryer)

The wonderful thing about our VRD designers is that we each have our own style and that means you get a super awesome group of projects!

You can order the patterns individually on the VRD website in both print and digital. The 12 Quilts of Christmas collection which includes all 12 new Rose Card patterns is only $14.95 for all 12 patterns! WOW!

Now, how about a GIVEAWAY????

12 Quilts of Christmas Collection Giveaway

To kick off our NEW 12 Quilts of Christmas Collection with a bang, I’m going to give away 2 sets of the collection right here on the VRD blog, Villa Rosa Quilts! Yay!

All you have to do is leave a comment below telling me a favorite holiday tradition.

I apologize, but this giveaway will be for US residents only.

Oh, almost forgot! You have from today, November 14th through Thursday, November 21st to leave a comment. I will select 2 lucky winners randomly on Friday, November 22nd.

Good Luck!

Now let’s look at more quilts from International Quilt Festival.

Quilts from International Quilt Festival in Houston

I think I mentioned last week that there were around 1100 quilts on display at Market and Festival. What a mind-boggling amount of quilts to be displayed under one roof. I don’t know if this was a larger number of quilts than usual, but it was truly awe-inspiring. I must admit the reason I didn’t see every quilt on display was because I actually had quilt overload and had to stop looking at quilts. But I did see most of them and I took lots of photos to share with you.

Many of you already know what a stickler I am for copyright law protection for designers, so I will only show quilts from the show that I also have the documentation for. This is a great tip for anyone who likes to photograph quilts at quilt shows or events — in addition to asking for permission to photograph the quilts, it’s equally important to include documentation with each quilt photograph because down the road, you or someone else might want to know who created or designed the quilt, quilted it, or what pattern the quilter used. Keeping documentation with a quilt helps to protect the rights of the quilt maker. I usually take a photo of the quilt first and then a photo of the information after the quilt and as long as I do this consistently, I can share quilt photos on social media without compromising the quilt maker. In my opinion, one should not just post or repost quilt (or any other art form) without the maker information included.

Take your time and please enjoy the quilts in the slideshows, below. I am not going to introduce each slideshow because the first image of each slideshow tells you the Exhibit along with a description (in most cases).

Just a quick note about Sharyn’s display — the quilts are arranged from right to left instead of the usual left to right. Knowing this will help make sense of the quilt timeline Sharyn created.

Below you’ll find information about the planned Exhibits for 2025. Have you ever thought about submitting a quilt for International Quilt Market and Festival? Maybe 2025 will be your year!

I wanted to share more about Festival, but it’s getting late and I need to wrap things up. So, that’s it for me this week. Stay tuned for next week — I’ll announce our 12 Quilts of Christmas winners and I want to show you some of the fun stuff I found at Market and Festival.

Until then —

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @ VRD

quilt festival · quilt market · Rose Cards · villa rosa designs

NEW November VRD Rose Card Patterns and 50 Years of International Quilt Festival

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Hello Quilty Friends!

Happy Thursday to you!

Just got home from International Quilt Market and Festival in Houston. Texas was a very welcoming and friendly place, like always. I didn’t get to many places as it was primarily a work trip, but I did make it to Phoenicia. Unfortunately, I never made it to Guadalajara’s for lunch with my quilty pals, Cathey and Leslie – maybe next year.

I am deliriously happy to be writing this post on my trusty desk top computer instead of the laptop I took with me to Houston, which fought me every step of the way. What a relief to type and actually see the words show up on on the screen one at a time instead of me typing and waiting and waiting some more before my words actually made it it onto the screen.

It’s always great to get home after being away for a while. You should have seen my pup, Bailly, when I walked in the front door. She was so excited she could hardly contain herself – her little backside was wiggling like crazy and her tail was doing circles! There’s just something so incredibly special to come home to a furry pal, even if you were only gone a few hours. The cats were also happy to see me and showed me in their much more reserved cat-like ways. It feels so good to be loved like that. Of course, I brought goodies home for each of the fur babies from my trip! And Bailly is wild about her new yellow squeaky dog shaped like a banana. LOL!

Before I jump into a bit about Quilt Festival, I want to share the NEW November Rose Card patterns with you, which came out while we were at Festival last week.

NEW November Rose Card Quilt Patterns

We’ve got 5 new throw-sized quilt patterns for this month from 5 different VRD designers.

Get your set of 5 print patterns HERE

I’m excited to finally show my new throw-sized pattern, 2M Junior. If you loved the original 2M pattern (see below), but maybe didn’t want to make a large bed-sized quilt, then 2M Junior is just for you. And I’m absolutely thrilled to tell you that I used Pat’s new Riley Blake fabric collection, Bedazzled, in 2M Junior. Bedazzled is shipping to shops in December and you’ll be able to pre-order it soon.

Get your 2M Junior print pattern HERE or your digital pattern HERE

Get your original 2M print pattern HERE or your digital pattern HERE

And we can’t forget this month’s table runner, Bespoke, and our new snack mat, Little ‘Shroom.

Get your print Bespoke HERE and your digital Bespoke HERE

Get your print Little ‘Shroom HERE or your digital Little ‘Shroom HERE

With 7 brand-new November patterns to choose from, which one will you make first???

International Quilt Festival’s 50th Anniversary

This year, 2024, International Quilt Festival celebrated its 50th Anniversary! How amazing is that??? There were something like 1100 quilts on display!

I spent some time exploring the quilt displays, but I definitely did not see all of the quilts this year. I did take lots of photos to share with you, however!

There was a special Red, White, and Blue quilt display hung from the ceiling in the quilt area. Oh my goodness! It was mind-boggling! So many gorgeous quilts from traditional to modern from small to large all in red, white, and blue.

Let me share some photos I took, although they cannot do justice to the display at all, but I hope you will enjoy them.

Inside the circle of quilts hanging from the ceiling was a mini quilt display.

There were also more red, white, and blue quilts all the way around the ceiling display, too. Here are 2 of my favorites by the amazing Combat Quilter, Andrew Lee.

Well, I guess that’s it for me today. I hope you enjoyed a peek at some of the quilts on display. Stop back next Thursday so I can tell you more about my trip to Houston for Quilt Market and Festival. And, yes, there will be more quilts, I promise.

Until then —

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @VRD

quilt festival · quilt market · villa rosa designs

Quilt Market Bound!

rosecards3 Comments

Hello Quilty Friends!

Happy Thursday to you!

Today is the day! As you read this post, I’m on my way to Houston, Texas for International Quilt Market AND I am staying for Festival again this year. I wasn’t originally planning to do that, but things worked out and I am able to stay for Festival now. Yay!

I definitely have to thank my family for taking care of my Bailly pup, my kitty boy Griffy and our kitty girl Pip. I know they’ll be spoiled and loved, but I will miss them a lot while I’m down in Houston. It will be fun to come home again to my Bailly’s tail wagging a million miles a minute! And I can’t forget my Griffy’s show of affection when he gives me random whole body rubs against my legs. And Pip — what can I say? – she is very quiet and observant of everything around her, but she’ll walk right over to tell me she’s glad I’m home. If you’re a pet parent, I know you’ll understand exactly what I’m talking about.

If you are planning to attend Market and/or Festival, I hope you’ll find time to stop over at the Villa Rosa Designs booth and say hello! Pat, Molly, Heidi, and I would love to meet all of you in person! 🙂

The VRD booth during Festival 2023.

I’m sitting here, smiling, thinking about last year’s Market and Festival. My friend, Cathey of Cathey Marie Designs, and I met for lunch during Market — we hadn’t seen each other since Market 2022. This year, our friend and fellow designer Leslie, is attending Market with Cathey. My fingers are crossed that we might be able to break away for a little lunch at Guadalajara, our favorite Mexican restaurant in downtown Houston, but we’ll see….

Last year my pal, Gaynel, and her sister Evie, went to Quilt Festival, so I was able to have a quick lunch with Gaynel — giant Texas-sized potatoes, of course! A long way to travel for lunch! LOL!

Here I am, showing off my yummy potato smothered in cheese, sour cream, and bacon!

Did I mention the food??? LOL! One of my favorite things to do when I travel (which is actually not very often) is to try different restaurants. Who wants to spend time cooking when you can spend time eating????

Of course, while I do get to have a bit of fun, I am also working at the VRD booth for Market and I get to help at the booth during Festival, too. Market and Festival are such a whirlwind of creativity, inspiration, and exhaustion.

One of the biggest features of both Market and Festival is the HUGE amount of quilts on display in the exhibit area. Most of the time, I don’t get to see all of the quilts, but I sure do try to slip a little quilt-gazing into my trip. Last year, there was a wonderful antique quilt display and I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time to participate in a quilt walk through the exhibit. what fun! There were quilts from the 1800’s right up to the 1980’s! Some of my favorites were the unique and original African American quilts. I am in awe of the art these women created with what they had. I really could have stood there for hours just looking at the fabrics and how everything fits together!

I was also totally mesmerized and amazed at how quilters in the 1960’s and 1970’s turned double knit polyester into gorgeous works of quilted art. I have always been fascinated with the idea of double knit quilts and I am very lucky to have a couple examples now — sweet little doll quilts. I will definitely have to share some of my sweet and wonky doll quilts sometime on the blog, won’t I?

What else is there to see at Market and Festival? Why, the people, of course! Lots and lots of folks from all over the world — it isn’t called International Quilt Festival for nothin’! I just love to hear all the happy and excited voices in different languages on the show floor, in booths, among the quilt exhibits, at the food court, and in the halls. The excitement and inspiration is so intense, you can almost taste it.

You might also get the chance to meet a famous quilting rock star, too. Over the years, I’ve met quite a few of my quilting heroes and they are always so gracious, even when they are mobbed by their fans.

Both Market and Festival offer a plethora of classes, too, although I rarely get the chance to pop into any classes these days. While Market Schoolhouse lectures are going on, we’re busy getting the VRD booth together for you. When it’s time for our VRD schoolhouse session, we grab the quilts and hurry upstairs. Then it’s back down to the show floor to finish setting up the booth.

If you’ve never been to Quilt Festival, I hope you’ll get the chance sometime — it’s the biggest most awesome quilt show and shopping venue! And if you are a quilting professional, I hope you get to attend Market at least once to experience all the sights and sounds of the quilt industry.

I count myself so lucky that I’ve been to Market more times than I can count and this year will be my second Festival. I’m ready — bring it on!

See you in Houston!

Until next time —

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @VRD

Just Quilty Stuff · quilt festival · quilt market · villa rosa designs

Antique/Vintage Quilts from the American Quilt Study Group Display and My Favorite Finds at Quilt Market and Quilt Festival

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Hello Quilty Friends!

Happy Thursday to you!

I’m still in Quilt Market/Festival mode and boy, have I got some goodies to show you today, including another slide show of quilts! I’d like to point out that this demonstrates how far-reaching and important Quilt Market and Festival really are — it literally takes weeks to “unpack” your brain afterwards. That can include looking through literature from companies, sifting through all your goodies, contacting new contacts, making connections about orders or new projects, and so much more. I am most definitely still decompressing from Market and Festival. Whoah! Squirrel……….

American Quilt Study Group Display

One of my favorite quilt displays at Market and Festival this year was by the American Quilt Study Group (AQSG). The display had a wonderful title — “Every Quilt Tells a Story”. It was a really interesting display with quilt examples ranging from the 1850’s up to circa 1980 — that’s one really broad stroke in quilt history! Some of my favorites on display were the double knit polyester quilts, believe it or not! I’ve always wanted to adopt a double knit quilt because the whole idea of working with such fabric always fascinated me.

As many of you know, my personal roots in quilt-making began with collecting antique and vintage textiles long before I taught myself to quilt after I graduated from college. I came to quilting through the side door, so to speak. Quilting, for me, was a perfect merger of my love of the antique and vintage as well as history and textiles. And OH THE STORIES our quilts could tell us….

So, this display was very near and dear to my heart. I even managed to be in the right place at the right time and participated in a quilt walk talk. It was great to hear more about each quilt as well as the collector/owner.

And while I was there, I even joined AQSG! I’m excited to learn more about my own textile collection and to see how I can contribute to the AQSG existing body of knowledge. You can learn more about the AQSG (and how to join) HERE.

Without further ado, here’s the slide show showing the quilts I was particularly drawn to. Again, please note the quilt information is the slide after the quilt.

Pretty awesome, huh? Which one was your favorite?

Speaking of antique and vintage quilt stuff, let me show you some of my favorite finds at Market and Festival.

Favorite Market and Festival Finds

Probably my most special find was Harold the antique quilt with the opened feed bags for a backing. Did you miss my story, “The Quilt that Followed Me Home”? You can find it HERE.

Then there’s the HUGE collection of antique and vintage Orphan blocks I found at 3 different antique quilt vendors — Quilts From Mulberry Lane, Tenny Roche Vintage, and Legacy Quilts . I can’t wait to play around with these….

Speaking of antique and vintage quilty stuff, I also found this incredible piece of Hawaiian quilting at the Lavender and Old Lace Co booth. It is hand-appliqued and completely hand-quilted. Maybe it was going to be a pillow square? Who knows? There probably isn’t any way to find out how old it is because it’s a solid red on muslin, but it definitely isn’t recent. It had a wide red silky blanket binding applied with some kind of fusible product all around the edges. The blanket binding pulled right off, but it did leave some red staining here and there. Ho hum, just part of the piece’s history. I plan to square it up, bind it in a vintage red fabric, add a hanging sleeve on the back, and a label. I don’t know the name of the block yet, but I will enjoy doing some research into Hawaiian quilting.

Of course, I had loads of fun shopping in our very own VRD booth! Being that I live in PA and the VRD quilt shop is located in CA, it was kind of like visiting the shop (at least a mini mobile one). I grabbed a couple kits I’d had my eye on — Pascali and Picture Perfect.

It’s your lucky day, too — we still have kits left for both patterns!

Pascali in True Blue HERE

Or maybe you’d just like the Pascali pattern? Physical Pascali HERE, Digital Pascali HERE

Picture Perfect in California Parks (the one I bought) HERE

Picture Perfect in Dwell in Possibilities HERE

Or maybe you’d just like Molly’s Picture Perfect pattern? Physical Picture Perfect HERE, digital Picture Perfect HERE

I spent time during Festival helping Molly and Heidi to keep the half and full yards of fabric organized in the plastic bins. I had never seen (or felt) the Charley Harper fabrics up close and personal before now. The fabric was so smooth and silky and the images so colorful and crisp!

Of course, after handling it for days, I just had to take my first Charley Harper fabrics home. It was hard to decide which fabrics to start with, so I ended up putting together a winter collection, a fall collection (’tis the seasons…..), and the last photo shows 2 random prints I fell in love with. It was really fun to mix and match the prints from different collections together. I am looking forward to creating a new VRD pattern (you know, in the next 50 years or so) using my Charley Harper fabric finds.

Pat, our VRD Rose Queen, has used Charley Harper fabrics in a couple patterns already, Newsflash and Jolie. Of course, the kits are long gone, but you can still get the patterns — physical Newsflash HERE or digital Newsflash HERE and physical Jolie HERE or digital Jolie HERE. And you can shop our VRD Charley Harper fabrics HERE.

Charm Squares and Fat Quarters, oh my!!! What more can I say???

PSST! The fat quarter rolls were from our VRD booth, you can see our VRD bundles HERE.

Have you ever been to Phoenicia in Houston? It’s an amazing specialty grocery store through the park and a block away from the Convention Center. Totally worth the short walk. Specialty grocery just doesn’t do the store justice — it’s a restaurant, coffee shop, bakery, meat and fish store, fresh foods, international foods, hot foods, cold foods, salad bar, fresh fruits/vegs, wine and beer, gifts, and so much more. I haven’t been here since 2019. I had so much fun wandering the aisles upstairs and down. I found some great goodies to take home for my family and even some special stuff for myself. I LOVE Turkish Delight. Have you ever tried it? I go all the way to Houston to find my favorite Koska brand from Turkey. And there were even some new flavor combinations, too!

Here I am sitting out front at one of the little bistro tables enjoying a S’mores cappuccino ( light on the coffee, heavy on the chocolate) and an amazing chocolate eclair. Yum!

Speaking of food, I get really excited to go to Quilt Market (and now Festival) just to have one of the most amazing Texas-sized stuffed baked potatoes. Yep, you heard me right — baked potatoes. I’m talking butter, brisket, cheese, BBQ sauce, sour cream, real bacon, and chives. Yum yum yummy! You can’t beat it for the most filling lunch ever. It’s not cheap, but it’s oh so satisfying.

Here I am digging into my tater……

So grab your own ginormous potato next year at the Food Court and tell ’em Tricia from PA sent you. I think they should keep a world map and a USA map on display (and color in the countries/states) to show all the places where potato lovers come from. Just sayin’……..

When I went to Houston, I took along a little hand-sewing wool felt project for the airport and on the plane. Of course, while I was taking everything in, I was drawn into the wool booth, Yellow Creek Quilt Designs — blame it on the Gnome piece that reached out and grabbed me. Ha Ha! Of course, I bought the pattern for the Gnomes well as a few others. And at another booth, Penny Lane Primitives, I bought this adorable snowman candle mat kit.

Well, I guess that’s it for me this week. I’ve got to get back to work on our upcoming 12 Quilts of Christmas collection! Stay warm and get quilting! And get some rest so you’re ready to first eat turkey next week then shop until you literally drop.

See you next Thursday on Thanksgiving —

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @VRD

Just Quilty Stuff · quilt market · Rose Cards · villa rosa designs

NEW November VRD Rose Card Quilt Patterns and International Quilt Festival Quilts

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Here I sit at the Hobby airport grabbing some lunch while I wait for my flight back to good ol’ Pennsylvania. Wow! What an awesome Quilt Market and Festival! I am so excited to get back to my studio and get to work on new projects — my head is just exploding with inspiration and ideas.

I did figure out how to get Harold the quilt home — I bought a duffel bag at WalMart since I’d only brought one suitcase and “2 bags fly free.” The only problem with the duffel is that with only Harold in it, it was kind of empty so I just had to shop for awesome cool stuff at Festival to fill it up so Harold wouldn’t be lonely on the trip home. So sad, huh? I’ll be showing you some of my favorites in next week’s post, so stay tuned……

Now let me show you our NEW VRD Rose Card patterns for November.

NEW November Villa Rosa Designs Rose Card Quilt Patterns

Yay! It’s the Thursday after the first Friday of the month and you know what that means — NEW PATTERNS!

Aren’t they great??? As always, you can get the set of 5 regular patterns for the special price of $8.95 HERE.

We’re happy to welcome our newest Villa Rosa Designs designer — Deanne Moore of Creative Sewlutions. Most of you are probably already familiar with her classic Oh Henry pattern — Deanne selected the most popular size for her Rose Card Oh Henry pattern. Find the kit, featuring fabric from Wild Wander, HERE. And Deanne’s other new pattern, Messages is just tons of fun, isn’t it?

Peking Duck is an awesome pattern by Heidi to showcase those gorgeous large prints you just cannot cut up. I’m thinking Charley Harper fabrics would look great in her pattern, what do you think?

Molly’s fast and fun pattern Underline would also look great with larger prints or novelties paired with an accent. This is a good size for a kid’s quilt. You can find the kit HERE.

And don’t forget Farmhouse Blues, my new November pattern. I was sew inspired by the blue and white Moda collection, Blueberry Delight, that I just had to design a quilt around it. I had the most fun photographing it on my Dad’s vintage tractor. I think this is one of my best cover photos ever.

Here’s the original uncropped photo for the Farmhouse Blues cover. Definitely one of my favorite covers ever!

Molly created a sample using the red, white, and blue collection, Patchwork Americana by P&B. You can find the kit HERE.

Molly’s version of Farmhouse Blues, available as a kit.

I’m sorry that we don’t have a table runner for this month — there just wasn’t enough time to get everything ready and to press before Market and Festival. We will have a runner coming for December, though, so hang in there.

Now let’s get back to Quilt Market and Festival!

Quilts of Quilt Market and Festival

During Festival, I was able to spend quite a bit of time enjoying the quilts on display. Oh my goodness, talk about amazing and inspiring! I was really blown away with the creativity and skill. Truly amazing! Pair all of the quilts with all of the shopping and you have an amazing experience. If you haven’t attended Festival, I really urge you to go to one sometime, you won’t be sorry. I do suggest that you plan for at least 2 days, although staying for the entire show would be awesome. There is absolutely no way you can see and experience everything in just one day. It really is sensory overload, so a couple days is a must so you don’t get too overwhelmed.

Anyway, I thought I’d share some of the amazing quilts on display. In the image after each quilt, I’ve included the maker information. Please enjoy my little slide show!

Well, that’s it for me this week. I hope you stop in next week for another little slide show and my favorite finds from Quilt Market and Festival. Until then, spend some quality time with your sewing machine!

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @VRD

quilt market · Quilt Stories · villa rosa designs

Villa Rosa Designs Quilt Market NEWS, Quilt Festival, and the Quilt that Followed Me Home

rosecards9 Comments

Hello Quilty Friends!

Happy Thursday to you!

As I sit and write this post, sadly, Quilt Market is over. I must apologize that I did not pop onto the blog to talk about anything going on here at Market in Houston, TX. But it just all went so fast!

Working in the VRD booth was lots of fun! I just loved chatting with folks when they stopped by the booth and I spent a lot of time hustling to pack up patterns (we all did!). And time just zipped by. By the end of each day, I put on well over 10,000 steps and I was plumb worn out.

I also must admit that I only took maybe 2 photos during the whole of Quilt Market. Sad, sad, sad, I know. It’s okay, you can roll your eyes at me, I don’t mind….

Here’s a photo of Market looking down from the second floor back in the good ol’ days before the Pandemic.
Here’s an old photo of the VRD booth from 2018. This year’s booth was set up a little different, but still had all the same components — current quilts on display, fat quarter bundles and kits, and our patterns (of course).

One of the very best things about Quilt Market is getting out there and networking with real people. It was great meeting lots of new folks and catching up with people I work with online so we could actually meet face to face.

Of course, it’s also a great time to connect with old friends. I had lunch with my pal Cathey Laird from Cathey Marie Designs. Catherine of Running Doe Quilts (one of our VRD designers) stopped by — it was so nice to see her again. I also met our newest VRD designer, Deanne Moore of Creative Sewlutions. An old quilt guild friend, Sondra Raby of Art Quilts by Design, was here doing demos and I at least got to say hi as she was running off for her next demo. I caught up with Christa Watson of Christa Quilts, a favorite machine quilter, author, and fabric designer and Vanessa Goertzen of Lella Boutique, who is also a fabric designer and author. This is what Quilt Market is all about — meeting people and making connections. If you ever have the opportunity to attend a Quilt Market, I totally say “Go For It” — you won’t be sorry.

Although Market is over, the good news is that we’re rolling right into Quilt Festival and I promise to take lots of photos, including of the VRD booth, too. If you’re coming to Quilt Festival here in Houston, TX, don’t forget to stop and shop at our Villa Rosa Designs booth #801. You won’t believe the “dump” table which is piled sky high with fat quarter bundles. Oh. My. Goodness. It’s a quilter’s paradise.

A smiling Molly!
Kits, kits, and more kits. And quilts! Oh my!
Majestic Bundle Mountain — AKA, the “Dump” table.
Here’s our VRD Rose Queen, Pat.
Bolts just waiting for you at the booth.
Kits, kits for everyone!

One of the coolest things about Festival, besides that it’s my first one, is that I finally get to meet Villa Rosa Designs designers Molly and Heidi Cook (it’s Heidi’s first Festival too) in person! Yay! Oh, the mischief we could get into together…. Sigh…..poor Pat.

And here’s a really funny thing — my friend, Gaynel, from my neck of the woods, is coming to Festival on Friday. What a long way for us to come just to meet for lunch, huh? LOL!!!

Now, let’s move on to some awesome announcements we made at Market about what’s NEW at VRD!

Villa Rosa Designs NEWS

I am happy to share some great new stuff coming soon with Villa Rosa Designs with you!

Designer News

Kate Griffin will be returning to Villa Rosa Designs. Some of her wonderful patterns are coming out of retirement, so stay tuned for more information….

Deanne Moore, designer of Creative Sewlutions patterns, is joining the VRD Family! Check out her 2 patterns coming in November, Oh Henry and Messages. You can visit Deanne’s website HERE.

New Pattern Collections

Coming in November, we will have 2 brand new exclusive 12 pattern collections!

We are delighted to announce we are partnering with the Quilts of Valor Foundation to bring you a collection of existing VRD patterns that meet the size requirements for QOV quilts. A portion of every sale will be donated to QOVF.

We will also be offering a brand new “12 Quilts of Christmas” pattern collection just in time for the 2023 holidays! This collection will feature 12 new holiday patterns for projects ranging from table runners to place mats to throw quilts and more featuring designs of many of our wonderful VRD designers.

Coming in 2024

Back by popular demand!

Coming in January/February 2024, we will host our second Fast and Even More Fun Blog Hop. More information to follow soon!

The Quilt that Followed Me Home

You know the saying — “what happens at Quilt Market (or wherever you are), stays at Quilt Market”? Nope, not this time — this story is meant to be shared.

Every time I attend a Quilt Market, the first place I literally visit besides our Villa Rosa Designs booth is Quilts from Mulberry Lane and my friends Carolyn and Don Springer. You can visit their website HERE.

I think I met these dear folks way back at my first Market in 2010 when my first book, Orphan Block Quilts, debuted (psst — this was also when I met Pat Fryer, our VRD Rose Queen, and you know how that turned out).

As most of you know by now, I personally LOVE antique and vintage quilt and textile stuff, so of course I found my way to Mulberry Lane. Anyway, when I stopped to check in with Carolyn and Don, they couldn’t wait to tell me about this interesting quilt that had found its way to them. The quilt had opened feed bags on the back of it and one of the bags was still very easy to read. They knew of my love for feed sacks and knew I’d be interested. Sadly, there was no provenance.

It really warmed my heart that they thought of me! They are such kind people. Don showed me the quilt back first. What an interesting find, for sure. I’d heard of people using opened feed bags for utility purposes such as quilt backs, sheets, underwear, etc., but I’d never really seen it in person. Until now. Then Don finally showed me the front and it had humble Snowball blocks in plaid and stripe shirtings with a few Indigos thrown in for good measure set side by side. I’m thinking perhaps circa 1920’s-1930’s. As a reference point, I have my grandpa’s Nine Patch quilt which was made by his mother when he was a young man and it also features shirtings and such. Very similar quilts. Also as a reference, printed design feed sacks weren’t available until the late 1930’s.

It definitely needed a good bath, but Don said they were concerned about washing it because of the printing on the back feed bags and they were concerned it might fade or wash out. It’s well-loved with typical wear and tear and could use a new binding. But all in all, this quilt still has a lot of love to give.

The Springers gifted this quilt to me. I was so so touched by their desire to put this quilt into the hands of someone (me) who would love and cherish it. We named him Harold (I have a quirky habit of naming everything).

Then the weather turned chilly here in Houston and Harold fulfilled his purpose once again and warmed me during the cooler nights — I definitely did not bring any cooler weather clothing with me (by the way, Wednesday morning we had 8 inches of snow on the ground at home in Pennsylvania — way way too early). Thank you Harold! And thank you to my dear friends, the Springers, for their kind generosity.

Now to figure out how best to get Harold back home to Pennsylvania….

I did grab a few quilt blocks and feed sacks from the Springers, too. Adding to my stash, of course because one can never have enough stash. I bought the blocks because they had feed sack fabrics or other interesting vintage fabrics in them.

Here I come, Quilt Festival!

See you next Thursday right here. Same place, same time —

Sew. Laugh. Repeat.

Always,

Tricia @VRD