Bag making supplies found in Markham!

Designs for Christmas

In the last little while, I have been busy designing some gift card holders for A Needle Pulling Thread magazine. These are for the festive issue and the deadline is June 1st. Believe me, I have been challenged to think Christmas when I am so very sick of winter, but I've finished making the sketches and the patterns, choosing the colours and tracing the designs onto the linen. Now I have to do the models, taking notes as I go. Then I will write the instructions. It isn't easy, but I like the work. I only hope the editors and the readers will like the end results.

Sweets from Sandra and fabric from Markham

In order to hobble the sugarplums' dance in my head, I was browsing around tote bag-making sites on the Internet on Tuesday evening. I actually found one close to home. So, me being me, I paid a visit the very next day. It was well worth the trip!
Normally, I don't do a lot of bragging for commercial enterprises, but I have to give a bit of a shout out to Quilt a Bag in Markham ON. It's about a half hour away, and has some of the most intriguing collections available in my part of the world for fabric and bag making hardware. It is also an authorized Bernina dealer -- and so, I love it.
Phoebe and Ann do a great job of finding some lovely Japanese designer fabrics -- including the sought after cotton/linen blends full of quirky, tiny prints. They also stock an impressive great selection of threads and Moda fat quarters. There are a ton of bag samples  made up for both inspiration and to showcase the fabrics.
These ladies are also warm, welcoming and very knowledgeable. Sandra and I popped over for a visit this morning, and we had a great time browsing and buying. Before we left her place, Sandra shared some of her pretty sweets sent to her from a friend in Germany. All in all, it was a nice jaunt.
Now we are longing to fit a class or two at Quilt a Bag into our schedules this year. They don't have mail order yet, but it is in the works.
In the meantime, have a virtual visit. There are a couple of tutorials there as well -- check out the zippered key chain purse. Sweeeeeet!