New Cloth Paper Scissors just arrived!

Look what arrived today! I just love this magazine. It has the most beautiful and inspiring photography and articles. We have 5 copies and we've priced them to be competetive, even with the publisher, Interweave's website! You will be so happy when this magazine arrives in your mailbox. There are quilt projects, mixed media fiber art, paper projects, a new to me technique called encaustic, using packaing styrofoam to make cute painted houses, and that's just scratching the surface! Here is a list of projects from the magazine, straight from the publisher's website:

• Creating soulful collaged and painted figures
• A Beginner's Guide to Beginning
• Artist Profile: Lynda Andrus
• Encaustic Collage
• Color Wheel Journal Quilt
• Bird Portraits
• "Chubby Houses"
• Artist to Artist: Crystal Neubauer
• Fanciful Sculptures
• "Pass It on!: Mail Art Affirmations" Reader Swap
• Canvas wall art for collectors of odds & ends
• Drop Cloth Girls: Combine canvas, collage, and stitch
• Sailors' Valentine Reader Challenge Results
• Sailors' Valentine: Treasures from the Sea
• Building Upon Layers: Detailed design made easy
• Cloth Paper Scissors Mixed-media Pendant Swap
• Transforming papers to make a unique painting surface
• What's the craziest thing you've ever stamped with?

What a great value for only $7.50 plus shipping!! Yes, I know shipping can be cost prohibitive, but this is a publication that may not be available in your local bookstore or grocery aisle checkout. Think of it as an investment in your quilting and artistic education. Stop by our shop now and help us get to 150 sales before 2010! The 150th sale purchaser will receive something special in their package and it may just spur us to have a giveaway too! More to come soon!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna

End of the Year Special

Time is running out! We are hosting an End of Year Special over at the shop and here it is:

Now through FRIDAY January 1st, ALL Patterns ship for FREE!!

You might wonder what sorts of patterns we have, well, I'm glad you asked.

Tote bag patterns

Such as this adorable pattern for the Abigail Tote by Serenditpity Studios

Garment patterns

Such as this cute pattern for the Scrapbook Jeans and sweatshirt. Just take ordinary clothes that your child already wears (and are COMFORTABLE) and embellish them a little to make them into something EXTRAORDINARY.

Quilt patterns

Of course, these are our favorites, we have patterns for using all of our fantastic precut fabrics such as jelly rolls, charm packs, layer cakes, fat quarters or just regular yardage!

Embroidery patterns

Fast and easy projects that can be whipped up in just a couple of hours. No light box needed for our Aunt Martha patterns because they are iron on transferable and reusable several times! Or build your embroidery skills with the Crab Apple Hill patterns that branch out into some more decorative stitches, the Gardener's Angels for the Seasons are my favorites.

Don't forget about our Books and Magazines as well (we'll pay up to $5 shipping on these).

So please stop by the shop and check out the patterns section. This special won't last so better get going!

Oh, and did you notice the new blue box over in the right hand sidebar? If you'd like to sign up for shop updates to be delivered directly to your e-mail inbox, please take a moment to enter your e-mail in the sign up box. This is an opt-in program and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Periodically, I'll send out notices of specials out to the e-mail list before I announce it on the blog, Twitter, or Facebook. Sometimes I might even have an e-mail only special! So please sign up and be the first to hear about our shop specials and updates. Also, if you're local to San Antonio, TX (or willing to drive) you can opt in to receive notices of our monthly Crafty Girls Workshop meetings. Thanks for joining us!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna and Regin

The Crafty Girls

New Year's Resolutions

Yes, it's almost that time again. Time to say goodbye to 2009 and ring in the new year of 2010. I just finally got used to writing 2009 and now it's going to change! Personally, my main quilting resolution for the new year is to actually QUILT some of my quilt tops. I've managed to get several quilt tops done this year, but I always put the quilting off until later. So, even if it means biting the bullet and taking my quilt tops to a long arm shop and renting the machine, I really want to get them quilted, maybe in 2011, I'll work on the bindings. :-) I want to improve my machine quilting skills and there is a fabulous blog that I've been following that is super inspiring. Leah Day is working to design and post 365 different quilting designs to her blog! I've signed up to get a once-a-week update to my e-mail about the designs she's posted on the blog. It's a great reminder that I can go and see the new designs. I'd encourage anyone interested in any sort of machine quilting to check it out. She posts great short videos showing how to complete each design. I have some other resolutions for this blog and the Crafty Girls Shop but you'll have to wait to see those in the new year. So, anyone else out there thinking of quilting resolutions for the new year? Or are you still working hard on preparations for Christmas and the holidays? I guess I'm not as wrapped up (no pun intended) in the activities because I'm not hosting any family this year and we don't have any kids so we don't quite get into the spirit as much as some do. It is fun to read about what other people do to prepare though. I'd love to hear about your holidays and if you have any resolutions for 2010. Until next time.

Happy Stitches to You,
Anna

L'amour is in the Air

L'amour by Sandy Gervais

From what I've seen around bloggy land, everyone seems to really be getting into the holiday spirit, seems like it's just about the right time to start promoting Valentine's fabric!! Actually, we really liked this new line, L'amour, by Sandy Gervais, because even though some of it is seasonal, a lot of it isn't. We have many precuts for you, finally, a reason to purchase the book called Layer Cakes, Jelly Rolls, and Charm Quilts! We have some cute charm packs:
We've been told we have the best price on charms on all of Etsy.

We have the scrumptious Jelly Rolls, perfect for tote bags and quick quilts:

And we have fat quarter bundles that we'll be splitting up into Short Stacks, don't forget you can always create your own Short Stacks by purchasing the listing called Create Your Own Short Stack. There are SOO many cute patterns out there that used fat quarters and these would make up into some CUTE gift baggies for your children's best friends for V-day or just for anytime. Fill them with cookies, candy, or some crayons and a coloring book. The pinks and browns are perfect girly girl colors.

If you need a little more inspiration, we have several books and patterns that are specifically made for precuts. We have an awesome book just about jelly roll patterns called Let the Good Times Roll. You can find the patterns for the precuts in the same section of our shop as the precuts you are searching for. So for example, if you are curious what other Jelly Rolls we have, just choose the Honey Bun/Jelly Rolls link on the right side of the shop home page. We want to make it super easy for you to find fabric and complimentary patterns in our shop. Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna

Merry SITSmas to All and to All a Good Time

I hope everyone has TONS of fun hopping around blogland today! I wish I could join you but as it turns out, I have to work at my day job, bummer! Maybe I can catch up a little after work while I'm waiting for our cable guy to come and replace our box. A few weeks ago, the SITS girls informed me that Crafty Girls Workshop would be featured on SITSmas so I am so thrilled! I hope that we get a lot of fun comments and new followers and visitors. I believe that also means we're participating in the Giveaway that they mentioned, but I am not completely sure of the details. Just know that it's something very cool from our shop. I hope everyone is having prettier weather than we're having here in San Antonio, Texas. It's chilly, drizzly, and altogether just depressing. It's one day I'm actually happy I don't have a window in my office! So, I hope that if you stop by and leave me some comment love that you'll answer one little question for me:

Are you making gifts for anyone this year?

This could be baking, or putting together a mix for cookies in a jar (I love that one), or letting your kids decorate the wrapping paper, I want to know what you are doing! If you aren't making gifts, have you found some great deals somewhere that you can share? (I haven't done any Christmas shopping yet.) Thanks so much for stopping by and Merry SITSmas!

Oh, and if you have NO IDEA what the heck SITSmas is and just happened to come by today by accident, I recommend you check out the SITS blog. They are a great group of women who will always make you feel good with their blog recommendations or their comments.

Happy Stitches to You,
Anna

P.S. I forgot to mention that if you DO decide to purchase something from our shop anytime this month, please add Merry SITSmas to the message to seller and we'll add a little something extra in with your purcahse. Thanks!!

In the Holiday Spirit

Yeah, I know it's sort of late to be thinking about making Christmas-y decorations but I can't help it. Lots of people around blogland seem to be finding the time somewhere to make such cute things! For example, Jodi, over at Pleasant Home has created some of the CUTEST table runners ever and with just simple strips! She said I could borrow her picture to show off her work. She takes such awesome pictures too! See!?

She gives pretty great instructions on her post about this as well, if you want to whip one up before all the great holiday parties you're planning to host! (I'm not going to host any until I get some new flooring and my downstairs painted, but that's another story.) Now, how does this relate at all to my shop you might ask? Heehee, I have to relate it back, well, wouldn't this tablerunner look SOOO awesome done up in some CUTE retro fabrics like we have in our shop? How easy it would be to cut them into 2 1/2" x 11" strips and one short stack would get you A LOT of strips! Here are some of my suggestions for cute fabrics for this from the shop.

Riley Blake Retro Christmas Short Stack (1 of 3 choices)

or

for a more traditional look

Studio e Christmas Short Stack

Remember you should be able to get several table runners from each Short Stack and if you were to add in a little bit of our solid white, Moda Bella Snow it would be a perfectly quick project. I think the best thing about those Riley Blake FQs is that because they aren't so traditional and they have snowmen, you can keep the tablerunner out way into January! Fun! Thanks Jodi for this inspiration and thanks for letting me borrow your idea. This is what I call collaboration! Oh and don't forget, if you want a variety, we do have the Create Your Own Short Stack option too! Then you can get 3 of the Riley Blake and 3 of the Studio e or add in some from Anna Griffin or even some of the red, white, and blue stars for a jump on a July 4th runner. (The combinations are endless you know.)

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna

Charm Pack Winner!

Thanks to everyone who joined in our Sale-bration! It was so exciting to see our list of new blog followers and Facebook fans growing so much every day! I hope you will all keep in touch, because I have some great plans for this blog. There will be a lot more posts and they will actually have more substance than just what's new or on sale in the shop. BUT I think that's all I'm going to say for now about that. Without further ado...(drumroll please) the winner is:

Commenter Number 73 JILL!

Jill if you're reading this, I'll be in touch this afternoon to get your snail mail address so I can send that Aster Manor charm pack on to you. Oh, and by the way everyone, I guess as a sort of side effect of this giveaway, we've had a sort of run on our charm packs! We're down to just 3 of the Rouenneries line remaining and 3 of Simple Abundance. If either of those were your picks you might want to go grab them before they are GONE!! These were very difficult lines to get in stock so once we're out, that's it. The GOOD news is that we have some ULTRA cute fabrics coming in very soon that I really can't wait to tell you about. I hope you have a Terrific Tuesday!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna