At Summer's End

Quilters' Quarters has had a wonderful summer season, with many thanks owed to the Row by Row 2014 quilters who visited us each week.  What a wonderful, kind, patient group of people to invite into one's life! This morning, a quilter brought her finished Row by Row quilt in to Quilters' Quarters, and received her prize of 25 hand-picked fat quarters, and a special prize because her quilt includes our  "Beyond Winter Windows" row!

We will celebrate our First Anniversary in November, on "Small Business Saturday,"  the Saturday after Thanksgiving Day.  That was our "Mini-Grand Opening" day last year, and with a dozen bolts of fabric standing in an old travel trunk, some hand and sewing-machine needles hung sparingly on a peg board, and a basket full of donated fat quarters from the stash of a very good friend, we began our quilt shop adventure.  For the first few weeks it was simply called Terry's Thoughts and Threads Quilt Shop, as my business name was established with the town and the state years ago when I began writing and selling books, and making quilts.

The shop became known as "Quilters' Quarters" once I'd begun writing my new mystery series ... the story of the octogenarian couple, Helen and Henry, and the mysterious things happening to them in this new millennium. It was important to me to have the apostrophe in the right place in the shop's name, so that all Quilters would feel at home in our Quarters. The book title, though, uses the singular form, The Quilter's Quarters, as it is the story of Helen's role in her shop.

She and Henry are there to greet quilters who come to visit. The heat bothers Helen a great deal, and she has shortened her skirts and rolled down her stockings for the duration of summer. Henry is always comfortable in whatever the weather offers, wearing his long-johns and jeans, flannel shirt, white socks and work boots all year long.

There is a second story of Helen and Henry in the works, and it will optimistically be available for our First Anniversary celebration. Winter Wonder in the Quilter's Quarters will pick up where book one ended, with Helen and Henry entering the beautiful winter season with some trepidation due to unexpected events.

Rick and I are looking forward to the cooler weather of Autumn and the return of school children to our neighborhood.  The Little Free Library at the end of our driveway will be replenished with books for children and parents alike, and then the shelves of free books in the Book Nook of Quilters' Quarters will begin to bloom with new additions as well. All are invited to "take a book, share a book." And any donations left in the tin will be brought to the public library's Friends group, to help fund the summer programs and museum passes each year.

The quilt shop is continuing to grow; we love to hear about things quilters are

looking for.  In response to one quilter, we are now stocking Bosal foam stabilizer, which helps those making bags, slippers and such. And we've added that and more to our on-line web store at

 http://www.terrycrawfordpalardy.com/apps/webstore/

that is where you can get my books and now fabrics and kits easily, from the comfort of home ... particularly inviting when winter's icy roads set in. Henry can tell you all about his experience with icy roads in the next story.

We've met more than two hundred new customers this summer, and look forward to seeing them again in the near future.  The organizers of Row by Row 2014 have an announcement ready for release in late September ... something to do with state postcards ... and quilter contacts .... you'll have to stay tuned for more details!

Come visit us and see the new Autumn fabrics we have in stock ... beautiful harvests, and Halloween fabrics, and more birch trees and cardinals to grace your tables. We have a few guests who've come to stay in the shop as well: Scooby-Doo, the Pink Panther, and a herd of nearly invisible unicorns. Snoopy, Linus and even Charlie Brown make an appearance now and then, and Dalmatians, Dogs of all kinds, Butterflies and even Rudoph can be found in various cabinets in the shop.

Be happy in what you choose to do; share your talents with those you love.
~ Terry and Rick


As always, if you are reading this update in your email, thank you for signing up for the newsletter. We usually publish it about twice a month, but in between editions, we also update the various pages that comprise this blog. Recent additions are the Machine Quilting Classes page,  and progress on current quilts at Terry's QuiltingJournal 2014 page.  Come visit us at the blog and see what else is happening at Quilters' Quarters.

Feel free to share this email or blog link with your friends and families, and encourage the quilters among you to check out the Row by Row page of the blog as well as the website itself. We're in for a great experience this summer ~ jump in and join us!

Terry, web page TerryCrawfordPalardy.com, email: needlesandpens@comcast.net
Rick, web page WoodenToyandGift.net, email: woodentoyandgift@comcast.net
Rick's blog: WTandGNews.blogspot.com

A Brand New Happy Quilter at Quilters' Quarters!

Update: August 20, 2014
 Linus panels are on sale this week at Quilters' Quarters!  25% off.  Now only $7.50, this panel makes a quick gift or charity quilt. With a yard of muslin and a half yard of colorful fabric for a binding, and a crib-size piece of batting, this can be completed for about $20.00!  Watch for the panel's addition to our web store: http://www.terrycrawfordpalardy.com/apps/webstore/.  People who want to donate the finished quilt to Project Linus can come into the shop for more details.

August 24th: Row by Row summer quilt shop hop FREE PATTERN GIVEAWAY ends in one more week And then, it's time to make those quilts and return to a shop ~ if you're the first to do so, you win 25 fat quarters~ and a bonus prize at Quilters' Quarters if the quilt also contains our Beyond Winter Windows Row! October 31 is the deadline for finished quilts and prizes.

~ Fiona's Story ~

I taught for thirty years in public schools. I had that old "golden ticket" of Kindergarten through 8th grade certification, and a Master's degree Nursery through 9th grade for moderate special education. In time, I taught all grades from 1 through 8, both in general and in special education classrooms, and loved each one of them. Whenever I told someone I loved my job as a teacher, they would most always ask, "What do you teach?"  And my answer, always, was "Children." All content areas were included in my certification, and I had the opportunity, in those many years, to teach every one of them at one grade or another.

After retirement, I missed the classrooms, the students, my wonderful colleagues ... I wrote about it and published books. I then turned to coaching other authors through the self-publishing process of today. But I missed the little ones.

I decided, shortly after opening Quilters' Quarters, to return to teaching things that I love to the people that I love best - children. My first thought was to tutor middle school students preparing for high school, as that is the most recent age I'd taught in public schools. But my recall of facts, of names especially, and of dates had lessened following retirement. I didn't want tutoring to be a challenge to me - I wanted to be able to share something that I could do comfortably, and happily.

I decided to offer lessons in sewing. And that's when I met Fiona.

Fiona in July, threading the machine

This little bundle of energy, curiosity and enthusiasm was a bright spark of light in my life. She came for an hour or two each week, and was focused on filling her dream of making her own quilt. Not for a doll, not for a wall ... one for herself. And so we began.

Fiona, just recently seven, chose her fabric, planned her design, decided on a block size, learned to measure for cutting, calculated the number of squares needed by adding inches and counting fabric blocks that we'd cut. She, very much like I, would talk aloud to herself, remembering the steps of beginning to sew on the machine ... I would hear her say each week "Presser foot down, needle down, turn the machine on ... "  Within a week she had learned to machine-sew a really decent 1/4" seam, joining first block to block, alternating her Bugs Bunny fabric with her Tweety fabric. And as she worked, she talked: "End of the line. Presser foot up, needle up, pull the fabric to the back, and SNIP the thread close to the fabric. Then pull the thread to the back left." She had the steps already embedded in her memory, and followed them beautifully, week after week. 

Then she learned to sew one row to another, and how to back up if her line of stitching went too close to the edge. " Stop, and pull out the pin. Put it in the pin cup, not on the table."  If I was taking a turn starting to join two rows, she would 'ping' the little brass bell when she saw me getting near the next pin, reminding me to stop and take it out. And she would giggle - and I would laugh. We were  happy quilters together. We most often played the Chipmunks Christmas album while we worked ... high enough in volume to hear in the next room, over the sound of the sewing machine.

Beautiful fabric, beautiful thread,
beautiful smiles and happy giggles!

I showed her how to pin her quilt top to her batting (after choosing the fluffiest one in the shop) and then chose a third fabric, one of "What's Up, Doc" Bugs Bunny, for the backing and binding. We pinned all of the Bugs Bunny squares, and left the Tweety squares open for diagonal quilting lines. 

She helped with the quilting, and easily remembered the name of the "walking foot," I would start a line of quilting, and she would finish it. We then pulled out all of the pins and went in a criss-cross diagonal line through all the Bugs Bunny blocks, and admired the quilted squares that had emerged on the back of the quilt. She then let me put the binding on for her.

She learned how to set the machine for a straight stitch, a zig zag stitch, and when and why to use a reverse stitch. As we didn't have a quarter-inch foot for the machine we were using, I taped a small sticky-note pad at the quarter-inch line, showing her how to line the edge of the fabric up with that. And in six weeks' time, she had finished her quilt. 

Awesome quilter, she is!  Congratulations, Fiona, on your very first quilt! The only thing we didn't do this last week was print a label, which is VERY important;  we'll do that when we meet again!

I sent her home with a Happy Quilter T-Shirt and told her she can now proudly wear that, knowing she has the skills that it proclaims to the world.

Fiona, Bugs Bunny, Tweety and me-
Happy Quilters!
 August 15, 2014

In the Heat of the Night

UPDATE 8/16/2004: Our re-order of Row by Row License Plates has arrived, and prepaid orders have been mailed to customers today. There are still plenty more to sell - we look forward to seeing those who wanted to wait until both license plates and kits were both back in stock, and we achieved that today.  Come visit us for your free pattern, and take a look at our new kit fabric, with glow in the dark constellations!

As August continues to bloom in all it's heated beauty, the quilt shop continues to grow in summer fabrics. We've gone to a cool, minimalist window display to get us through the summer while the carpenters are hard at work in the hot attic above us. Martyn Richards and his crew are "sistering" the old beams of the attic of the barn, and a new six over six window will replace the old one to hold securely an air conditioner. The new skylights are already helping to pull the heat up and out of the attic room, and of course, ice cream treats from Jeff and Maria's new Ice Cream Shop on route 97 help, too.

Friends continue to stop in and add to our collection of 'orphan fabrics' and the lending library of quilt books. Here's a simple wooden dimensional picture of a quilt block that resembles something Rick and I plan to add to the front of the barn, brought to us by our artist-friend, Lynne.

Our quilt-artist-friend Ann keeps us well-stocked with quilt quality fat quarters and color family fat-eighth bundles, as shown in the new display case that Lynne also donated to the shop. Often, when quilters come in to pick up their Row by Row free pattern, and maybe a kit and/or a license plate

collectible, I talk with them about the artists who help keep Quilters' Quarters as diverse a quilt shop as it can be.  Many recognize Ann's kaleidoscope purse kits and know her as a teacher of workshops at their quilting guilds throughout the state. It gives all of us a sense of friendship and shared experiences to talk about with each visit.

I've done some shop-hopping myself this summer as part of the Row by Row experience, and as a new quilt shop owner I've learned a lot from the various shops I've visited. And along the way I pickup some beautiful fabrics and cut a few into fat quarter collections for Quilters' Quarters. I'm most often out in the shop during open hours, but sometimes also in the evenings, preparing the next day's

supplies of Row by Row kits.  And when I find a sale and get a lower price, the fabrics in the shop also have a lower price, which helps us keep a good range of prices to please both quilters and crafters alike.

Our kits have a new dark sky background in the Attic Window Pane: the galaxy print by Timeless Treasures was out of stock a month ago, and so I chose another fabric that has the same blend of deep, dark blues; this one, though, has distinct constellations rather than distant galaxies in its focus. You can see it on the top of the Sew a Season stack of fabrics, below:

I've also begun making our kits with a slightly smaller dimension; rather than 3 inch strips, I'm using 2.75 for both the season side panel and the winter tree window sill. This small change allows me to use the other 3/4 of the Sew a Season tree fabric for other season rows, and for 'All Four' season rows.  Recently, a completed quilt was brought to a shop as a winner of the 25 fat quarter prize, and it included our Summer Row, but rather than placing them in a horizontal row, they were used as the four corner blocks. Here's a picture of that quilter and her winning quilt, and another with our row:

Stop in to see us, and take a look at the new fabrics sitting on the floor in a large box, waiting for more cabinet space to be built. All are quilt-quality, ready for your end of summer projects, or back to school outfits, or picnic table toppers.  And remember, if there is something you are looking for that you don't see in our shop, let us know so that we can shop and stock what you want to find at Quilters' Quarters.

This fall, watch for a new set of patterns and kits in our shop; we'll be adding some different media that I think you will be excited to find and use!

Thanks for keeping in touch with our blog - we've had almost 6,000 visitors already. Take a look at the Feedjit post in the right margin to see how far-reaching our followers are!

As always, if you are reading this update in your email, thank you for signing up for the newsletter. We usually publish it about twice a month, but in between editions, we also update the various pages that comprise this blog. Recent additions are the Machine Quilting Classes page,  and progress on current quilts at Terry's QuiltingJournal 2014 page.  Come visit us at the blog and see what else is happening at Quilters' Quarters.

Feel free to share this email or blog link with your friends and families, and encourage the quilters among you to check out the Row by Row page of the blog as well as the website itself. We're in for a great experience this summer ~ jump in and join us!

Terry, web page TerryCrawfordPalardy.com, email: needlesandpens@comcast.net
Rick, web page WoodenToyandGift.net, email: woodentoyandgift@comcast.net
Rick's blog: WTandGNews.blogspot.com

Already August!

Update August 8th: Under the Roof Construction

This morning, the roofers are hard at work stripping old shingles from the front of the barn roof. By opening time at 11:00, they will be finished tossing debris down and will be re-shingling. The shop is, technically, open and customers can pull into the driveway despite the number of construction vehicles. If there is not a clear pathway to the door, I will meet customers seeking row by row kits and their free patterns out front.Thank you for your patience during this construction period. Yesterday, in a single day, they stripped the back side of the roof, installed two skylights for Rick's new workshop and shingled it completely. They intend to be finished with the roof job by the end of today.  Amazing to watch, their energy is impressive and their skills are also. The O'Keefe brothers of Salem, MA are a firefighter family who do excellent work for a reasonable price.

Update August 6th:   Hooray!
The fabric has arrived, and I will be busy tonight and tomorrow morning putting more kits together for our Beyond Winter Windows row.  We'll be taking orders, too, for the license plates and expect a TRIPLE order to arrive in another week or two.  Busy Busy Busy ... and loving it! We're open Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 11 - 7 this week. Come visit!

Second Update August 5th:
Sorry - the last of the license plates left of the second batch of 48 are now gone ... but there are more shipments ahead, coming by August 20th, Sew a Season fabric? The second order of that WILL be here by the end of THIS week. Patience is a virtue <3

License plates and fabric can be pre-ordered at Quilters' Quarters, at the shop or on the quilt shop page of our web store. 

Update August 5th:

The Sew a Season Timeless Treasures fabric will be here in the shop, in limited quantity, this Friday. Pre-orders for winter season kits will be cut first. Thank you, all, for your patience! It is because of customer enthusiasm and high levels of ordering nation-wide that this fabric has been so scarce this summer. 

We just sold our ONE remaining HAPPY QUILTER license plate from this second order; there are more orders coming, and they are expected to arrive late next week.  To pre-order yours, use my email at PayPal: needlesandpens@comcast.net   :)  or visit my webstore at www.terrycrawfordpalardy.com/ 

This first summer of our quilt shop is flying by at high speed. The Row by Row 2014 Experience has given a tremendous boost of publicity and business for new shops across America and Ontario. People who might never have known of Quilters' Quarters have found our location through the Row by Row website, and we are very appreciative of all the new friends who have come through our shop.

What people most often comment on is that "It's so charming!"  It is an unusual shop, in an unusual building that we call our barn but was, in fact, a carriage house in its earliest days. From horse-drawn buggy to early automobiles, the two sliding doors remain as evidence of its purpose. But behind those doors today is a unique quilt shop. Those doors no longer open, having been sealed closed long ago when an earlier owner created a dress shop inside for his wife's home business. Then for a while it was just used as a storage and office space for an architect-owner, and then it housed Rick's tool room for his Wooden Toy and Gift shop.

It's a quilt shop now, with beautiful cabinets made  by Rick to hold bolts of fabric. One cabinet is holding Quilt of Valor bolts of red, white and blues; another has nautical fabrics, and yet another holds Christmas colors. Animal prints like dogs and butterflies, and even one of shimmering unicorns brighten the cabinets. And of course, Helen and Henry are there with Terry's books, watching over things.


We are going to offer Rotary Blade Sharpening services ... we've bought an electric rotary sharpener made specifically for that purpose, and will charge only a few dollars for each blade renewed.

She really is a Happy Quilter!

We are also offering after school sewing lessons for individuals who would like to learn some machine quilting skills; both adults and children can take a lesson with Terry. Check the machine quilting lessons page of this blog to see what might fit your schedule. Then  come in or email to reserve your spot. You can bring your own portable machine, or use one of our new Brother machines bought for these lessons.

Our lending library of quilt books is growing and is open to all who come visit us. You are welcome to borrow a book for as long as it's needed, and then pass it on to another quilter or return it to the shop and borrow another.

We are still waiting for the second order of Sew a Season Row by Row fabric to arrive, and are hearing that it may be here within a week's time.

This coming week, the roofers will be at the shop while it is still open for business. They will be adding skylights to the roof to give Rick good lighting for his scroll saw work. And as the quilt shop continues to expand with more and more cabinets of fabric, Wooden Toy and Gift's showroom will move into the east room of the shop, as Rick will move some of his smaller saws and tools upstairs into the renovated space. We'd thought about using that space for sewing lessons and group workshops, but without an elevator or escalator it would not be handicap accessible, and so we've decided to move things around in the shop to make room for accommodating small groups in the original show room.

If you see construction trucks in the driveway, it doesn't mean that the shop is closed; rather, it means that, while it might be a little noisy at times, it's growing and becoming "even better!"

As always, if you are reading this update in your email, thank you for signing up for the newsletter. We usually publish it about twice a month, but in between editions, we also update the various pages that comprise this blog. Recent additions are the Machine Quilting Classes page,  and progress on current quilts at Terry's QuiltingJournal 2014 page.  Come visit us at the blog and see what else is happening at Quilters' Quarters.

Feel free to share this email or blog link with your friends and families, and encourage the quilters among you to check out the Row by Row page of the blog as well as the website itself. We're in for a great experience this summer ~ jump in and join us!

Terry, web page TerryCrawfordPalardy.com, email: needlesandpens@comcast.net
Rick, web page WoodenToyandGift.net, email: woodentoyandgift@comcast.net
Rick's blog: WTandGNews.blogspot.com