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 The Quilt Basket

    If one day is good, three days are better! Join us for our Fall Quilt Retreat on September 6 through 8, 2013 for three uninterrupted days of sewing fun! The Leadership Center in Aurora is the setting for our sew-in. Start anytime after 9a.m. on Friday and sew, sew, sew until 4p.m. on Sunday.  Meals are provided so you don't have to stop to cook. The bedrooms are just down the hall so you can sleep when you're tired and sew when you're not. The workspace is huge with great light! Food is yummy and the Refreshment Station keeps us hydrated with coffee, tea, pop, cappuccino and hot chocolate. Sound like your kind of weekend? Sign up today and join the fun!

  OPTIONS:     Fri-Sun  $220 includes 2 nights lodging, 6 meals

                        Commuter Option: Sew with us, Sleep at home $45 per day

  $50 deposit at sign-up, balance due by August 15th.

  

  

     This Summer BERNINA has a special promotion for you - GIVE AND GET BACK! Bring in your old sewing machine, in working order and take 10% off our price of a new BERNINA machine. You can save up to $500. These used machines will be donated to charitable sewing groups across the country. You have a chance to donate to a worthy cause and get back some cash toward your new machine. If you've been considering a purchase this deal helps you help other sewers!   

  

NEW CLASSES OFFERED

      

We're planning a few new classes for you to enjoy!

    

T-Shirt Quilt

Have you ever made a t-shirt quilt? We've scheduled a class for you to turn a pile of t-shirts into a beautiful quilt for September 13th. This is just a heads up to get you thinking about what you'd like to do. Start collecting your t-shirts or your child's t-shirts or your husband's shirts and mark the 13th on your calendar so you can join the fun!

  

Seasonal Silhouettes

Edyta Sitar has done it again! You've seen her beautiful Spring Bouquet and Spring Sprout quilts that are made with her pre-cut appliques. Now she's introduced a new 12 block series called Seasonal Silhouettes. There is a block for each month of the year. The block on the front of the book is the April design. We'll start the project in July but they'll need to be ordered now! If you're interested, please call or come in and sign up as soon as possible. The finished quilt is 76" by 73" and is $38 per month. If you'd like to make the blocks into individual 18" by 22" wallhangings, that option is $42 per month. Individual silhouettes for the blocks are available for $30. You'll need to purchase the book and then tell us which month(s) you'd like to order. The books are available for you to purchase now and the silhouettes are expected to arrive in late June. Don't wait too long, quantities are limited!   

  

Heartfelt Holiday Quilt

  

Remember this quilt from the Christmas party? It's finally here! We're offering it as a five part Block of the Month. You can sew in our classroom or pick up the kit and sew it at home. Either way you end up with a beautiful holiday quilt that can easily be finished for this Christmas season. The quilt finishes 55" by 63" and if I'm reading the directions correctly, you'll have fabric to make two additional wallhangings as well. Class dates are: July 11, August 8, August 22, September 19 and October 3. Kit fee is $20 per month. Sign up as soon as possible so that we're sure we have enough fabric for kits!

 GALLERY HAPPENINGS                

       This month, we welcome Joyce Booker from McCool Junction to our Gallery. Joyce a quilter and a devoted grandmother.  The quilt at right started with one of her grandson's school projects. He had to design a quilt block that was reminiscent of Native American art. After the project was finished, he asked Joyce if she'd make a quilt using his block. She started by transferring his drawing to fabric and putting it into the top left corner of the quilt. Then Joyce replicated his block 27 times using machine applique and small red and black fabric pieces. She separated the blocks with flying geese and sashing and cornerstones. The finished quilt has a definite Native American feel, with a little Nebraska red and black thrown in. What a great memory her grandson will have each time he uses his special quilt!

     Joyce's quilts will be on display an extra week because of the Independence Day holiday next week.  Please stop by our Gallery soon to see this quilt along with all of Joyce's other quilts.

 

   This week is your last opportunity to get the Spanish Hemstitch Attachment for 25% off. This foot, along with the open toe foot #20 joins two pieces of fabric or lace with a decorative stitch and leaves a small space between them. This space is sometimes left open or filled with cording. In the olden days when sewing class in school was called Home Economics, this technique was referred to as "fagoting". Come in and see what this interesting foot can do while it's still on sale!

THIS WEEK:   

MONDAY: Spring Bouquet: 10 to 4pm

Hoping Joanna inspired you to get to work!

FRIDAY: Scrap Basket: 1 to 8:30pm

Bring your scraps and start a new project.  Bring medium background scraps and dark fall scraps for leaves to start a 48" by 57" throw. Batiks would be perfect. Buy the 1/3 yard inner border and 7/8 yard outer border and get the pattern for $5. Pattern has Wall hanging to King size directions. Leaves can be cut with our accucut machine.

NEXT WEEK:

Notes from My Basket.... 

 SHOW & TELL  

        Wouldn't you like these to be your first quilting project? Kathy Buller of York loves to do hand embroidery but she doesn't sew much and hadn't quilted before. She bought this cute Nancy Halverson panel to make for her great-grandson. She added the borders and did beautiful hand quilting around all of the letters. They turned out beautifully! Good work Kathy!

 This striking yellow, black and white quilt was made by Jessi Harrington Newton (on the right). Jessi has  shopped at The Quilt Basket for her 4-H quilting projects for the last few years and we've enjoyed seeing her progress. This year's quilt is a beauty and should bring her a big ribbon at the York County Fair. You should be really proud of this one Jessi!

Joanna Pankoke of Fairmont, signed up to do the Spring Bouquet Block of the Month we offered starting last spring. Not only has she kept up with the monthly kits, she's already finished our version of the quilt quite a few months early. That's an accomplishment in itself but she's also made the same blocks using Kansas Troubles fabric. They are both so awesome that I can't decide which one I like better. Can you?

Are you finishing a project? Please bring it in and show it off! We really enjoy seeing what you're working on.

CHRISTMAS IN JULY

     We're getting in new Christmas, Halloween and Fall themed fabrics. So it's time to start thinking Christmas in July. Watch for new samples, patterns and gift ideas. This year we'll be featuring a special Christmas Bucks program. For every $10 you spend on regularly priced merchandise during the month of July, you'll receive a Christmas Buck that can be spent on more regularly priced merchandise in August. The more you spend in July, the more you can save in August. It's not too soon to start thinking about gift ideas for Christmas!

Relay for Life Fundraiser!    

    Here's the jug we're hoping you'll help us fill with change (and some bills would be nice too) for The Quilt Basket's Relay team, "Piecing Together a Cure". All money collected will be donated to the American Cancer Society to help support research to find a cure for cancer. The money from the Pop Jar in the refrigerator is all going into the jug, so if you'd like a pop or water during class, buy one from us and make your donation!

     We're trying to remember to ask if you'd like to round up your purchase to the next even dollar and donate that change to the Relay for Life. If we don't ask, feel free to volunteer your change and drop it into the Relay Jug. 

FOR SALE:

     If you'd be interested in buying a slightly used Bernina 830 (the new model) from an individual, please contact the store and we'll put you in touch.

Nanc and I leave this week for Bernina University or BU as it has come to be known.  This is our annual convention where Bernina rolls out the newest and best products for the upcoming year. Rumor has it, we might be seeing new sergers, but you didn't hear that from me, especially if its wrong! We get to take three days of classes from Bernina experts to teach us new techniques and ways to show you how to use your machine to make sewing even more fun. Look for some new samples and ideas to be coming your way soon.

This year we're meeting in San Francisco and I'm excited at getting a chance to see the Pacific Ocean for the first time. Nanc and I have a little spare time to do some sightseeing before the convention starts - probably because we're taking a flight that leaves Omaha at 6:45 a.m. - but I think it will be worth it. Don't know if I'll be able to hook in my computer and send a newsletter with photos from BU next Monday, but I'll try.  Meanwhile, friend us on Facebook and I'll post as we go.

Our heart goes out to....

     Marsha Redman who son Jason died after a stroke last week.

     Shirlene Hoffman whose brother, Lynn, died this past weekend.

God bless these families as they deal with their loss.  

Until then,

Linda