Shop Hopping with Mom

This morning mom called me a crazy fool. I wanted to meet at 7AM to go shop hopping. We met and headed off on our journey. Neither mom nor I are morning people, so to leave my house before 6:30 AM on a Saturday, when I normally don't get up until then during the week was a challenge. For a day of fun, I can do anything! We started with breakfast at Mc D's and were on our way. I figured it would take two hours to get to our first destination, Nuts & Bolts Quilt shop in Edgemont, SD. It's in the far south western corner of the state. We only needed an hour & a half, so we used our extra time for planning strategy and figuring out the Wanna be a cowboy quilt.
Nuts & Bolts opened at 9AM and we weren't the first shop hoppers in the door even!

All their books, except Eleanor Burns and Nancy Halvorsen were 40% off, so I found a bargello book with the heart bargello in it. It's one of the quilts on my bucket list, so I'd like to learn how to do it. My favorite book was the shop hop journal. They only had one, but it's just so awesome I can't wait to start filling it out. I figured I'll do my 2010 shops in it. I'd love to find more like it, what a novel idea. I also picked up a spool of pink/white verigated Aurifil thread. I'd been kicking myself for not picking it up in Aug. when we were there. I've made two pink/white quilts since then.

These are the pages of the journal. I just think it's the neatest idea!
 
Then we headed to the east, to Hot Springs, SD where we went to HeartSongs Quilts. It's always been one of my favorite shops since they have unique fabrics.
Nothing was catching my attention there today, but suddenly the Winding Ways fabric,  an old stand by favorite that was on sale, jumped off the shelves at me. I used this fabric, that I picked up the last time we were there in Aug., as a book cover for a special book, but now I have enough to make a binder cover for my course materials.  If I'm in graduate school, I better have a fun binder to keep me motivated!

From Hot Springs, we headed to Custer, SD to The Quilt Shop. I found this fun cat print that just called my name. My MIL has a cat and she wants a quilt for Merry, so I told her when something strikes me, I'd be motivated to make her one. This fabric just hopped off the shelf at me! I'm going to pair it with some pink and purple and it will be a fun quilt.

Mom and I also got half yard cuts of this sewing motif fabric. I have some already and mom has several sewing fabrics. We found a pattern that calls for 10 fat quarters, so hopefully soon we'll be making sewing quilts. I also got this little Mighty Bright light. It's about 1"x1.5", so very tiny but very bright.

Then we headed north to Hill City, SD where we stopped at Quilt Corral. Since mom and I both worked at Quilt Corral Too, when it was in Rapid City, we know all the girls who work at the shop. It was fun to see the girls and give everyone a hug. It was Strip Club day, so most of the girls were working. I found a couple bright pinks that found their way home. They were both on sale. I can see the one on the right as part of a purse. The one on the left might just make it into Merry's quilt.

We had lunch at Alpine Inn in Hill City, which was a nice treat. I failed to remember the camera from Custer to Hill City, so no location pictures.
Then we headed up through Deadwood and into Spearfish to Dakota Quilt Company. When I lived in Buffalo, this was the closest quilt shop and I went there a lot, but they've changed their fabric style and I haven't been back in almost 2 years... they still had my old name in the computer.

I found one of my favorite fabric purchases of the day there. They had the Wanna Be a Cowboy line with the brown stars and the pink stripe! I'm so excited to be able to use the stripe in my quilt now. They also had the Creative Grids rulers that I LOVE! I had seen the 2.5x6.5" before and really wanted it, but this one has their company logo on it, so I'll always remember where I got it. Such a great momento from our trip. 

The other few fun things I picked up were a Handy Helper to put my bobbins in my quilting machine. Mom has one and I've been looking for one ever since I got my machine. We got a free measuring tape emery board at the Hot Springs shop. I picked up a new package of 100 paper piecing pieces at the Quilt Connection, our last stop of the day. We skidded in just 10 minutes before they were to close. I haven't finished my tablerunner, but I'm thinking of starting a new handwork project that I can take with me when I'm sitting at drs. offices.

Mom and I had an awesome time on the shop hop and hope to be able to finish up the rest of the shops, I think about 5 more later this week. We hit 6 of the shops today. We would be all done, but Good Friday we were snowed out. Tomorrow I hope to do a bit of quilting, but I have a paper or two to work on for my class, so some sewing, but lots of studying to do!