It’s been a whirlwind summer on Pickle Road. I got to travel a lot and to meet a ton of Quilter’s Home fans.
I gave birth to my November/December issue and I can’t wait until you get to read it (I’m pretty sure that this is my favorite issue to date sans the baby-weight that I continue to carry around on my bloated bod. Has anyone else besides me felt like they’ve totally let themselves go? I’m thinking I need to call Jenny! You know what Jenny I mean). The next issue will be released in mid October.
In July, I visited The Quilt Patch in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada, where I taught classes and lectured to a full-house banquet in the ballroom of their world-famous spa resort!
Here’s the shop in Moose Jaw. Moose Jaw is as quaint and as as sweet as Mayberry—only better. There’s no Goober or Gomer!
I had a blast and think that Moose Jaw is one of Canada’s best kept secrets. Now, here’s the queen-sized drama of the trip: The town has erected this giant Moose statue near their tourist center (they just put a fence around it so that the local teens would stop spray-painting Mr. Moose’s “jewels”). My hosts Jeanne and Shelly took me to see it directly from the Regina airport.
Jeanne and Shelly before I lost my passport and when we were still friends! LOL I know it’s a lousy picture and you can’t see them, but you can see that darn moose! I had such a good time with these two, er, three! I never laughed so hard as with this group!
Anyway, after I retrieved my camera from one of my suitcases in the back of Shelly’s pick-up, we drove off without closing the gate. That suitcase fell out of the back of the truck and onto the road, and was gone forever. My passport was in that damn suitcase, so getting back to the good ol’ USA was daunting. I felt like I had to spend the rest of my trip plotting for a Von Trapp family trek across the border!
My next stop was about 6-hours away at the fab-o Lori’s Country Cottage in Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada! Fabulous!
This is Lori in front of her shop in Sherwood Park, Alberta
Just one of the rooms at Lori’s shop!
More classes, more fun, and a pierogi and stuffed cabbage roll all-you-can-eat banquet at my next sold out ballroom lecture! I was in Frankie Yankovic HEAVEN, dudes! Lori’s is another great Canadian shop and I had a blast.
This is me with Lori and her staff standing in front of my califon fabric collection! Really nice people. I make people stand in front of me so I look thinner. Are there any Quiltzillas in Canada, you ask? Not that I can tell!
In August I visited the CK Media offices in Colorado and had lunch in Golden with McCall’s Quilting editor, Beth Hayes.
This is what the outside of the CK Media compound looks like. They even have a quilter’s gallery in their lobby which I love to browse through when I visit!
This is downtown Golden, CO. Very cute and where “Buffalo Bill” Cody is buried. Ironically, the CK Media editors are also buried there (in work, that is!) LOL It’s all good! And who can pass up McCall’s Quilting, Quick Quilts, Quiltmaker and the grande dame of them all, Quilter’s Newsletter?
Here’s Beth Hayes, the talented Editmatrix of McCall’s Quilting and Quick Quilts after our Nicoise lunch in Golden, Colorado!
I spent one hot August afternoon in Dallas with the Pfaff company looking at all of their latest and greatest machines. There are some phenomenal new machines hitting the marketplace so make sure you keep your eye out for them.
This me with Jill (she’s my buddy and the Pfaff marketing queen) in front of some stuffed cow in Dallas! This girl is a riot and we had a lot of laughs!
I loved this balloon sculpture of a Pfaff sewing machine. If only it were that easy, right?
As it turned out I walked out of there owning a new, sensational Pfaff Creative Vision 5.0! I’m now learning how to do some rockin’ machine embroidery, so stay tuned (OK, it might be 2023 before you see anything, but I’m going to die trying to learn this stuff!)
Next, I flew into Alpena, Michigan (like Regina, it’s another one of those kind of names) on a propeller airplane to teach at the Thunder Bay Resort for one of the most fun quilting retreats I’ve ever experienced. I’ve been invited back next August and I’m going! What a quilter’s heaven! Full days and nights of quilting in their “quilter’s barn,” massages, facials, pedicures, pizza parties, dessert parties, horse-drawn carriage elk sight-seeing tours and a gourmet dinner cooked on antique wood burning stoves.
Here’s the inside of the Quilter’s Barn where I taught. All you heard was chatting and laughing! Totally a hit!
This is a view from the horse drawn carriage that I was riding in on the way to find elk!
And here’s what we found—oodles of them!
Here’s a pic of me with just a few of the Thunder Bay retreaters in the beautiful cabin where we had our gourmet dinner!
I’m thinking of asking John Edwards to come along with me on my next trip so that I can push his deceitful butt into the fire for cheating on his sick wife! The scenario worked for Hansel and Gretel, so I say why not give it a try? I know it’s old news but I just can’t get over it.
I just put my next issue of Mark Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home to bed yesterday. I love this November/December issue. I really believe that it’s my best one so far! It is packed full of all kinds of new, fun and funny things— and it’s also 8 pages bigger than normal!
Here’s just some of what’s inside:
Just wait until you see the pattern and directions for a batik tuffet. You are totally going to want to make one! I also got a tour of quilt designer, Diana McClun’s Walnut Creek, California home. There are instructions for 3 terrific quilts, not to mention the latest in patchwork shoes, 10 quilty holiday gifts for under $10-bucks (you can stop pretending you’re going to actually make something for all of your quilting friends this December), and hysterical stories of what our travelling quilting teachers have had to put up with during their teaching gigs. Also, how to make money from your quitting, how to get started designing notions, a revealing article on why quilt appraisers die young (you won’t believe what some people bring to them), and a look at my personal, quilt-themed, international collection
of. . .
Well, it’s jam packed! I wish I had room to tell you everything!
On the home front, subscriptions are going through the roof—so much to the chagrin of a certain Quiltzilla shop owner from Pittsburgh, Mark Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home is a bona fide hit!
Now that I think about it, maybe I’ll take two people with me to that luscious wood stove burning dinner! I can eat for three! LOL
As a matter of fact, a copy of the premiere issue just sold on eBay for over $35-bucks! Take that, ‘zilla!
I want to thank all of you for putting a new, fun and sassy magazine like Quilter’s Home on the map. I know, like you, that we quilters are more than just a bunch of patchwork automatrons—we love our quilting but we have lives and interests outside of the sewing room, too. We love to laugh and have a good time! So every home is a Quilter’s Home, right?
Anywho, here’s a sneak peek at the next cover!
And don’t think it was easy for me to get Tulip to sit on my shoulder!
Don’t miss this issue, turnips! It’s quintessential Quilter’s Home—The only magazine for quilter’s that’s fun to read!
Well, the hot weather is almost over. I can already feel the chilly night air on Pickle Road. The bad news is that summer is coming to an end. The good news is it’s just about Quilting Season again, and I can’t wait!
So, tell me, what kind of quilty things did you do on your summer vacation? I’m dying to know! Just pop me an email at QuiltersHomeMag@aol.com or visit me at www.marklipinski.com!
To subscribe to Mark Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home, telephone (866) 429-0133.
Until next time, dumplings!
Do what you love! xoxom
P.S. My spring chickens have finally started to lay eggs! Now, where’s my Frittata recipe, baby?
