A new trend in pants!

Oh—I had a great opening line, and now it's gone! I'm overstimulated from everything I have seen at the show, and my mind has exploded, so I might not make much sense today!

Claire and I have had the chance to review most of the quilts over the last three mornings, and we have pointed out multiple things to each other, and it has been quite the learning experience. The number of pictures I took is, well, there have been a few. And there is ONE section left that I haven't seen yet, so I plan to hit that this morning. I also realized I didn't take pictures of the garments. 

I took the pictures to share with my Monday sewing group and my other classes, since I found some neat techniques/concepts that I think they are going to fall in love with!! 

However, that doesn't mean that I don't have pictures to share with you. 

Yesterday, we talked about the sock thing, and well, guess what? Here are more socks. Two of the ladies working at our booth both walked in yesterday morning with socks they had knitted on their rotary knitting machines. OK—I am behind the 8-ball, and I need to get my machine working. 

Socks made on a rotary sock machine

Socks made on a rotary sock machine 

Do they not look comfy or what? I need to get home, check my machine's brand, find some videos to get me started, and get knitting. It would be nice to show Mom a pair of socks I have made. 

I spotted this relatively large flock of geese on the morning walk. 

The geese are gathering.

I don't think I'll be going for a walk this morning. It wasn't the best of nights, and I got a lot of computer work done, so I don't have time for a walk this morning. 

I will say, the people working in our booth are pretty darn creative. One lady wore a pair of light-colored denim jeans (the short sock person) yesterday, and I asked her how she got the embroidery on the back pockets because it looked perfectly in place. OH NO—she MADE the jeans, and I swear they looked professionally made. I'm not kidding. She told me about the pattern, and I think I might give it a whirl. 

STOP laughing because I have so many things on my plate. And I keep saying I can do more! I guess, sadly, I'll cut back on what I teach next fall to make time! 

BUT the big trend here seems to be side insertions in pants. Remember back in the day (1970's) when this was so popular. Everyone wanted elephant pants. I think even Mom did it for my brother, but he wasn't thrilled with the fabric. I don't remember the details, but I had a pair of elephant pants, and only the bottom part was flared. 

Elephant pants have a totally different meaning these days—they are wide-legged and mostly made from lightweight cotton. 

Anyway - this is what I spotted yesterday, and I did not stalk these people; I stopped and had a conversation with them. Of course I did!!!

This first pair belongs to a young woman at the SMT Boutique quilt shop. She and her mom own it, and they are quite the pair. She made her insert from Tula Pink fabric. The legs were quite tight - this happens even to skinny girls, and so, with the insert, the jeans get new life!!!

Pant insert

This was another insert, also on a store employee whose name I have forgotten. Her insert is on wider-leg pants and is appliqued on. 

An appliqué pant "insert"

The third example was this one on a visitor to the Salon. These are also flying geese blocks, and it's an insert. Notice the matching shoes, and she had a beautiful quilted jacket, too. 

And yet another insert

Is it a new trend? No, but it looks like it's making a comeback. I've seen it at other shows, and well, I have a pair of denim pants that fit, but the legs are pretty tight. I was going to toss them, but I think I should take a closer look and see if I can figure out how to rescue them. Yep - just add another log on the fire and jump right in! 

The store that had the appliqued flying geese also had quilted vests, and this logo was on the back of the vests they wore. It is beautiful. 

Store logo on a vest

Here are some photos of quilts for you. This was a challenge, and the topic was puppets - Les Marionettes. I didn't get the full gist of what this challenge was for - something within the guild. I went back to my pictures to see if I missed one that explained what this challenge was all about, and I did not take anything. So here are all the quilts in the challenge. 

The challenge quilts

And I have a couple of close-ups. Oh my goodness, some of them were absolutely adorable, and they are all for sale - $50 each. By the way, because I know you want to pull the puppet strings on the bottom, they do NOT move the puppets—I tried when no one was looking!! 

And one more—this was very cute. Lots of them were 3-D in some form or fashion. 

And this one had finger puppets along the bottom - this one was sold. 

Finger puppets!!!

I spent the day messing around with sewing some things that we had cut on the Momento, and I almost got my little quilt top done. It's a challenge to make HSTs as I don't have a square ruler for trimming and the rotary cutter is a tad dull. So slow and steady wins the race. I might finish it this morning. 

I also went back to the Wonderfil booth—just say NOOOOOOOOOO. All I did was take pictures of other parts of the Halloween banner. The motifs are just so adorable. 

Halloween garland

Look how cute they are. 

More blocks from the Halloween garland

Any of that would be super easy: take a machine embroidery design, attach it to felt, and finish the edges. It will look totally different from those done by hand, but different is OK. The cuteness factor is what matters. Since I have a lot of wool felt at home, I should take a look. One could always do most of it by machine and then add an embellishment of hand stitches. Why not? 

The other thing I have to say is that it is exciting to work with the young people! Several of the PFAFF and Husqvarna Viking local store staff working in our booth this week are YOUNG. Fresh out of school, but both of them know how to sew. And both of them have pretty spiffy sewing and embroidery machines. And BOTH of them know how to use them. I just love it, and I'm sure they are tired of me telling them how excited I am for them. 

Can you imagine starting out with the tools we have and how eager they are to learn? They will be sewing circles around us before long. 

So I have to say there is a lot of eye candy around at this show. It may not be huge, but it's big enough. It's taken three days to see most of it. I'm determined to see this show this time round, as I usually wait for the afternoon and then I'm tired, so I don't care. I've taken hundreds of pictures. My Monday group is probably rolling their eyes at this, but it's not all for them. And I'm sorting them by type and style, so it's all going to be very entertaining for them. Plus, as mentioned, some of the other groups will profit from the pictures. 

Let's just say if you are in my scrap class, you are going to be whipping out your scraps faster than you can say BOO because I have loads of ideas, found some incredible examples, and can't wait to share them with you. 

But back to the eye candy. On our short walk to the past restaurant last night, we spotted a REAL candy store, and one of the ladies wanted to go in. It was literally wall-to-wall candy. 

A LOT of real candy to eat

They even had Harry Potter Beatie Botts. 

Any Harry Potter fans?

Check out all the flavors!!!! Who knew that existed? 

The flavours

And there was a large station for the Jelly Belly candy. I haven't seen that in a long time. 

Jelly Belly

And look at all the flavors, and they had recipes where you could mix the candy - I didn't really understand that part. 

Loads of flavors

So while my credit card did get a bit of a workout, I did NOT buy any candy. I bought a couple of patterns and some fabric for a jacket. STOP laughing!!! 

I am leaving this hotel this morning and will be dropped off tonight at the hotel near the airport because I am on a plane early tomorrow morning. I want to get home and get to work. I have a lot to do this week. Before I go down for breakfast, I need to finish packing, but I'm pretty fast, and it's mostly done. 

I am almost finished with my logic puzzle book. I'm on puzzle 47 of 50. Number 45 was a stinker, and it took me several days of trying to figure out who did what and when. I finished number 46 in a few minutes. Now, why is that? 

Hopefully, I can finish it off this week, and I have another one lined up at home. They are a good NON-SCROLLING diversion!!!

Well, that's it for today. I'll try my best to get a blog to you so you have some entertainment tomorrow morning. The show ends today at 3 PM, so we should be able to pack up quickly and then have some time after to relax and write the blog. 

It's going to be a WONDEFUL day!!!!

Ciao!!!!