Riley Blake

Glamper Tour Recap: My Girlfriend’s Quilt Shoppe

IMG_0662_webHere it is! The Glamper Recap of our day at My Girlfriend’s Quilt Shoppe in Logan, Utah on March 22nd, 2014. Here I am sitting in front of the shop with the owner Kris Thurgood. Her darling shop is three stories tall with classes, a full on hang out room (The Attic), kiddie area, and of course, shopping.

We parked the glamper outside with guests Deena Rutter, Emily Taylor, and Samantha Walker. Riley Blake sent the fabulous mom and daughter duo Jina and Alexis Barney.

I was grateful for the sunshine (you’ll notice we are all squinting in the photos!). When we arrived it was pretty chilly, but by 11am it was perfect. I lucked out for an outside event in Utah in March!

Here’s a peek at our day there:

 

 

 

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Shoppers were entered into a raffle by getting their paper stamped by every designer at the event. Prizes included fabric donated by Riley Blake and large goodie bags made up of stuff from my designs at Carta Bella Paper Co, Deseret Book, and Riley Blake.

IMG_0605_web

(photo below) You could sit a while in the shade of the glamper and do a make and take. (Thanks for posing for me ladies!)

IMG_0634_web

(photo below-right) Designer Deena Rutter shows her patterns and beautiful fabric. Did you know that Deena also designs for me over at Carta Bella? I adore working with her!  (photo below-left) My Bella Stash Bag pattern hangs out next to some fabulous football mums.

glamper_blog5

IMG_0657_web

(photo above and below) Emily Taylor’s fabric and sewing patterns are so lovely!

glamper_blog2

(photo below) Designers Samantha Walker and Deena Rutter hang out with customers. Sam’s family recently bought an RV so we all hung out over the weekend (Sam also designs for me at Carta Bella). Hoping for more of that! (And yes, my family stayed in the glamper before and after the event).

IMG_0619_web

glamper_blog3

(photo above-left) Jina Barney is the Creative Director at Riley Blake and her daughter Alexis is her right-hand gal. It’s always a fun day when Riley Blake comes to party! (photos above-right) Kit shows off my Little Playdate Outfit in my Evening Blooms fabric. (photo below-left) Some Carina Gardner patterns hang out next to the daughter-doll duo of Love Next Ruffle Dress and Little Love Nest Ruffle Dress. (photo-below-right) Jolene of Sew Red Glasses and I hung out and determined color value with her cool glasses. A perfect quilting tool! Check her out at http://sewredglasses.com/.

glamper_blog4

IMG_0648_web

(photo-above) My biggest misstep for the event was ordering WAY too many cookies. Thank you to everyone who was willing to have more than one:). I took plenty home and donated several to neighbors.

IMG_0643_web

(photo below) My fabulous assistant Susan made the trek up to help me set up and take many of the photos you see here in this post.

IMG_6968_web

(photo-below) I don’t have a lot of photos inside the shop, but here are a couple I couldn’t resist posting. The one to the left was the Riley Blake tree from a Quilt Market booth they did in Salt Lake. It is above My Girlfriend’s Quilt Shoppe children’s play area and the perfect accessory to this gated happy place. The second is the awesome trio of chairs hanging from the ceiling in The Attic. There were so many other cool displays! I highly recommend taking a trip and checking it out!

glamper_blog1

(photo below) I can’t tell you how hard it was to find a shot where all of us were looking up with our eyes open! (from left to right) Samantha Walker, Kris Thurgood, Jina Barney, Carina Gardner, Deena Rutter, Emily Taylor, and Kim Christopherson.

IMG_6978_web

IMG_0661_web

(photo above) Kim (Kimberbell Designs), myself, and Kris in front of the glamper. I was thrilled to hang out at their shop and meet so many of you! Probably the most amazing moment was when three ladies from my hometown of Clarksville, Tennessee showed up! It was so incredibly delightful! Thank you Judy, Susie, and Barbara for coming to see me! It made my day!

IMG_0567_1_web copy

Our next stop is in three weeks at Quiltique in Las Vegas, Nevada (April 19th from 11am-2pm). It will be just me, my family, and the glamper for that stop. Those of you in town, I would love to see you!

Happy Glamping and Sewing!

Carina

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Glamper Tour Recap: My Girlfriend’s Quilt Shoppe Read More »

Fabric Fest with Riley Blake Designs 2013

IMG_3881_1It’s taken me a few days to recover from Fabric Fest with Riley Blake Designs in Vegas. As always, RB put on a classy event. They fed, fed, and fed us some more. There were some fabulous classes, but mostly it was nice to reconnect with other designers, shop owners, and people I love.

The photos to the right and below are from the dinner and fashion show on Tuesday evening. I spent the few days before Fabric Fest quickly getting these outfits together. I loved how they turned out!

(shown in the photos from left to right are Evening Blooms fabric line, Tulip Park Pinafore, Bella Stash Bag, Playdate Outfit, Little Playdate Outfit, Love Nest Ruffle Dress, and the Little Love Nest Ruffle Dress).

 

 

 

 

 

fabricfest_4

I drove down to the event with designers Samantha Walker and Lori Whitlock (also at Carta Bella and Echo Park with me).  Every time I get together with these girls I am more amazed at all they do. (Photo below from right to left: Shari Butler of Doohikey Designs, Samantha Walker, myself, and Lori Whitlock).

IMG_3844_1

This was my first time meeting Sue Daley. Other than being a bubbly and positive personality (with a darling Australian accent), I was loving that she was wearing all of my fabric during the entire fest!!!! Look how darling she is in Evening Blooms (photos below)! Even the darling piping on the dress to the left is pink Dainty Blossoms. I took Sue’s paper piecing class and learned so much. I am a total fan!

fabricfest_3

That messy table of tchotchkes is my little booth in the vendor hall. We sold out of most of the samples the very first night.

IMG_3813_1

fabricfest_2

I took the Halloween Advent Set to show people (FYI, did you know that the Lunch Love Notes and the Halloween Advent Classes are only $3 each until Halloween? Get them while they are hot!).

IMG_3821_1

Me pretending to be Vanna White with my latest line Evening Blooms.

IMG_3849_1

fabricfest_1And how could I not adore all of these lovely ladies? (Kris and Kim of the DIY Dish, Kimberbell Designs, and My Girlfriend’s Quilt Shop, Lori Holt, Shari Butler of Doohikey Designs, Melissa Mortenson of the Polka Dot Chair, Lindsay Wilkes of the Cottage Mama, and Amy Smart of Diary of a Quilter)

Ask if I finished ANYTHING at the conference. Oh, ya. I was 0 for 5. I came home and finished Melissa’s Retro travel bag (and hand-bound the inside bias strips) just in time to see everyone this coming weekend at Sewing Summit. September is turning into my official sewing month! Especially with sewing patterns due out by October 1st. Eek!

Heavens knows I have a few fun surprises for you in the coming weeks! For more pictures on fabric fest, check out my instagram feed at http://instagram.com/carinagardner.

Sew happy,

Carina

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Fabric Fest with Riley Blake Designs 2013 Read More »

Evening Blooms Fabric Collection

IMG_2922_web

carinagardner2013_cameraquilt_webI just got back from CHA yesterday and am hoping to have photos up of all the scrapbooking goodness up sometime next week. In the meantime, I am so excited to announce that Evening Blooms™ has now hit quilt shops! This is my first black and white line. I also threw in a fun gray and yellow colorway to mix it up a little.

To top it off, I have a free quilt pattern for you! I was inspired by the colorways to create a vintage camera quilt pattern. You can grab the instructions, yardage information, and pattern from the shop here. This pattern is for intermediate quilters (there are a lot of tiny pieces).

I should have more projects to show you with this fabric line because I am making many of the patterns for Fabric Fest (sneaking up on me!). Below you can see my Siri-girl dressed up in the Love Nest Ruffle Dress with her look-alike doll in the Little Love Nest Ruffle Dress. It’s always refreshing to see the patterns in new fabric!

IMG_2847_web

As always, I have a lookbook for you for this fabric line. Check it out here: https://carinagardner.com/fabric/evening-blooms-fabric/

Carina

 

 

 

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Evening Blooms Fabric Collection Read More »

Nesting

I begrudgingly decided it was time to get a new computer. Besides running really slow, it turns out my love for the 17″ MacBook Pro is outdated. So I settled on a 15″ that I was assured will make me faster. With baby boy on the way, I knew all the “down time” I currently spend just letting things “run” needed to end. So my “old” Mac and “new” Mac both went to the doctor for a data transfer this weekend.

It’s been a long time since I didn’t have access to a computer. Maybe too long…because I managed to do some much needed nesting over the weekend. I have a major list of things that will absolutely NOT happen before this child arrives in a couple of weeks, but I also have a minor list that (hopefully!), I will on get done.

One of these “to dos” was to get curtains up in my kitchen. I made these ruffle curtains out of the Paris and Company fabric that I designed for Riley Blake (released out this last April (2012)). They are fun and pretty girly (Josh is dealing pretty well with this), and match the light blue chairs I painted for the breakfast nook.

I also managed to spend a good deal of my time catching up with the Olympics and Pinterest. My obsession for white colonial-style houses and lots of bright colors is evident.

In the coming weeks, I may be a little busy with our new adventure which may result in fewer blog posts. But my obsession with Instagram (follow carinagardner) should keep those of you who want to see the Carta Bella-Riley Blake-Jessica Sprague.com-Sewing Pattern-More Licensing(Yikes!)-Gardner Family-adventures in the loop.

XOXO- Carina

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Nesting Read More »

SongBird Fabric Line—Quilt Market 2012

Quilt Market is a week away and I’m finally getting around to showing you my next line—SongBird™. My booth at Quilt Market will be featuring this line. Most of the sewing is done, and I even have a new pattern I’ll be introducing at Market (Don’t worry, I’ll show it here soon as well!).

Never heard of Quilt Market? It’s a tradeshow for distributors, retailers, manufacturers, and designers to show off what is new in the fabric world. I’ve blogged about the Minneapolis Show 2010 here and the Salt Lake Show 2011 here.

This is my first ever Quilt Market where I’ll have my own booth. I started thinking about it last September and started actual work on it this February. What started out as one crate became two + lots of loading issues. To get the crates from my house to Riley Blake we had two freight trucks arrive (one that was tall enough and one with a liftgate) to get them out to Riley Blake’s warehouse.

The actual loading of the crates wasn’t a picnic either. Poor Josh had to reorganize twice. We packed them pretty full.

Josh is coming with me to Kansas City QM to do the heavy lifting and to help me out in general.

If you are coming to the show, please come visit me in Booth # 1529. If you aren’t coming to the show, send your quilt show owners my way! They (or you) can also visit me in a Schoolhouse presentation at 10:40am in Room 2505A on the new line and how to make the new sewing pattern.

_____________________________________________________________________________

You can check out all the fabrics in Songbird by clicking on one of the photos in this post. It is all summery-goodness! It hits quilt shops in June (2012).

Happy sewing!

Carina

 

 

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

SongBird Fabric Line—Quilt Market 2012 Read More »

Reversible Blouse and Dress Free Download and Video

Today you can learn how to make my Reversible Blouse and Dress Pattern that I created especially for beginning clothing sewers! This is such a fun and easy pattern! I’ve created instructions and a 8.5″ x 11″ printable pattern! All you need to do is tape the patterns together. How easy is that?

This pattern comes in both the dress and blouse sizes with my typical sizes of XS-XL. I use the same Child Measurements Chart that I use on all my sewing patterns, which is also laid out in the downloadable instructions for this pattern.

Need more of a visual? You’re in luck! My big news today is that I have done a video on Riley Blake’s Cutting Corners with Cindy Cloward showing the steps for creating this outfit. There are examples in the Paris and Company™ and Dainty Blossoms™ fabric. Check out the video by going here! NOTE: This video has been postponed and will go live May 1st.

______________________________________________________________________

Aren’t these girls darling? Gweny and Mae are two of my good friend Aimee’s children who happily agreed to pose for me! I’ll have samples of this outfit in my booth at Quilt Market in my new line Songbird™ (which I will reveal fully soon!).

Big news to announce tomorrow afternoon (yes, don’t get antsy but I won’t be announcing until the afternoon).

Hope you enjoy the pattern!

Carina

 

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Reversible Blouse and Dress Free Download and Video Read More »

Quick Trip Down to Christensen Wholesale

I made a quick run down to Christensen Wholesale’s new warehouse last Friday and I had the wits about me to remember my camera! The new warehouse is really great. I love walking in and seeing this (Dainty Blossoms™):

And this (Paris and Company™):

Something about all those bolts of fabric just makes me happy!

I went down to pick up my bolts of Paris and Company™. The line turned out so fun! Thought I would drop by to show you the goodness before I get back to work. Lots of good things happening and only a couple more weeks before the reveal…

Hints and hints,

Carina

Silhouette Design Store JOANN Stores

Quick Trip Down to Christensen Wholesale Read More »