Our First "Little Quilt Shop"

Get ready because this first post begins the "11 Quilt Shops in 2 Days" journey of the Central Virginia Tour de Quilt. As promised I have immortalized the trip for all of you who were unable to attend. Let's celebrate my birthday month together... You, Me and my friend BP. My friend LS in Tennessee decided to call her quilting business "Loose Bobbins" (which is a completely appropriate name..yuk yuk...) So BP and I decided we should expand on that with nicknames during this trip. B said she wanted to be Lucy Bobbins and then I guess I should be Ethel. Hubby just called us Thelma and Louise (which after you hear about the whole trip you may agree).

So here are all the details of the fun stuff on the trip. At the first stop you can pick up your Passport. A completely filled passport gives you a chance to win a Grand Prize and 1st, 2nd and 3rd Place prizes. There is also a Scavenger Hunt along the way. Each shop has 2 clues. You have to figure out which clues go with which shop. A completed Scavenger Hunt gives you a chance to win a different prize. Each shop on the tour had to make a quilt out of the "Tour Fabrics" which is the Jacobean Arbor line and they each had a store fabric which could be purchased. You would then have a chance to own all 11 fabrics in the line and create your own tour quilt. Each shop has door prizes, a shop prize contest, a buffet (of sorts) and shop freebies. One of the shop freebies is a store project pattern. Each shop makes a project and gives away the pattern to that project. Each shop can give away whatever freebies they want. So I will try to show you as much as I can. You can read about the Tour de Quilt here.

Alright... enough babbling... Let's get to the trip. B starts the trip off right by showing us the #1. Our first stop on the tour was That Little Quilt Shop in Madison, VA. Madison is a quaint little town off Route 29. It's West of Fredericksburg (where I live) and the first stop before you head over the mountains. Madison (which is owned by Noreen Smith, who also owns 145 Art and Design Studio in historic Culpeper, VA) is nestled inside an historic old church. Here is the front of the church.

Here is the Shop Quilt on the tour. I think the Little Quilt Shop did a great job with their design, don't you?

This little lady was a clue on the Scavenger Hunt and she was wearing the first free pattern that we received in the day, a little apron which looks like a little skirt. Clue #1 was the wire dress form and the second clue was a little bed on the second floor of the shop.

Here is the second floor balcony of the shop. The Little Quilt Shop has a nice collection of Civil War Repros and tons and tons of gorgeous Baiks. You can see some of them here.

Here are the lovely little purchases that I made at this shop. A few one yard cuts and a Tour de Quilt pin. This shop is really scary for me. I could spend all day here but of course we had 10 more shops to go to and we needed to get moving. Grand Total at Shop #1: $50.93 YIKES!

I should probably learn to pace myself.

That Little Quilt Shop gave me this lovely little pack of fabric as my free gift. What a great little store...but times a wastin'. Next, to eat or not to eat... that is the question. Come on Thelma... let's get a move on!

Over the mountains we go...