Open House & Sample Sale

I am super late on my Quilt Market Recap and believe it or not, I am still editing photos and trying to wrap my head around it all. Sooooo much! But in the meantime, I thought I'd let you know that we'll be opening our doors for tours and holding a HUGE studio sale tomorrow, Friday, June 1st, if you are local to the Central Illinois area or just passing by.

There'll be lots of items up for grabs, all at 20% off list price (including lots of one-of-a-kind sewn samples!!). The last time we opened our doors to the public was 6 months ago!

Details are below... click on the image to enlarge:

Thinking back and looking forward

We hosted Christmas at our house this year, which meant that all of my family from Florida came up and all of Jon's family from Chicago-area came down... luckily not all at once, so it wasn't super crazy (just a little). :) This was the first time in years that we had all of my family together under one roof -- well, actually, the first time EVER, if you take into account that our newest member is only 4 months old -- so we took this opportunity to try to get a nice family picture.

We all gathered at MODKID HQ late on December 22nd (after celebrating my sister's birthday), turned on the self-timer, and tried to get serious for a photo. Here's a look behind the scenes at our attempt to get everyone to stand in one spot, look forward, not close their eyes and smile for the camera (easier said that done, when you have 10 people ranging in ages from 4 months to 69 years!)



Of course, the kids behaved properly and did what they were told... can't say the same for the adults.











This one was almost perfect but baby Natalie was looking down and a few of us were looking, hmmmm... not so enthused.



So, with the help of my BFF (Photoshop) I took a face from here and another one from there, put them all together and... voila!



I drove my parents -- the last remaining guests at our house -- to the airport yesterday so now it's eerily quiet and a tad sad, so I'm trying to keep myself occupied with the piles and piles of work that awaits me at the office. Forgive me if you've sent an email that I haven't responded to yet. I promise I will get to it this week... or next!

I am really looking forward to this year. It's going to be a year of firsts in so many ways. This is the year I become a published author... YIPPEE!!! (and speaking of that, I didn't forget that I still owe you guys another book sneak peek... I'm working on it!). This is also the year in which I offer my fabric designs in more than one new exciting substrate... DOUBLE YIPPEE! (more on that soon, soon!) And lastly, we hope this is the year we grow our company beyond our wildest dreams. Ohhhh... we have so many plans and so many aspirations. My imagination goes non-stop!

I thank you all for your support in 2011 and I wish 2012 is the best year EVER for you too! Now, get back to work!! :)

A Very Mod Christmas

I love living in a small-ish town where everyone is so supportive, helpful and genuinely excited about being a part of our little business. The friendships we have made in the past few months of having our MODKID HQ here are absolutely priceless!!

Last month I told you guys about how the Modern Quilt Guild ladies pitched in to create some of the most amazing quilted projects I've ever seen. Well, this time Jon, Emalee and I were blessed with the help of our friends, The Barrs, and 4 wonderful girls from Illinois State University's Apparel, Merchandising & Design Department: Megan Bjorn, Alethea Hemauer, Paige Kent and Jessica Lottinville. Talk about The Season of Giving... these wonderful people worked tirelessly to create our amazing window display for the upcoming December First Fridays event, which is in just 3 short days!

It all started out with a super cool idea by my friend Nikki. She came here one day talking about floating trees and Christmas light waterfalls. Shortly thereafter, Emalee, Nikki, Megan, Alethea, Paige, Jessica and I were brainstorming, sketching ideas on paper and figuring out the logistics.

Several shopping trips later, we were ready and eager to get started. The Sunday after Thanksgiving Jon and Justin hung our Christmas light waterfall, complete with a soft curtain of white mesh to soften it up a bit.



Then yesterday, the Merchandising girls came by to get the rest of the display done. The floating tree proved to be the most challenging part, since the ornament strings kept twisting into one another and tangling themselves into a colossal web. Luckily, Em & Em gathered up the patience to untangle each and every strand. A million thanks to sweet Emily Parks (currently referred to as Ms. Parks by her adoring students) for stopping by and helping us out!



How many people does it take to put up a floating tree? Well, it appears the answer is seven! And one photographer. haha



Even as we were hanging the tree, those pesky strands kept gravitating towards one another... eeeek!



Then it was time to get the base nice and leveled (easier said than done, by the way!). A little higher here! No, a little lower there! This strand needs to go 1" to the right! No, your other right!



We all let out a huge sigh of relief once this little project was finished! Then it was time to step back and admire the masterpiece... ahhhhh.



The rest of the display went together without a hitch.

Wrapping faux presents...





With cute ragged fabric bows...



Making the windows nice and "snowy" (you'd think by now and in the heart of the Midwest, we'd have some real snow, but nope!)





And adding the finishing touches... TADA!







A million thanks to the Merchandising girls, Megan, Alethea, Paige and Jennifer, for all your help, your smiles and your positive attitude. This is BY FAR the coolest window in Downtown Bloomington (at least in my eyes)! And a special thanks to their teacher, Elisabeth Reed, for connecting me with these great girls.

Also, a million thanks to Nikki Barr, Justin Barr and Emalee Grambo for all of your help and super cool ideas! It was definitely worth all the headaches and late nights, no?

And last, but not least, big hugs and kisses to the adorable MODKID models, Sydney, Sophie and Anna for being such great troopers and coming out to model for my First Fridays invitation. It turned out so awesome!!!





If you are in the Central Illinois area, please stop by and see us this Friday, December 2nd from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. We will have music, refreshments and live window display PLUS lots of items for sale! In addition, all of the other businesses downtown will have activities, food, displays and sales going on. There's even pictures with Santa and free gift-wrapping at a few venues. This event is not to be missed!!

The LUSH Quilts
(a.k.a. I *heart* The Central Illinois Modern Quilt Guild)

First of all I wanted to thank you all for the sweet comments regarding my Lush fabric line. We are beyond excited about it! There is still time to enter the giveaway so go on over there and leave us a comment.

I mentioned before that my booth would be quite empty if it wasn't for the kind hearts of the members of The Central Illinois Modern Quilt Guild. These ladies sacrificed their entire weekend to help us make some amazing quilted projects for our Quilt Market display, so I'd like to dedicate this post to Terry, Pat, Melissa, Arlene, Jean, Vicky, Mary and of course, Emalee. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart!













Quilt #1 in progress...











And here are the finished products. Cool, eh?!? An extra special thanks to Ann Anderson and Mary Edwards who quilted the 2 bigger quilts in record time (literally in just hours!)



The large Stargazer Lilies that extend beyond on the side panels are appliquéd on...





There are 4 layers of quilt batting just under the "Lush" letters to give it that raised and poofy look...







We used the left-over fabric selvedge to hang this pennant-style quilt.



Come see these beauties in person this weekend at The International Quilt Market in Houston, TX, booth #1653.

Pink isn't just a color... it's an attitude!

Our baby girl turned 7 (SEVEN!) this weekend and we celebrated it the way any little princess would want to.... by having a Hollywood Diva party! Ohhhhh... it was so much fun, we didn't want it to ever end! Everything was pink and sparkly and glittery and girly! We turned Modkid HQ into party central and I want to share some of the highlights with you. Plus, I have included some FREE downloads at the end of this post so you too can give your girl a Hollywood Diva party!

We had super pink cupcakes with famous diva sayings on top...



There were famous quotes from classic divas, like Coco Chanel and Marilyn Monroe, and some more recent ones, like Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus and Lady Gaga (of course!).





This was Sydney's personal cupcake...



I also used the same famous quotes to decorate the goodie boxes, which were hot pink Chinese take out containers filled with all the little items any diva should have, like lip gloss, glittery emery boards, funky pony tail holders, heart-shaped barrettes, faux diamonds and lots of bracelets!









We had some very pink finger foods...





Balanced out by others not-so-pink but still as yummy...





We even had "girlie-cocktails" for the little divas (Fruit punch + 7up + Maraschino cherries + little umbrellas + pink plastic champaign flutes from Hobby Lobby)



And, boy, were those the BIG HIT of the party!!! :)



The girls played dress-up and had their picture taken in our photo studio...







Then they strutted they stuff down the "pink carpet"...





We pulled up the white backdrop so they could have a dance party on our dance floor...



They made beaded jewelry (no pictures of that because I was helping the girls with their bracelets).

We sang Happy Birthday...



And opened presents...





Almost everything Sydney received was PINK! :) She is a happy girl right now! And mama scored big points for what she called "The best party EVER!" YAY!!! :)

I figured, there might be one or two or 3000 readers out there with little divas in their lives with birthdays coming up, so I wanted to share the graphic file for my cupcake-toppers and goodie-bag-labels. Click on the images below to be taken directly to my Flickr pool, then download the largest file available (original). These will print at 100% on your home printer on letter-size paper.

Print these cake-toppers on card stock if you can. They will be much sturdier that way. I bought my 90 lb. card stock at Office Max. Print two sheets so you can glue them back to back with a toothpick sandwiched in between. We used a hot glue gun for this.



Print the goodie-bag-labels onto full or half-sheet label paper (sticky-back), then cut them out with scissors and adhere to the front of your goodie boxes or bags. If you don't have adhesive paper, you can print them onto the same card stock as the cake toppers and just use spray adhesive, a glue stick or a hot glue gun.



Hope you can put these to good use! And please share if you do. I always love checking out other people's birthday parties. :)