Tuesday, April 04, 2006

sweet home, Chicago...


I am back home in Chicago for a week and am trying to keep myself busy until the quilt show!!!
Today, I spent 3 hours driving and visiting quilt shops on the south side, where I am from.


First stop, Threadneedle Street in Orland Park. Cute shop, lots of Thimbleberries fabrics, some batiks. Seemed to me like everything in this shop was one color? Anyway, I bought some orange hand dyeds and batiks. Char, the owner, was super nice!


Next stop, Quilfabric.com near Naperville. I drove a bit to the north west side of the city for this one, but it was worth it. The shop is amazing and the selection grand. "known for the batiks" is right. Holy cow. Lots of staff, and lots of selection. They were getting ready for the show, as they are a vendor, which is why it took them a few minutes to notice I was ready to check out.


Next, Susan Marie's in Palos Heights. It's a beautiful shop, but the staff pretty much ignored me until I was ready to pay. Light on selection, but this shop is definitely slanted toward the brights. Few thimbleberries here (thank goodness). They made up for the ignoring me by the big sale they had going and my free tote for signing up for the newsletter.

Last, Sew Creative in Tinley Park. Oh, too bad the hometown (or closest to me) is the worst of them all. Mish-mash selection. I found some Lonni Rossi typosheres and asked for a yard cut. She would not cut through the repeat and would only either give me a 2/3 yd or 1 1/3 yd cut! Um, customer is always... Geez, forget it. Seemed like I was troubling her just by being in the store, she was watching tv.

So there. My average purchase per store was $20.

The picture here is by Richard L. Baron. Called "The El Chicago" (C) 1999.

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