So I went

I debated going to Lulu and Hazel's today. On the one hand, yes, it is apparently "love your local fabric shop" day and if a person doesn't occasionally show their local fabric shop a little love (including buying stuff), they won't have one much longer. (And if the shop is a GOOD shop - this one is - that stocks nice stuff, I think it's good to spend money there).

On the other, yes, I do need to do that bit of editing and new-graph-making. (But Saturday. Failing everything else I could do that Saturday: I have no desire to go to Sherman this week and have enough food on hand to manage).

So I originally thought, "Come back to campus after lunch, do the editing, then go as a reward." But I know myself: I'd work with one eye on the clock, and maybe not get the editing done in time, and then feel grumpy because I didn't get to go (they close at 5 pm). And I wanted to go TODAY.

So I went. And I guess instead of a reward, I got a "pre-ward" - yes, I bought some fabric. Because they had some super cute new stuff, things in bright clear colors (red and yellow and that lime green I like) and I picked out five half-yard pieces, and I probably have a bunch of  other stuff at home that will go. No quilt in mind, but I might just do a bunch of smallish simple blocks of a single design (I will have to look at my block books) in the different colors, and put them together for a smallish quilt.

But also, why I go: I like talking to the people there. It's a family concern - the main business (a used car lot, of all things) is run by Dad, and Mom helps out in the quilt shop and the car dealership. And the two (grown) daughters run the quilt shop. So that makes it fun and nice. And everyone there is super positive, which also makes it fun and nice: I feel welcome there. And it's nice just to go and look at fabric and maybe buy a few little things.

Funny thing: while I was in there looking, someone who had apparently been an old customer/friend of the family who had not been in since the quilt shop opened last summer came in, and the dad was showing him around. He laughingly showed the "quilt rooms" and observed, "I used to have all my car parts and junk here but it's been replaced by fabric and quilts" and the man asked, "Is the quilt shop more profitable?" and he answered, "Well, it's more *consistent*."

And yes, I can see that: you might buy a used car every 6-7 years or so (and if it doesn't last at least that long, you're probably not going back to that dealership) but an avid quilter can run through yards of fabric in a month. Or, as I noted to the young woman cutting my fabric: "A lot of us accumulate fabric faster than we use it" and she laughed.

We also talked about the cold weather, and I referenced the blizzard of 1978 in Ohio. And the mom remembered 1978 as a cold year HERE... (I think the daughter was too young to remember 1978, if she'd even been born then). But yeah. Just nice. Nice and something I need now and then, and I have some nice bright spring colors to work with, maybe when I finish the "birb" top....I can dig in my stash and probably find some other fabrics (these are slightly reminiscent of 1930s fabrics, but have brighter truer less-greyed colors to them) that will also go, and add those in, and like I said, maybe just pick a block that is one fabric-plus-background and make a bunch of blocks and do a quilt that way.