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I promise (fingers crossed behind my back) that this is the last chocolate themed post! You must have that sticky sweet feeling in the back of your throat by now, certainly! Just thought I would give you one more cavity, with well, eye-candy. For real. I'll be giving a little class at Quilt Market called 'Chocolate Lollipop and the sweetness of sewing'. It's customary for designers and other industry folks to chat up their new line to a group of buyers or any other topic buzzing around the quilting and sewing world that they choose. I'll obviously be talking about the new line, but also about the surge in sewing over the past few years. In particular, I have a theory about how much we need the hands-on luxury of things like sewing, knitting, and other slow paced endeavors to balance our hi tech and fast paced lives. And I'll be talking about all this to a bunch of people who have just been handed one of these lollipops, so maybe they'll agree with wh...

Well I'm trying to stay on top if it anyway! I made a top instead. So much to do! The first 60 pages of my book (that's only 1/4 of it people) is due on Tuesday. On Wednesday I leave for Quilt Market where I will spend 5 days talking about Chocolate Lollipop and doing other shameless self promotional type things. There are hoops, hurdles, and all sorts of other tricks to be jumped through, jumped over, and danced upon before I can have a rest. I am resting my eyes a bit right now on this little creation. Well both of these little creations actually. The studio has been a-whirl with sample making and photo taking for next week and I am so lucky to have a resident model who keeps my spirits up when I am waaaaayyy low on sleep. Anyway, most of you guys won't be at market so I thought I would sneak you a peek of some promotional images. She looked so grown up and serious in that pic above that I had to include the real her below. How about the antebellum stone column...

In case you think I don't leave the studio I thought I should share proof. I carted 5 children to track and soccer yesterday and employed all the usual accomplices to keep everyone happy...overpriced concession stand stuff. It was a rare day that I actually had cash in my wallet, and no time to pack anything. Well, okay , no time is not rare. I guess you usually don't see those boys do you? Oh they're always here. Just not modeling the latest Chocolate Lollipop fancy. I can usually feel people looking at us amused when they see us file into anywhere all in a long seemingly endless row of children. Definitely felt that yesterday placing the orders at the concession stand, finding a spot to settle, then beginning the 10 minute opening of all the drinks and snacks. Isabela has become quite the goalie, barely letting a thing by her. She doesn't miss a thing. She's always been like that. Juliana has got her 1/2 mile down to well under 3 minutes. Which coincid...

I finished up all the details on the octagon quilt this weekend. The lovely Vivian Love did the quilting, and may I say she did an amazing job. She employed free motion quilting in a stitch pattern completely dreamed up by her and inspired by my fabrics, says she. I was so thrilled to have a few quiet hours in the studio yesterday to get the binding on, while Jeff braved the afternoon set of soccer games and Juliana's track meet. So on Sunday all conditions were set for a parade of color across the front lawn led by none other than the girls . We had such beautiful sun and while still in their Sunday frocks from the their mom's hands , they were more than happy to play with mommy's new quilt. Can you find the sweetie feeties above? Oh there's another set! I know that some prefer not to stomach this much bold pattern all smushed and pushed together in one quilt. It is an eye or two full isn't it? It just satisfies me to see the order that's forced upon u...

I've been having a bit of a love affair with saffron yellow for a while. I'm dropping it here there and everywhere in my design work and a dash around the house and studio too. Hey, I said saffron , where'd that pink and lilac come from!? They were hiding. I chose to nudge them out with some thoughtful pleats. That was fun, let's do it again. Ah, yes a beach-y glass-y green. Pretty. Peek-a-blue! I thought of it in my sleep the other night as a clever way treat these fabrics or any nice thick stripes for that matter. It was all I could do to not hop up and light the midnight oil. Actually it was well after 2 am, what do you burn then? Probably just calories. Anyway, just join the same color stripe edge to edge and stitch hiding their non-spotlight color friends in the pleat. I'm thinking if placed over little girl bellies , you'll know they've been fed if the colors in hiding make an appearance. Some days a material clue that we remembered to f...

It's both hard to read the news and hard to not read the news. Most of my prayers today are in Virginia. May God heal and bless all those affected by this tragedy. Remember hope in these days after Easter.

Oh. My. Word. Is fabric getting really expensive or something? Chocolate Lollipop officially has a life of it's own, which does this designer proud. You guys are amazing. And smart too! I don't know how many comments I got that said I would need more than a Ball Jar. Duh. What was I thinking? I'll tell ya what I was thinking. I was thinking, oh this'll make for some good fun so I can work on my book for the whole week and not have to post again until Monday. That was until I hit around 400 something in comments and started thinking of cutting up all those strips of comments. Even my husband, Mr. Computer Programmer in the Biostatistics Research Department at Vanderbilt, looked at me like I was crazy when I insisted on the old-fashioned method. I just figured, that's what I said I was gonna do, so it was the least I could do to cut those little suckers up after you sillies said so many nice things. Not that I prompted you or anything. But oh my gosh, I...

Who is in that window? And what's that in her hands? Okay. No more goofy guessing. You know it's me holding a stack of sweets . And that's our little playhouse outside we built a few summers ago. I should show you more of that one of these days. Can you believe that this post was 100 posts ago? I certainly can't. I'll tell you what else I can't believe, is that you're still here. And more of you! And that apparently I haven't completely talked your head off and made you run away. I'm feeling generous and tried to think of all the fun little things I could make you do to win yourself some sweet stacks. But I figure, just leave me a comment, any old comment, even "Anna you stink" and I will throw your name in a hat (or likely a Ball jar). Monday I will post 4 winners whose comments I've pulled out of the hat, errrh, jar. You heard me, 4 ! Winners will receive a fat-quarter stack of either of the two color ways of Chocolate...

I hope that you all had a beautiful Easter weekend! We traveled a short ways to my parents' house on the river in east Tennessee to join my brother George , my sister Eleni , and their darling families. Ten little sets of cousin feet stomped in happiness all through the house for three days as we hunted eggs, ate cake, wiped away sleepiness for a midnight church service and celebrated a beautiful Easter together. Those bright and beautiful eggs were meant to be shared with you last week. We had a bit of a snag on Thursday. Our precious Juliana was a passenger in her friend's car when they were hit head-on by a drunk driver. It was the tearful phone call no parent wants to get, and by the grace of God she and her friend both walked away a little banged up, dizzy, but no broken bones. I've never been so happy to see bruises on her because the biggest marks left on her were from the seatbelt she thankfully was wearing. Everything you would imagine went through my head...

Eeked out one more quilt top recently in preparation to show at Quilt Market . I dashed into the patio yesterday to photograph it as the light was so beautiful after a wacky raining while it's still sunny stint. Maybe you've noticed a sliver of it up in that new banner? I thought I would only do the Chocolate Lollipop quilt that I designed for the collection. I received a copy of Quilter's Companion Australia and saw this gorgeous octagonal quilt, and HAD to try. It was great fun. Those sweet folks are actually doing a feature on lil' ole me for the summer issue. Hi Aussie lovies! Our brick patio comes right off the back of the kitchen , and it is slowly coming to life this spring. I usually try to put as many flowers out there as I can hide in the grocery bills all through the spring and summer. But I wanted to do something a little different this year. Appreciate green. And variations on green. Even I, who must wear blossom blinders while driving by the...

You guys are so nice! Thank you so much for all the encouragement for my next big ta-da ! Wowee! I also learned another friend of sorts will be write there with me. (I'm doing it again, I have a tendency towards the puns, which I either need to embrace or abandon). Wondering what's up with all the colors? Just a little studio task I checked off the list today (long, long list, speaking of books). These are my home made color chips. Whenever I design a collection of product, the art is usually turned over to the manufacturer in the form of a digital file on disc. But many times more than one type of factory will be producing the collection so you need to give them a matching system so that all the colors are cohesive in the end. In this particular case, we're coordinating the manufacture of rugs and needlepoint pillows in China with table linens in India. Rather challenging, I must say. Lots of people use the Pantone system, and call out numbers to get it right...