Notes from my Sewing Room

Quilty comics, a finished closet, and a fabric-room clean-out that got slightly out of hand.

Hello, my quilty friends!

Another weekend and another little note from my sewing room to yours. Here are a few things that have been happening around here this week.

Saturday Morning Cartoons

A few weeks ago, we started something new on Instagram that has actually been years in the making: Quilty comics!

If you didn't know, my husband, Dave, is the illustrator behind all of the artwork at Maker Valley. We've been collaborating on our t-shirt designs for more than 10 years now, but Dave has been drawing comics for much, much longer than that.

He's been drawing them since he was a kid, and when we met in college, he had a daily comic strip that ran in our university newspaper. He also created editorial cartoons for the newspaper and later for different websites.

For years, Dave has talked about wanting to create a comic about quilting, and we've always thought it would be so fun to do together. Why did it take us this long? Life, mostly. A full-time job, four kids, running a business, and all of the other things that seem to fill up the days.

But as we've stepped away from the fabric-selling side of Maker Valley this year, we've finally had a little more room to try some of those ideas that have been sitting on the back burner.

And so, Saturday Morning Cartoons was born.

Most of the comics start with something that has actually happened to me—or at least something very closely inspired by my life as a quilter. I give Dave the idea, and he brings it to life through his illustrations. It's been so fun coming up with them together, and I love seeing how many of you relate to them too. Apparently my quilty problems are not unique to me! Here are a few of the more recent comics:

We'll be sharing a new one on Instagram each Saturday, so be sure to follow along. We have lots more ideas coming.

Follow along here!

The Closet Is Finished!

If you remember from last week, I was in the middle of cleaning out our game/quilt closet—and I'm happy to report that it's finished!

I got rid of a LOT of stuff, reorganized all the games, and went through all of the quilts that had been stacked and stuffed in there over the years. And it feels so good.

There's something about having less stuff—and actually being able to see and easily get to the things you decided to keep—that makes me ridiculously happy. Every time I open the closet doors now, I just want to stand there and admire it for a minute.

I also ended up with a whole stack of quilts that I'm ready to part with. Some will be gifted to family members, and I'll be selling some of the others. It feels good knowing they'll actually be used and loved instead of sitting folded up in a closet.

And apparently finishing one closet gave me just enough momentum to tackle another space...which brings me to my fabric room.

If You Give a Quilter a WIP Bin...

I went downstairs today with one very simple goal: sort through my bin of WIPs.

That's it.

For anyone who might not know, WIP stands for work in progress, and apparently I have accumulated...ahem...a few.

I wanted to go through them, see what was actually in there, and decide which projects I still want to finish and which ones I'm ready to let go of.

Instead, it turned into the quilter's version of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.

If you give a quilter a bin of WIPs, she's going to notice the shelf next to it needs organizing.

And if she organizes the shelf, she's going to notice the boxes in the corner.

And if she goes through the boxes in the corner...

Well, you get the idea.

Several hours later, I was cleaning out the entire room.

Years ago, when I started buying and selling fabric through Maker Valley, I turned one of our downstairs bedrooms into a fabric room. Over time, it also became a bit of a catch-all for sewing supplies, quilting stuff, business stuff, and all sorts of random bits and bobs that didn't have another home.

Now that I'm no longer actively buying fabric to sell, I'm ready for the room to have a new purpose.

My goal is to turn it back into a functional guest bedroom—with a bonus fabric stash, of course. I'm still keeping a shelf in the closet with some five-yard cuts for quilt backings, flannel, and other fabrics for my own projects. I'm getting rid of things, reorganizing what I'm keeping, and slowly uncovering an actual room underneath all of it.

And after today's accidental cleaning marathon, it's already looking so much better.

There are still a few odds and ends of fabric inventory that will hopefully be trickling into the Maker Valley shop over the next week or so, so keep an eye out for those too.

Just a Girl Who Loves to Sew

And finally, this week's New Tee Tuesday brought back an old favorite: Just a Girl Who Loves to Sew.

We originally released this design several years ago, and it was one of our most popular tees, so we decided it was time to bring it back in four colorways.

The idea was inspired by one of my favorite movie moments from Notting Hill, when Julia Roberts' character says:

“I'm also just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.”

Our version is a little less romantic and a lot more quilty:

I'm just a girl who loves to sew.

Because sometimes that's really all there is to it. I just want to go into my sewing room, work on a project, play with fabric, make something with my hands, and have a little time to be creative.

And I'm guessing a lot of you understand that feeling too.

Here's a link to the tees!

That's what's been happening around here this week: comics, pattern-making, an unexpectedly ambitious cleaning project, and, of course, a new-old quilty tee.

Thanks for following along with all the different things we're creating at Maker Valley. I'm really enjoying this new season of having a little more space for pattern writing, sewing, and some of those ideas we've been wanting to try for years.

Until next week,

Holly

From my sewing room to yours.