We are thankful!

At this time of year, we like to pause and be thankful for the many blessings in our lives. As a small company, Through the Needle's Eye has so many things that fill us with gratitude. Our cornucopia overflows with thanksgiving! 

THANK YOU TO . . . 

Our many blog readers. Since we began our blog in 2015, it has received over 321,000 page views. We have over 1500 readers who receive our blog by email, and we aren't sure how many more through Bloglovin', Quilters Blogs, other blog sites, social media, or other means. But we are so grateful for the support of all of our readers, especially those who leave comments or send us emails. Stitching is our passion, and we love to share it with you!

Our social media followers. Did you know that you can follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest? Some weeks we are more active than others, but it is a fun way to interact and see what we are stitching. Check us out if you are on any of those sites! You can click the link in the captions below.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/needleseyestories/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/needleseyestories/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/needlese/

Our local quilt shops. There is no place like home, unless it is a quilt shop—a home away from home for anyone who loves to work with fibers. We are thankful that Jackie, the owner of Patches Quilting and Sewing in Mt. Airy, MD, took a chance on us five years ago and helped us to get into our teaching groove. We are also thrilled to be able to work with Kathy, the owner of Primitive Homespuns Wool and Needleworks in Frederick, MD; we teach classes there, and Kathy kits many of our wool patterns. We love our shops!!

Patches: https://patchesquilting.com

Primitive Homespuns Wool & Needleworks: https://www.phwoolandneedle.com/
And we are grateful to have our designs featured on the shop's homepage! 😊

The Baltimore Appliqué Society. Our first lecture was scheduled with BAS, at the very beginning of our partnership. The encouragement of the members of this group went a long way in giving us the confidence to move forward with our business. We have taught several workshops for them, primarily focusing on embellishing appliqué blocks. What a fabulous organization, promoting the history of appliqué quilts and acquisition of skills as well. 

BAS: https://baltimoreapplique.com/

Past workshops taught for BAS

Future BAS workshop, to be taught in June 2020
Patterns in this series taught with permission of Elly Sienkiewicz, from Baltimore Elegance

The Academy of Appliqué. When we first decided to start our business, it was a dream to be able to teach at a venue like the Academy. It has been a humbling honor to be able to be a part of this magnificent experience, and we are indebted to Barbara for inviting and supporting us. And of course, those who have enrolled in our classes—who have stitched and laughed with us—have proven to us that dreams do come true. March of 2020 will mark our fourth year teaching there, and we have loved every moment of our adventures in Williamsburg. We might have a seat or two still open. We hope to meet you there!  

The Academy of Appliqué: http://www.academyofapplique.com/

Our class in March 2020 is from our new quilt, Woodland Reverie, with an option to choose a spring or fall block, or both.

Baltimore on the Prairie. Another venue on our teaching bucket list has been this appliqué conference in Nebraska, so we were delighted when Tresa invited us to teach our wool and ribbon designs next September! The conference comes highly recommended, and we are looking forward to being part of the faculty there next year. We are so grateful to have this opportunity. Thank you, Tresa, and thank you to all who have already enrolled in our sessions. If you haven't yet decided, we hope you might join us!

Baltimore on the Prairie: https://www.baltimoreontheprairie.com/

 

Our Baltimore Fraktur class, in two colorways 

We are currently designing a couple of settings for this center medallion.

Our Floral Elegance class expands on our mix of fibers, combining wool appliqué and ribbon flower techniques.

Quilt guilds, near and far. It is always a pleasure to receive an invitation to speak at a guild and share the stories of our quilts with fellow stitchers. We have lectured in Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and New York—and Germany. Every quilt has a story, and we love to share the tales of our quilts, and often to hear some of your stories, as well. Thank you to those who have reached out to us and invited us. Someday, perhaps, we might pay you a visit!

You! The best way to learn something is to teach it. We have both become better needle artists because of the opportunities we have had to teach you, whether it be at a class, Academy, conference, lecture, or writing our blog. You make us better stitchers, and you are the reason we love what we do. 

So THANK YOU!

Happy Birthday...to us!

We can't believe we started this blog two years ago! Time certainly has flown, and we have come a long way in those two years. Here is a peek back at our humble beginnings:

Once upon a time, there were two friends who loved to quilt. They set out for a weekend away from their families to take some classes at a quilt show in Gettysburg, PA. Sadly, they waited too long to reserve a room, and upon check-in were a bit disgruntled with the accommodations. Not to be discouraged, they decided to stay in the humble lodging rather than return home to the kids. (Even though they loved them dearly.)

Kara, the perky one, got into her pajamas and leaped through the air onto her bed in excitement. Teri, the cautious one, was lifting the covers on her bed and closely examining the wrinkles and strange fibers on the sheets. 

"Someone's been sleeping in my bed," cried Teri.  

"What do you mean?!" chirped Kara.

"There are hairs in my bed, and they aren't mine!" Teri exclaimed.

"Really? Are you sure? ...Oh, ewww! Someone's been sleeping in my bed, too!"

Thus began our adventures stitching together. Suffice it to say that we got clean sheets, stayed the night, had a great weekend of quilting, AND learned to make our reservations early. It may not have been Goldilocks in our beds, but we have been blessed to combine our creative energies, and working together has been just right.

We have learned and experienced so much since our Gettysburg adventure. Here are a few of our highlights:

• Teaching at the Academy of Appliqué in Williamsburg
• Having our quilt, A Fairy Tale Album, accepted into the Houston International Quilt Festival
• Going to Houston to see the quilt and experiencing all that excitement
• Going to our first Market
• Meeting other quilters from all around the world
• Designing our first pattern (Marcia's Flowers)
• Lecturing at the Baltimore Appliqué Society and other guilds
• Teaching at the Baltimore Appliqué Society and various local quilt shops
• Having almost 90,000 views on our blog in our first two years
• Launching our website

Speaking of websites . . . we have been meaning to catch up on a few things that we had to put aside while preparing for the Academy. On the list of things to do was to add a few items to our website. If you pop on over there, you will see what is new in our shop. We started our store with the Marcia's Flowers wool patterns in two palettes, and now we have the wool kits to go with them. Each kit contains enough wool to complete the project, which you can then use to top a wooden box or turn into a pillow.

Marcia's Flowers Pattern bright palette

bright palette

warm palette

Marcia's Flowers warm palette

As we promised in our Pansies post, we now have pansy ribbon kits available. Each kit makes four, five-petal pansies, with a little bit left over to make a violet or two. The how-to directions are in our pansy post (linked above). Our students in Williamsburg were all amazed at how realistic these pansies are and how easy they are to make! You can buy the kit in two different sizes: 1" wide and 5/8" wide ribbon.

5/8" pansies

5/8" pansy ribbon kit

1" pansies

1" wide pansy ribbon kit

Also in our shop, we have a limited supply of kits for our Floral Wreath block and our Secret Garden block. The Floral Wreath kit comes with everything you need to create this beautiful and realistic wreath of flowers—even the background is included! In the kit you will find River Silks and Hanah silk ribbon, French ombré wired ribbon, Gentle Art threads, as well as detailed directions.

Floral Wreath

So many beautiful ribbons in this kit!

While you provide the background, the Secret Garden kit contains all the appliqué fabric, ribbon, and threads needed to create your own garden. There is River Silks, Hanah silk ribbon, French ombré wired ribbon, and sari silk for the wisteria tree not to mention all the threads needed for the embroidered garden. The kit also includes a comprehensive set of directions to help you as you complete this block inspired by children's novel, The Secret Garden.

Secret Garden block

Ribbon, sari silk, and threads—oh, my!

We couldn't have achieved our milestones without you, our readers, so what better way to celebrate our two-year birthday, then to have a GIVEAWAY! The winner will receive a Marcia's Flowers pattern and kit in their choice of colorway. All you need to do to be eligible for this giveaway is to leave a comment on the blog below telling us which of our posts over the past two years is your favorite—and why. That's it! (If you are reading this in email, hop over to the blog by clicking here.)

 Good luck!

We thank you all for traveling with us on this journey as we tell the stories of the many different ways we, and others, use a needle. Our love of stitching binds us together, and it has been our pleasure and honor to share these stories with you. Here's to many more years of stitching and storytelling!

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A First Anniversary Giveaway!

My, how fast a year can fly! Kara and I (Teri) have just passed a milestone: one year of blogging! We have been amazed by this journey, and we are so grateful for the many readers that have joined as we have begun our stitching and storytelling adventure.

Over the past year, we have shared many quilts, both old and new. We've told stories about our great-grandmothers and their quilts, and about our grandmothers, too. There have been baby quilts, wedding quilts, anniversary quilts, reunion quilts, classroom quilts, album quilts, story quilts, inherited quilts, and just because quilts. We have visited antique malls, museums, gardens, quilt shows, and classes—both as students and teachers. We've stitched cotton, wool, silk, ribbon, and beads with patchwork, appliqué, embroidery, and crazy quilting. 

Our humble blog has been viewed over 22,000 times by readers in just shy of 100 countries, statistics that astound us. Our highest month was in November, when we started a wool ornament pattern series with fairy tale designs. The free patterns certainly drew an increased number of readers, but about halfway through the series, Mary Corbet included a link to our blog on her page, Needle 'N Thread, and we had thousands (like 4 or 5!) of views in the next few weeks. (Thanks, Mary!)

One the most exciting posts for us was Fairy Tales Through the Needle's Eye, when we revealed our new fairy tale album quilt. We had been working on it for a couple of years, from early designs to final stitches, and we were thrilled to be able to share our love for fairy tales and quilts together. The feedback we received from our social media channels was encouraging and inspiring. We are already planning our next story block!

To thank you all for your part in making this blogging experience so much fun for us, we thought we'd celebrate with a giveaway. It is springtime, and flowers are beginning to bloom—such natural beauty to inspire our stitching. So we've put together a little "Spring Stitching Set" for you to enjoy. Perhaps you could create a few flowers or butterflies. To win, just leave a comment below and tell us which of our quilt stories from this past year you have enjoyed the most. And we'd love to know why, if you care to tell us that as well.

Giveaway "Spring Stitching Set" includes an assortment of:
fabric, DMC floss, French wired ombré ribbon, ultrasuede, milliners and chenille needles
(flowers not included)

To enter for a chance to win this Spring Stitching Set:

1. Leave a comment on the blog. (If you are reading this in email, just click on the title to head to the blog site.)
2. In your comment, tell us your favorite post from this past year.
3. Like us on Facebook, or follow us on Instagram, Pinterest, or Google+ for another chance to win. (Please indicate that you have done so in your comment.)
4. To be entered in the drawing, your comment must be in by Monday, March 28, at 12 noon, EDT. 

We will be choosing a name from the entries at random and announce the winner next week. Please be sure that we have enough information about you to identify you. For instance, if you don't want to include your last name, tell where you are from so we know which "Mary" likes Post X, such as Mary from Timbuktu.

We have lots of fun planned for the months to come. We hope you'll come along for the ride!

Happy Spring!!