Newsletter
February 20, 2021
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Dear Customer,
* A lot of snow came to Northern Virginia these last two weeks!
Beautiful to look at, but also very disruptive. Deliveries, pickups, roads all
messed up. Kerry couldn't reach work for two days. On a positive note, I was
so fortunate to have my daughter, her husband and grandchild Nora home twice!
Eline has to work and her dialysis patients need the care, also during snow.
Where to bring Nora when daycare is closed because of all the snow? My husband
and I volunteered! So we had them twice over during the last 14 days. They
came just before the winter storms arrived and left when it was over. Wish you
could see Eline talking to patients in between the fabrics, some even asking
her about her background. My son in law was giving a class to medical students
in a bedroom upstairs. Husband was working from his home office and I was
playing with Nora! I was the only one not using the internet: we had blocks,
books, animals and spools of thread. Since Nora is only 16 months old, she
still sleeps a lot. I could work on orders during her naps and in the
evenings. Not a single order got delayed!
* We received three great collections these last two weeks. First
came
Alessia by P&B Textiles. Alessia is a
108" wide fabric, perfect for backings and long borders. There are 14 colors
in Alessia and that is quite a selection for extra wides. The design has
elegant swirly leaves and vines, not traditional, not modern. I think it will
be a very useful backing for a lot of quilts and with that range of colors
there is always a winner.
* Hoffman shipped their two new blender collections for this
winter.
Marbled is a group of
18 fabrics with a marbled design. The
marbling is quite intense and clouded looking. It really has the effect of
stones, rocks. Nice! The other collection has the name
Waves, and the waving stands for the
ombre effect that this time is being created by different designs. An ombre
always goes from dark to light. In Waves, the "going from dark to light"
effect is created not by one design, but by many. It's almost as if Hoffman
has sewn uneven strips of fabric together and turned it into one new fabric.
It's fascinating and it will create quite an illusion in quilts.
The blue fabric already looks like
waves in the water.
The yellow is already a sunset. And how
about making a binding with this fabric? It's a really neat concept, made
possible by the digital printing techniques.
* Customers who ordered the Hoffman fabrics from our
Coming Soon page, will see their orders
in their mailboxes this week. One would think that is a given, but earlier
this week I had a very unpleasant situation with Tilda fabrics, where they
didn't ship the promised fabrics to us. We got just part of the order. Some
customers got their pre-ordered fabrics. However, most didn't, simply because
the company didn't have enough fabric to ship to all shops. I'm not sure if
this is Covid related or not. It is hard for fabric companies to deal with all
the issues they have on the production and distribution side of the fabric
business. Delays are to be expected, and we have seen every company dealing
with it. But all other companies also showed care for their customers and that
care was lacking this time. Not a single word. So, all I could tell my
customers was that their orders won't get shipped, because there is no fabric.
Such a disappointment! It will not happen again, because I will not order any
more Tilda and all future orders have been canceled.
To show you how companies can care: Moda, located in Dallas TX, has
been hit hard by the weather and energy crisis in Texas. The temperature in
their warehouse was at one point 2F, keeping the fabrics very crisp, but just
dangerous for employees. Within a few days, Moda sent out a care email to all
shops, explaining the delays in shipping, the absence of answers on the phone.
Although it is quite unbelievable to see this situation happening in the US, I
know every shop and customer will happily wait a little bit longer. Wishing
everyone in TX all the best!
On the other hand, Hoffman was finally able to ship
1895 Iceberg to us! Yes, we have been
waiting for this color for five months, definitely a Covid-case. Iceberg was
introduced as a new 1895 color in October of 2020 and the fabric sold out
within a few hours. It's one of the lightest colors in a range of
300+ colors, so it is an amazing
background. The fabric is coming from Indonesia, went through many slow downs,
but is now here! Grateful.
* We have more planning to talk about in this newsletter.
The Alchemy book is on its way again
and arriving in the middle of the coming week. In the last newsletter I talked
about this fabulous book and the Fugue quilt I was making. Well, so many
people ordered the kit, that I had to take it off. I'm still making kits as I
speak and my hand started to feel it. It's a tremendous work as each quilt
requires 150 different fabrics, all cut and ready to sew. You can order the
book!
* On
Facebook I showed the progress I am
making in the
Vermont Summer Medallion Quilt by Judy
Newman. This beautiful quilt is currently only offered as a block of the month
in Australia and Europe, but once that is over (Month 6 out of 8 is coming out
soon), the pattern will come to the US as well. Probably August/September of
this year. Webfabrics will get it, because I think that this quilt is
outstanding. A great mix of piecing, applique, English Paper piecing. I
started making it with my youngest daughter Laura in mind, who lived in London
for a while and loves Liberty fabrics, gardening and especially birds. So my
quilt will have
Art Gallery's Chatter fabric as the
background and all light colors of an English Garden. Lots of flowers, a
bunny, a snail in that soft English range of colors, which is certainly not
only pastels. The fabrics themselves are a true mix of Liberty, reproduction,
modern, anything goes as long as it has some nature elements and light colors.
Hundreds of different pieces. As always, it's fun to work with fabrics and "fabric" people!
Warm regards,
Carly email: carly@webfabrics.net
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