Massachusetts Quilt Shop Hop

For the second year, I participated in the Massachusetts Quilt Shop Hop with my friend, Diana, and her sister, Alice.

Last year Diana and Alice did the shop hop over two days and I went along for one of the days.  This year, we did all 8 shops in one day.  I live the furthest away and had to leave my house at 5:30 am!  I drove an hour to Diana's house, then together we drove an hour to Lee, MA where Alice lives.  From there we drove another hour and 15 minutes to the shop that was the furthest east, Appletree Quilts in Auburn, MA.

We found that the shops were much less crowded than they were last year.  From what we could tell, a lot of people did the shop hop on Friday.  I can tell you, I appreciated the less crowded stores on Saturday, but I hope the shops did as well as they did the prior year.

I enjoyed all of the shops and made purchases in 7 of the 8.  I would have made a purchase in all of the stores except as the day wore on, my enthusiasm started to drop off.  I was looking at fabric and enjoying it, but just not able to bring myself to take bolts off the walls to have them cut up.  I think it was mainly being tired that curbed my enthusiasm and not any fault of any of the stores.

I found all the store personnel to be friendly and helpful, but, without a doubt, the staff of Quilts and Treasures in East Longmeadow was the most engaging, friendly, outgoing and helpful.  They really went above and beyond to be helpful and they were so cheerful.  

Before we left, I made a list of fabric and rulers I wanted and/or needed.  

I found two of the three rulers/templates I was looking for - a tumbler template, and a thin 12" long ruler.

I also found some red, off-white, and blue for a future patriotic quilt:

 

I found several soft floral fabrics for a quilt like one I saw in Vermont a few months ago:

 

I found fabric for this year's mystery quilt from Bonnie Hunter:

 

And I found fabric I didn't need at all:

Then there was the free fabric, a star-themed fat quarter from each shop:

 One shop was out of star fabric, so we were able to pick any fat quarter we wanted and I chose a green that will go in the Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt.

Even though I was totally exhausted by the time I got home at 9:30 pm, 16 hours after I left home in the morning, I had a great time.  The scenery was gorgeous, the company was great, and we had fun.