Goodbye Blog - Hello social media!

Hi everyone!

Things have really changed since my last post in February.  To be honest, the lack of blog posts has been a casualty of all these changes.

Covid19 closed the shop in March for two and half months.  During those months we operated through closed doors doing online/phone orders, mail outs and curb side pick up.  Understandably my staff was also reduced from 8 to 3 members.  So we worked like crazy to keep things going.  But there were a few things that fell by the wayside.  The blog was one of them.

I did discover that many of my customers followed the shop on Facebook and Instagram.  These are both great forums for letting you know all the happenings at the shop.  And for those of you who are not social media followers, I've been sending out a newsletter from my website (you can sign up for the newsletter right on the website if you're not already receiving it) to keep you informed.

Many designers and bloggers have moved to social media to promote their businesses and so I feel now the time is right to do the same.

This will be my last blog post so do follow the shop on Facebook and Instagram.  Or go to the Periwinkle website: www.periwinkle.biz and sign up to receive our newsletter via email.

February 2020

Half Way Through February!

We have been so lucky so far with having a relatively mild Winter.  Okay that week in January was a little chilly but all in all it's been great!  We are mid-way through February and things here at the shop are ticking right along!

So what's happening here?

We've got some great classes happening:

And:

And:

And:  Baby Pentagon Balls

And last and certainly not least!:  A work shop with Ron Collins.  (btw there's still room for 2 more people!)

As always we've had some amazing fabrics arrive this month:

                          Anna Marie Horner Conservatory

                               Tesselations Twice

And a whole bunch of navy fabrics from Indigo Gatherings and May Morris to augment our ever popular navy fabrics section.

Our Bernina's continue to be popular and we love showing them off.  We will be adding a Bernina Q20 with a Koala Table to our showroom! 
It's a wonderful sit-down longarm.  The throat is 20" to be able to offer you lots of quilting space.  The table opens out to 71" to support you quilt.  And when closed the table is sleek, modern and does not need a lot of room.  Bernina longarms use regular sewing machine needles and if you already have a Bernina you might be able to use some of the same feet!  And best of all the education and servicing for both the Q20 and the Q24 (traditional longarm) happens right here!  No waiting on the phone to have your questions answered.  No ordering of special needles.  No trying to fix your machine yourself.  And 2" more throat space than it's closest sit-down competitor.  It's the ideal machine if you're short on space and don't want to stand for long periods of time. Our Q20 is currently on it's way to the shop.  We'll announce it's arrival with great fanfare.  And then you'll have to come and have a look!

Well that's it for February! It's been a busy, full month so far and we're looking forward to the rest of it!

January 6th, 2020

Happy New Year!!

I hope everyone had a nice holiday season.  Surviving it counts too.  :)

We all had a good few days off and are ready to get 2020 on it's way!

We've been able to finalize our Build a Better Relationship with your Sewing Machine and Easy Precision Piecing workshops with Bernie and Shelley and we've got dates set and are ready for registrations.  You can find the dates on our website: Classes/Calendar and then check through each month. 

Shelley is also adding a couple of new classes:

She's teaching a class called Machine Applique the Apliquick Way.

If you've wanted to learn turned-edge applique now is the time!  The Apliquick tools help you to turn the edges of even the tiniest of shapes easier and faster than basting by hand.  You will learn to work with 2 Apliquick Rods in this class; 1 rod to hold large or tiny pieces and the other for turning the edges.  You will also learn about the Apliquick interfacing and adhesive in this fun class!

Shelley's teaching an introductory class on Hand Piecing:

 Get started on your hand piecing journey!  Working with the honeycomb shape and a square you can create a lovely Harvest Bales wall hanging, tablerunner or placemat.  This skills learned in this class will give you confidence to pursue more challenging quilts like La Passacaglia.

And she's also added a hand piecing class using the La Passacaglia pattern from the book Millefiori (1):

Kick up your hand piecing a notch while creating your very own beautiful La Passacaglia quilt!  You will learn how to select and prepare fabric for stamping and how to fussy cut working with the stamps.  You will also learn how to manage Y seams and seams where several fabrics meet.  You will discover how to press and twist seams so your blocks and rosettes will lie flat and much more!

The classes are up on our website and I've sent out an email to those of you on our Newsletter list.  If you did not get an email in the last day or so then you need to sign up for our newsletter.  How do you get on our Newsletter list?  Well you simply go to our website and find the box on the home page that has the Newsletter sign up.  We will also have some printed copies at the shop if you prefer.

We also have the good fortune of having Ron Collins teaching at Periwinkle.  He's got some great classes coming up on the 17th and 18th.  Pattern Alternations and Designer Techniques for Couture Results.    The descriptions are on our website.  Go to the classes tab, click on calendar, go to the 17th and 18th and click on each class for a full description.  Ron is an amazing resource for those of you that love to sew garments.

On January 13th we'll begin our annual UFO challenge.  You can enter to win a Fat Quarter Bundle with each UFO you finish.  You must bring in a photo of your UFO in it's "before" stage with the finished quilt to enter.   Minimum size to be considered is 20 x 30 inches.  And of course quilts larger than the minimum requirement will be accepted.  You will also have the opportunity to win your purchase back if you purchase your batting and backings at Periwinkle.  We will close the challenge on Valentine's Day, February 14th and do our draw.  So a great opportunity to get some projects done!

As has been our tradition, every January brings our Staycation Beach Party!!

  This year our party will fall on Local Quilt Shop Day which is Saturday, January 25th.  We'll have fabric and product markdowns, goodies and draws for door prizes.  Bernie Tobisch will be at the shop demo-ing the Berninas.  If you've wondered about these great sewing machines now is your chance to find out about how they work and the amazing things you can do with a Bernina.

  This is our opportunity to thumb our noses at winter even if it's been a mild one!  So put us on your calendar and come join us for a fun day.

And that's it for January happenings!  Have a great month and see you soon!

December

December!!

And here we are in December already.  I don't know about you but I'm still wondering what happened to August!  But here we are getting ready for another festive holiday season.

There's been a lot happening around Periwinkle. 

We've celebrated another fabulous quilt show put on by the Saskatoon Quilters Guild.  Periwinkle Quilting was a major show sponsor.  We sponsored the Saturday morning Trunk Show with Terry Rowland.  She gave a fun presentation and her quilts were nothing short of amazing.  Her talent and interpretation was inspiring!

The quilt show was followed by our annual Periwinkle Retreat at Shekinah.  There were 53 of us gathering to sew and share our talents.  The timber frame lodge is the perfect setting and the food as always was plentiful and tasty.  We will do it all again next year!

And finally we have launched our online shop!

This has been in the works since September.  We converted our shop to a Point of Sale system (computerized our inventory) and the system also allows us to have an online shop.  So many of you who can't come to the shop easily can now shop online.  It's something that we've been working toward for the last 3 years.  And it feels so good to have it up and running!  There is some primping that still needs to be done.  And we have many many more items to put in the online shop.  I imagine it will always be a work in progress.  https://www.periwinkle.biz/shop.htm

 So now we find ourselves with Christmas fast approaching.  We've got the decorations up and the music playlist set to Christmas Carols.  With all the holiday hussle and bussle do take some time to stop in.  The beautiful fabric and hanging quilts are sure to help you find some peacefulness during this busy season.
Wishing you all a joyous holiday in what ever way you choose to celebrate.  And our very best wishes for everything that is good in 2020!

October

October!

I think I'll just resign myself to sporadic blog posting while we are implementing our changes here at Periwinkle.

 Our move was the first change.

 Adding the sale of Bernina Sewing Machines was the second change.

 We've added a Point of Sale system so that we can computerize our inventory.  This gives us the ability to track your rewards points so you don't have to carry the punch cards any more; we can keep track of your purchases and help you find a certain type of fabric you may have bought previously or if you need another printed receipt we can do all that for you.  It also makes the day to day functioning of the shop a little easier.

The last big change that will happen in the next few weeks will be our online shop.  Having the new Point of Sale system will enable us to have a big beautiful online shop. 

In turn, this will allow you and other customers from all over the world access to our shop any time.


Funny story: we had a few days where our online shop was accidentally visible.  We're still not sure how this happened and our POS provider isn't sure either, but I digress.  The funny part was that two people managed to place orders in that short period of non-advertised shopping.  So I think this bodes well for when the shop actually launches!




In the meantime we are preparing for the upcoming quilt show in Saskatoon.

We are very pleased to be able to sponsor the Trunk Show.  Terry Rowland is the special guest and will show some of her wonderful quilts and talk about her quilt journey.

Tickets are still available.  Just email: tickets@saskatoonquiltersguild.com.  You can also learn more about Terry Rowland on her Facebook page.

In addition to our Trunk Show sponsorship of the Saskatoon Quilters Guild show we will have a booth set up in the vendor's mall.  The shop itself will be open Thursday evening (Oct 24) until 9pm, Friday (Oct 25) until 7pm and Saturday (Oct 26) until 6pm.   We hope to see you there!

Well I will keep this short and sweet. 

Wishing you all a lovely Thanksgiving long weekend.  There is much to be thankful for in spite of a seemingly crazy world.  As always, thank you to our customers who make Periwinkle a fun and inspiring place to be.

Patti

July!

July 2019

Hi all!

Well I can tell you the one casualty that came about as a result of our move was our poor blog!  So I'm going to rectify this by getting a new post together.

For those of you who are new followers you may not know that we moved our shop to a lovely new space on April 1st of this year.

We moved from our Broadway location to a space that allowed us to have our classroom and bathroom all on the main level.  Our Broadway shop was in an old building with a very narrow and steep staircase which caused accessibility issues for some of our customers.  And I will be honest.  After the 10th time of going up and down the stairs it was difficult to even contemplate one more trip!
So we are very happy and enjoying our new space.  We are located at 270-2600 8th Street East.  We share the mall with Taco Time, Subway and Saboroso.  We are right beside Wine 4 You. 

Here are a few pics from our move:

We spent the month of April celebrating the new digs with a big grand re-opening party and sale.  It was a huge success!  And we had enough 1/2 price bolts to keep the sale going for the whole week following.  It was so much fun!  And we are so thankful to all of our customers who came out to help us celebrate.

So what have we been doing these last few months (besides forgetting about the blog)?

We are now an authorized Bernina sewing machine dealer!  With that has come training and learning about our fabulous Berninas.  If you are a quilter and you've never used a Bernina, you need to stop in and have a play on our demo machines.  Swiss engineered, they are strong and quiet.   You'll fall in love.

We've also had the good fortune of getting to know Bernie Tobisch and Shelley Scott-Tobisch.  They first stopped in at the Broadway shop to say hello and show us their fabulous books.  Shelley demo'd her Easy Precision Piecing products too.  Her method makes piecing blocks (even teeny tiny ones!) accurate and easy.  Such a great opportunity for us to have workshops from both Bernie and Shelley!  You can check our shop and website for their workshops and our schedule of classes this fall which will be available the August long weekend.

Periwinkle is also converting to a computerized system in the store.

As you can imagine there is a lot of product that has to be entered.  And when we process your purchases we will be checking our system to see if you are in it.  We are doing this because our new reward system will be tracked by computer and you won't have to carry a stamp card anymore.  Hooray!  A new system also means that soon we will have an excellent online shop and you'll be able to sign up for classes online too.  Our new home page is live now so feel free to check it out.  www.periwinkle.biz

As always we continue to have the latest fabrics, books and patterns.  We even have some cool new notions we are certain you will use and enjoy.

Our class newsletter for Sept-Dec will be ready the August long weekend so keep watch for it so you can plan to take a class, join in on one of our mini-retreats or take advantage of special workshops being taught by guest instructors.

Until then please keep enjoying our all-too-short summer!  :)

February!

Happy February Everyone!

It's certainly been a more wintery February.  As a matter of fact, I feel like we've gotten all of our winter in the last 3 weeks!   However, winter weather also means more time for sewing and quilting and that's never a bad thing.

This month we've been working hard to get new kits and fabrics to you.

The above photo is the new Autumn Abstract by Jason Yenter for In the Beginning Fabrics.  It just glows!

      Elizabeth's Star 

               Memories Tablerunner in fun coffee inspired fabrics

 

Tic Tacs Quilt with Flower Garden by Primitive Gatherings 

        Curry Quilt using AGF Oh Clementine

        Horizon Quilt using Tilda and blenders    

             

Our latest batik quilt - love how it sparkles!

As you can see we've been taking full advantage of our weather by quilting up a storm!

We also had our UFO Challenge finish up on February 14th.  We had 3 lucky winners.  The winner of our $50 gift certificate was Jean Currie.  Dori Harder and Linda Lewis won their purchases back.  And Myrna Petit was the winner of our Valentine's Day Fat Quarter draw.  A pretty fun day I'd say!

And I'm happy to say that we have finally gotten our order of the crazy popular scissor mugs back in.

These are super fun and make great gifts.  

So on to our super exciting news!  The renovations have begun on our new store!!  The guys are working hard so that we can be in our new space for April 1st.  Our actual move will happen Mar 29th.  I've decided that movers are the way to go.  Far better they do the heavy lifting than me, lol!!

Here are a few pics of the shop in it's "before" stages.  If you follow Periwinkle Quilting on FB and IG you'll be able to see renovation pics there and see how things progress. 

 At the back of the new shop looking towards the front

 At the front of the shop looking towards the back

Back wall torn out.  Framing for new classroom, storage room and office in place.  Old stained and smelly carpet gone!  

There's lots happening so do follow my social media posts to keep up on the changes.

Before I forget, mark your calendar for Saturday April 13th, 2019.  That will be our grand re-opening party.  We'll have some great deals and surprises.  Team Tobisch will be doing Precision Piecing demos, Robin Hufnagel will be teaching her bag classes and we'll have refreshments too!  Again, you'll see updates about all of the festivities on FB and IG too.  

Speaking of Team Tobisch, Shelley and Bernie will be teaching workshops at Periwinkle too.  They will be doing a Sewing Machine Maintenance workshop, April 15 and then a two-day workshop using Shelley's Precision Piecing technique, April 16 and 17.   We'll be posting more information on the workshops online and in-store in the coming days.

Well that's it for now!  

Have a wonderful rest of the month and happy sewing!