Jaftex 85th Anniversary Blog Hop Winners Announced

Heather Mulder Peterson

The 85^th Anniversary Blog Hop has come to a close and was a huge success! The projects shared were beyond beautiful. It was such an interesting experiment to see how a simple bundle of fabric could turn into so many unique and impressive pieces. We hope the blog hop left you feeling inspired and eager to create something new with fabric from the Jaftex Family of Companies.

We can’t forget about the massive giveaway that was also part of the blog hop! Before we share the winners, here’s a reminder of everything that is up for grabs.

Janet Nesbitt

1st place: Winner receives a beautiful Janome S5, valued at $1500 AND 20 fat quarter bundles! Their favorite local quilt shop receives 30 bolts of fabric.

2nd place: The winner receives an Aurifil thread box valued at $300 AND 15 fat quarter bundles. Their favorite local quilt shop receives 15 bolts of fabric.

3rd place: The winner receives a Schmetz needle anniversary tin filled with needles valued at $75 and thread AND 6 fat quarter bundles. Their favorite local quilt shop receives 6 bolts of fabric.

How were the winners selected? The nifty Gleam widget that listed and verified your entries randomly selected 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd place winners. We then verified all the winners’ entries to confirm that they were in fact authentic. I then called the winners to share the good news and we conference called in the favorite quilt shop too.  It felt really good to hear how excited all the winners were.

Without further ado, here are the winners followed by a little bit about each of them!

Jill Finley

1^st Place: Barbara Sokol and her favorite local quilt shop, Annie’s Pretty Pieces in Hartwell, Georgia.

Here’s what Barbara had to say about her win, the blog hop and the quilting community:

"First, you and Jaftex have made my day! My week!  My month!  Oh, heck, My Year!!   A new Janome and lots of fabric -- woo hoo!!  I am beyond excited.

This all started for me because I have been a fan of Mark Lipinski since I read the first issue of Quilter's Home, and now, I follow his blog.  He announced the 85th Anniversary Blog Hop in such a fun way with a historical look back to 85 years ago complete with pictures, and I was 'all in'.  (In fact, I think your picture is there in that blog post -- I went back and looked at it just before writing this to you). It was a lot of fun to discover the blogs of other quilters as, for each day, a new one was featured. There were beautiful fabrics to drool over along with tutorials, fun projects to consider, creative ideas to read about, new books to contemplate, and tons of inspiration.  It was something I enjoyed all month, and will for lots of time to come as these prolific writers so generously share with the quilting community.  Some of them write so well that you just feel like they are sitting there with you chatting over coffee. Inside many of the blogs, are pictures credited to other quilters with more new ideas, and before I knew it, I had navigated a sweet spider's web of new sites. (My inbox is full of new blog entries, and it's lots of fun to see what each new day brings.)  It also let me discover new internet shops each with their own personality and focus.  I'm drawn to bright colors and crazy prints, but also love the soft and cozy pastels, and the internet connection became a daily, no-calorie, feast!!  As a retired IT professional, I'm still amazed at how the computer has made the whole world smaller and so easily accessed -- with just a few clicks, I can be anywhere.  It's really important to me because I live in a small town and my favorite quilt shop is 25 miles away in another state!

Sincere and heartfelt thanks to you and everyone at Jaftex who made this possible, and all of the wonderful bloggers who took the time to participate!  Over the next few days, I'll be making the 'comment' rounds to thank each and every one of them."

Barbara’s favorite quilt shop 25 miles away in another state is the lovely shop Annie’s Pretty Pieces. You can visit the shop's website here: http://www.anniesprettypieces.com/

Barbara Jones

2^nd Place: Pat DeVore and her favorite local quilt shop, Abigayle’s Quiltery in Berea, Ohio.

Share in Pat's excitement:

"I would like to express my surprise and a big thank you to Jaftex for sponsoring the fun blog hop. I learned about the Blog Hop from a sewing group I belong to, and then I saw the link to it on the Aurifil FB page.  I immediately started following the blog posts and learned so much as I visited the various pages.  I am interested in developing better quilting skills and I received so much inspiration to attempt to create beautiful quilts like the ones featured in the various blogs. 

I had a message from you on Friday telling me I was a winner, and it was hard waiting over the weekend to find out what I had won!  Even my husband was excited for me and it was fun to share my excitement with him.  I was stunned to find out I was a prize winner--I always enter contests and never win anything!  This prize is perfect for me.

I have sewn since I was a teenager many many years ago!  I have sewn clothing, home dec items, bags and quilts.  I am in awe of beautifully designed and executed quilts and really appreciate all the work that goes into them.  I hope to be able to create something equally beautiful!

Once again, a big thank you for sponsoring the Blog Hop and helping me to learn so much.  And a huge thank you for choosing my entry as a winner, it is such fun to be part of this celebration!

Pat's favorite quilt shop is Abigayle's Quiltery. You can visit her favorite local quilt shop's website here: http://www.abigayles.com/

3^rd. Place: Cathie Scanlon and her local quilt shop, Karen’s Quilt Shop in Seattle, Washington.

Here's a little bit about Cathie and her experience in quilting:

"I have been sewing since I was a child but only became serious about quilting 3 years ago.  I am retired and a SoCal transplant living in the Pacific Northwest.  I love learning about quilting and am amazed at how much there is to learn even for someone who has been sewing for as long as I have.

I am very excited to have won a prize in the contest and can't wait till it is announced and I can share with my family and friends!"

Cathie's favorite local quilt shop is Karen's Quilt Shop. You can visit her favorite local quilt shop's website here: http://karens-quilt-shop.com/

Closing Comments From Me, Scott Fortunoff.

Wow!  Awesome!  Thank you!  Fun!  Interesting!  Creative!  Cool!  These are just some of the words that come to my mind when I reflect back on the month long blog hop.  WOW to the bloggers for their unbelievable and creative projects.  Awesome job writing such thoughtful blogs.  Thank you for taking time out of your busy lives to participate in the blog hop.  There is no doubt in my mind that you could have been doing a lot of other things with your free time.  Thank you to all the fans for your great interest and participation in this event.  Thank you for spreading the word and the fabric love.  Thank you to everyone in the Jaftex organization that help to plan this event.  I hope everyone had a lot of fun, I know I did.  It is so interesting to see how creative our bloggers are and were.  Just when I thought I saw it all, someone comes up with an amazingly creative new technique or just completely takes quilting to an entirely new level.  That is why I love this industry.  Last, but not least, this event was cool and so are all of you.  On behalf of everyone in the Fortunoff family, past and present, thank you for celebrating our 85 years in the fabric business.  We look forward to the next big anniversaries and hope to welcome in the 5th generation.  Thank you, thank you and thank you again!  We love you all!

Sincerely,
Scott Fortunoff