On the Road Again

Last week I visited two great shops in the Shenandoah Valley area of Virginia.  First stop was Ragtime Fabrics in Downtown Harrisonburg.  Belle has a little bit of everything from quilting goods to leather to all sorts of notions, trims and cool stuff.  The shop is one block off courthouse square and is surrounded by all sorts of other cool shops and restaurants...plus she has parking right beside her building.  Yay!

Usually, our schedules work out so that one of us is not traveling but we had a little overlap this week at the last minute.  And, our usual Shelby-sitters were either out of town or had the flu so Miss Shelby went roadtripping with me which I love.  I would take her all the time but some shops are not dog-friendly and I don't like leaving her in the car that long.  I took a chance with this trip and it worked out fine.  Both shops welcomed Shelby with open arms.  At Ragtime Fabrics, she had her own little fabric nest in one of my suitcases and slept most of the time.

When we left Harrisonburg, it began to snow and I don't do snow.  Don't get me wrong...I LOVE snow...when I'm home with nowhere to go and a pot of chili in the crockpot and lots of sewing to do.  But this southern girl avoids driving in the mess as much as possible.  I know my limitations.  So we hightailed it back to the hotel in Staunton and kept an eye on the situation.  I figured if it amounted to something, we could camp out in the hotel until it was clear.  We had all we needed...a Cracker Barrel across the street, cable in the room, coffee and cookies downstairs and two quilts to bind.  (I was kinda hoping to get snowed in actually...there would be napping  and staring out the window at snow...heaven on earth!)

So it snowed until about  midnight and we walked around in it...which I enjoyed much more than Shelby did.  The next morning, this was the view out my window.

Pretty but not enough to keep me off the road so off to Charlottesville I went.

Les Fabriques is located in Downtown Charlottesville, another very cool place to hang out.  Her shop is in the ground floor of the new parking deck so there's plenty of parking and she'll stamp your ticket so the first two hours of parking is free.  Yay!

This shop is so very chic and caters to all kinds of sewing projects from quilting to garment to home dec.  She also has vintage textiles on consignment and cool beads and jewelry that a local artist makes.  The wood behind her sign is recycled from the goat shed on her 200+ year-old farm.  She's very cool like that.

Shelby was again greeted with open arms and snoozed on the fabric samples as we looked through fabric.  Here she is helping Carla pick out stuff.  We had the best time!

We were supposed to stay one more night and go to another shop on Friday but the weather was iffy and the Friday shop is extremely isolated so we're postponing until the mountains are clear of snow.  So, we headed home sweet home.  One of the hardest parts of this job is leaving my girl behind.  Having her with me this week was the best.  I could get used to it.