Mark would name him "Slow Hand"

All I want is a bottomless sack of cash, preferably in a nice fake Prada handbag, and all the time in the world to go to every fabric store in a hundred miles. 

IS THAT SO MUCH TO ASK FOR!?!

Ok, and while we're at it, you'd better throw in a couple of RockStars, a full tank of gas, and a burro to carry my purchases. But then, I guess the burro, (I will name him Mr Sparkles!) will need some sort of burro trailer, because I can't have him running along behind my car, or else he'll need some RockStars of his own. 

So ok, just the cash, the handbag, the TIME, the gas, the burro, and the burro trailer. 

With racing stripes, because being a burro doesn't mean traveling second class. That's all. I am not high maintenance. I am very easy to please. I have simple tastes. Fortunately, I also have some amazing fabric stores nearby. Like the Holy Mary-Mother-of-God-be-all-end-all sweet mecca store, Hart's. This joint is truly one of my happy places. It's huge, and they have EVERYTHING you could want. All kinds of specialty fabrics in addition to tons of quilting fabrics. Oilcloth and linen and silks and BAMBOO. Awesome. Just awesome. If you ever find yourself in Santa Cruz CA, you just must stop in. You must.

And that's just the tip of the immense fabric iceberg.

Mmmm... fabric iceberg... stuffed seals and penguins frolicking... nice.

There's also Judy's, in Scotts Valley, and now also Capitola! Nice big selection, and they also have a home dec store with alllll kinds of trims.

Not to be ignored, there's an amazing shop in Los Gatos, Natural Expressions. 

This place has it all. Fabric, fabric, fabric, lots that you don't see anywhere else, and BEADS! Tons of beads! Two, two, two shops in one! And may I digress a moment to share this song with you? It's my new favorite song. I can't stop singing it. And I can't wait for someone to send me one of those "What's your favorite drink? What's under your bed?" emails, so I can answer the "What's your favorite animal?" question with "Pangolin". Except that they're apparently covered with fingernails, which has the potential to really creep me out, but it hasn't yet, so go Pangolin! 

So, funny story about Natural Expressions. 

Is this the longest post ever? It's getting there.

So my very dear friend told me, "There's a fabric store in Los Gatos!" 

And I politely told her, "No, you dear sweet child. There is no fabric store in Los Gatos. I would know."

But she insisted that there was, and told me the street it was on, which happened to be the one main street,(not a huge town). So ok, I'm game. I'll check it out. So on the way home, I detoured off the freeway and drove through town looking for this mythical shoppe. With a pretentious 'e' on the end. And no, there was no such shop. Or shoppe.

So I went back to work and told her she was a liar, but she insisted that I just hadn't tried hard enough. 

Now, this is the same girl who would get me to go to the administrative area at work with her by telling me that they had kittens. Did they have kittens? Well, ok, they did once, BUT JUST ONCE! 

So this played out day after day; me driving through this town, not finding the store, sorry, shoppe, and her swearing the next morning that it really was there.

Day after day. Over and over. No shoppe.

Until finally one day we went to lunch together and she walked me over to this tiny little hole-in-the-wall that, low and behold... WAS A QUILT STORE! 

Now. In my defense. 

It WAS tiny. And it DID have beads in the window. AND it's named Natural Expressions! What quilt store do you know named Natural Expressions? That ain't a normal fabric-y name! There's another quilt store in San Jose that just has QUILT SHOP (no e) on the roof. It took me months to find out the name of that place is "Prairie Queen Quilts"

They too are a lovely shop. 

If you ever find yourself hankering for some fabric shopping and you're in San Jose, or Santa Cruz, or, aw hell, in California, give me a call and I'll show you all the best spots. And if you know any that I might need to add to my list, please tell me! 

Now, where can I buy a burro?