Quilt Shop: Sewing by the Sea, Trenton, Maine

As I mentioned in a previous post, we happened on a quilt shop in our travels around Bar Harbor. This one happens to be in the little town of Trenton.

We'd driven right past it on the way to get the oil changed in the truck, but it was off the road, and we missed it completely. I found it on my quilt shop app...happily, still working until the next iPhone update.

Outside the front door were some quilts for sale, and there were more inside.

This is how it looks as you walk through the front door. Behind the thread stand there on the right sat the woman shopkeeper working at her sewing machine.

She had a number of little lighthouse quilts hanging on the walls, and there were kits available for most of these.

To my right were a whole bunch of bolts of regional fabric. I perused these and pulled out a bolt, but then set it down again to return to later while I looked through the rest of the store. As it turns out, I never went back for it.

This part of Maine is made up of hundreds...maybe thousands...of small islands, and there were maps printed on fabric of many of the better known areas. This one happens to be of the area surrounding Mount Desert Island, where we are staying.

That was very tempting, but honestly, I wasn't sure what I would do with it.

The shop was absolutely stuffed to the gills with merchandise. There was tons of fabric...probably literally. It was organized clutter...possibly what you might imagine if the store were owned by a hoarder...but it was easy enough to make my way through, and there was certainly a lot to look at.

There was a nice selection of landscape prints, and yes, there were lots of vintage sewing machines sitting around.

These blues caught my eye, and I was reminded that the last time we traveled, I was on the hunt for blues for the scrub jay quilt...finished now, thank goodness. I especially liked that blue polka dot there in the middle.

There were lots of stripes, and I looked these over very carefully. You just never know when a good stripe will jump out at you.

Red Sox fans, anyone?

I'm always interested in a deal...good or bad...these fat quarters were $2.84 each, but if you bought ten, you got the 11th one free.

Her 2016 Christmas fabrics were half off. I'm not in the market for Christmas fabrics, but probably some good deals could be had here.

She had some pretty batiks, and some of these would have made great regional prints as well. I looked these over carefully.

I really like that leaf print in the image below, but I've already selected several leaf prints in my travels, so I passed this one by.

She had some cute patterns. I thought Sue Pritt might be a local artist, but it turns out she's from Michigan.

There were a lot of cute patterns and made-up items in the store that I thought were precious. I just really didn't know what I'd do with them, and so I passed them by. Probably, I'll regret this for the rest of my life.

This lobster placemat, for example.

This whole display contained patterns for bags.

This was mainly a quilt shop containing fabrics of 100% cotton, but there was something here for everyone. The fabrics in the image below were made of heavy canvas, and would have been suitable as upholstery. There were also vinyls and wools.

These Maine panels were very nice, and again, I wasn't sure what I'd do with them.

Don't you love a good fat quarter bundle? They're always so colorful. I find it hard to resist them, but most of the time, I do. 

There wasn't one square inch of open space in this shop. Every wall was covered with something, and the floor left only paths barely wide enough to walk through without stepping on something. They really needed a cat to finish it all off and to add a little danger to the walking paths.

There was a good supply of embroidery floss...always appreciated by this stitcher.

These flat folds were $4.75 per yard.

When I saw these kits, I fell in love with the lobster buoy fabric in the one on the left. I considered buying the kit just to get the fabric.

Then I rotated my body about 45 degrees and found a precut fat quarter. Hooray! And that's what I picked up for my regional print.

Oh, but wait...I really like this lobster one too. I couldn't leave without that.

And in all of that, I walked away with just two fat quarters. Yes, "restraint" is my middle name. Cough.

So, all-in-all, an enjoyable visit. Definitely worth stopping in if you find yourself in the area. When we arrived, we were the only car in the parking lot. During my 20-minute visit, five more cars pulled up, and the parking lot was full when we drove by later in the day. Obviously, it's a popular place.