Well I'm back and did I have fun!!!!!

I flew to Salt Lake City where Cathy K. hopped on the plane and we flew together to LA to visit Susie Wolfe for  for 5 days...  Susie had a packed itinerary for every single day starting with the LA garment district which was overwhelming to say the least...

We barely covered 2 square blocks in several hours.. I brought a big pull cart and we filled it.  This was a fantastic bead store with lots of vintage beads and trims... I did find velvet ribbon in many colors..  I love velvet ribbons. I found LOTS of gold which I will show in a later post.  There wasn't often a place to sit but when there was I rested... Let me tell you Cathy K. is a power shopper extraordinaire..

Day two was the Rose Bowl Flea Market which was immense...  Luckily Susie goes often enough she knew where all the good booths were.  This one had only vintage linens... That entire pile on the tarp and the table behind were only a small portion... plus boxes and boxes besides...incredible stuff.  One treasure especially which I will show in a later post. There were other trim and fabric vendors at this flea market and we finished it off with a fantastic vendor specializing in only laces.... It just couldn't get any better than this...

But it did.... My favorite day was another flea market in San Fernando.  The pile is about 24" deep and is ALL lace trim and motifs for $1 each... You'll notice Cathy's arms are piled full.

There were numerous  tents of fancy fabrics which ranged $1 to $5 a yard.  Again Susie goes here often and was able to zip us around to all the best vendors.. There was not a wasted minute anywhere.

Another day we went to a warehouse discount fabric store like none I'd ever seen.  This is just one corner.  I did find coordinating fabric  for my Hoffman challenge project here... Again Cathy was the super shopper of the day with a big bargain here...  She has the EYE....  And I found a spot to rest a minute.

Another day included the largest thread store I've ever seen and it was where I spent the most money but will enjoy it all....  This was just one corner of two rooms. Here I found some rainbow thread and some rainbow silk ribbon for my CQJP 2012.

And Susie found lots of pink thread for her CQJP 2012.

Every day's outing ended with a "show and tell" of our treasures and sitting around stitching together until bed time.  Susie had a closet filled with thrift store  fancy garments and one evening Cathy and I went through them, each cutting off a sleeve.

Susie had put so much thought into this visit and made every minute count...  I've failed to even mention all the thrift store stops also....  Without her planning and organizing this all would have been impossible... Susie even got on Google to find the most convenient Starbucks for me.... how cool is that.  She also managed to have perfect weather...  It was about 75 degrees and sunny EVERY day. I had such a grand time and came home with so many memories of time spent with two dear friends and we did it all in just five days.