The Quilter on Osage Hill

We had the pleasure of visiting friends in Rapid City, South Dakota recently. My friend Judi took me on a shop hop in the area. Amazingly there are 12 quilt shops within a hour of Rapid City. I was impressed with how different each of the shops were; it was rare to see the same fabric lines in any 2 shops. There were a lot of lines that I hadn’t seen at home which made visiting these shops a lot of fun. Many of the shops had a lot of flannel, wool and fleece. Lastly, I was surprised to find very little of the designers we seem to see in most quilt shops at home; most notably Kaffe Fassett and Amy Butler.

Hill City Mercantile, Hill City SD

This newly opened quilt shop in beautiful Hill City, South Dakota was in a unique building recently remodeled with a tin ceiling, brick walls, antique fans and beautiful woodwork. They also had a nice display of artwork. They had a great selection of fabrics with lots of Moda, Kaufman batik, Civil War Reproduction, 30s Reproduction and flannel fabrics. They also had a great selection of wide back fabrics.

The Quilt Shop, Custer, SD

Cute little shop with great selection of Civil War fabrics, white tone on tone fabrics, batiks and novelty fabrics. They had a nice selection of well priced Kona Cottons too.

I purchased 2 coordinating batiks and some Kona Cottons.

Heartsong Quilts in Hot Springs, SD

Great shop well known for their amazing collection of Aboriginal fabrics. Lots of great looking quilts on the wall. Many kits.

I bought a kit for one of their Aboriginal quilts called CaddyWampus Down Under .

Looks like a lot of fun and a bit wonky! I talked my Mom into getting one too. That will be our next project once we finish up our bags we started in Florida.

Here is a sampling of the fabrics in the kit:

Nuts and Bolts Fabrics, Edgemont, SD

Nice shop with large selection of fabrics. Many new lines I had never seen. Large selection of sale fabric too. Lots of notions.

There were several lines I hadn’t seen that I was tempted to buy. In the end, I bought 2 fat quarter bundles. They were different prints that “read as solids”. One set is yellows, the other blues. There were 12 fat quarters in each pack. I thought getting 2 – 12 packs for $23.99 was a great deal. The “reads as solids” fabrics are my favorite type of fabric to buy these days. They are always so versatile. My friend Joni taught me the value of having lots of these kinds of fabrics in your stash. I don’t think you could ever have too many.

The Bakery Fabrics, Belle Fourche, SD

The Bakery Fabrics in Belle Fourche, SD was housed in the old Tri City bread company building. They did a great job of creating displays while maintaining the character of the old bread company.

Charming, but large shop with a great selection of fabrics. They had 2 shelves of Kaffe fabrics. They had a large sale section with older lines from many familiar designers we see a lot at home like Kaffe, Amy Butler, Joel Dewberry, Heather Bailey, etc…

I purchased several vintage looking fabrics including a nice floral print with a black background that was on sale for $6/yard.

Fabric Junction, Sturgis, SD

Nice shop with a good selection of batiks, Civil War, Thimbleberry, black and white and novelty fabrics. And, yes, they had the famous Sturgis flame fabric here. They also had a great selection of wide back fabrics: batiks, black and whites and Civil War fabrics.

For those of you who know my mother, you know that she likes to make something for everyone each Christmas. She has been struggling to find something for this year and I found and purchased just the thing from this shop. I can’t give away the secret so no picture of what I bought for now.

Dakota Quilt Company, Spearfish, SD 

This quilt shop had a great selection of batik, Civil war, novelty and wool fabrics. They had a lot of quilts hanging up and many kits for sale.

I purchased a couple batik fat quarters and a pack of Christmas fabrics remnant on sale. Here are the fabrics:

Quilt Connection Etc., Rapid City, SD

Great quilt shop with an amazing selection of fabrics. One half of the shop was batiks and the other half prints. Lots of great patterns. Large selection of wide back fabrics. In the end this was my favorite shop. There were hardly any fabrics in this shop that I had seen before (either at home or in South Dakota) making it a tough choice on what to buy. In the end I purchased a kit called The Five Yard Quilt featuring a fabric line called simple marks. I also bought a some fat quarters of a couple fabric lines I hadn’t seen before.

Although I spent too much money on fabrics I had a great time on our little shop hop in South Dakota. The other great part was seeing the beautiful country side surrounding Rapid City. Special thanks to Judy for being such a great hostess and taking me to see all the great shops!

 Sew long from the Quilter on Osage Hill!