Quilt Shop Tour: The Little Red Hen

Today I’m continuing on the shop hop Kelli and I took when we went to the Elton John concert.  Today’s stop, The Little Red Hen in Muscatine, Iowa.

Driving to the shop was interesting.  A couple times I asked Kelli if she was sure if she had the GPS programmed correctly.  She assured me that she thought she did.  We kept driving into what seemed a more and more residential area.  Then it stopped and brought us here.  Hmm.  We didn’t really see a sign.  Were we in the right place?  We got out and ventured closer.  The house had a sign on the front door that indicated to use the back door.  We still weren’t sure we were in the right place.

Hesitantly we opened the door and were VERY warmly greeted by the person at the counter….we were even greeted by name.  The person said, “WOW, look.  It’s Jo and Kelli!”  I looked at Kelli and Kelli looked at me.  The lady looked a big familiar and they she told us that she had seen us at the truck show we did in Muscatine everal years ago.

We chatted a bit and then started looking…WOW.  They have a WIDE variety of crafts.  Here is the punch needle section.

They have all sorts of different threads.

The cabinet they store the thread in are awesome.

There is a “barn” attached to the house with a gift shop/floral shop in between.

We turned the corner and saw this…AMAZING!

The room was huge.  Kelli and started to make our way around.  Immediately Kelli and I both LOVED this Thanksgiving Alphabet!

Notice the #15 on the piece?

Well if you look below, there are kits and they are labeled.  It was easy to grab the kit we needed.  This is the nicest, well thought out system that we’ve ever seen in a quilt shop!!

The Little Red Hen publishes their own books.  Kelli and I were in love with the projects in this book.  There are 14 projects all fall themed.  They range from quilts to wool mats, to punch needle to the monster bags behind Kelli.  Everything you see in the photo is in the book.  There are 14 projects in all.

The displays were cute and easy to access.

They have also published other books.  This cute Laundry Room project was in the summer book….

as were the other projects in the above and below photos.

They die their own wool here.  How fun!  

Kelli made a beeline to the quilt on the wall in the photo below.  She thought it was wool…but those cute little center blocks are cheater cloth that was fussy cut.  It fooled me too.  Would you have been fooled?

There were LOTS of samples in the store and I love samples.

I loved the muted colors in the quilt below.

Here is another book they self published.  This one is all flags and Fourth of July.  All the things shown are in one book.  How cool is that?

Check out the cute Halloween towels.

They had a big display of pincushions.  I wish I could have bought patterns for them all!!

For the pet lovers, they had these….

Everywhere we turned there were things we liked.

The one below was precious.

Kelli and I covered the big barn room so then we went back to the house…yep.  There was more to see.  Here’s the baby section.

…and the section for embroidered towels.

I wasn’t teasing when I said the house was full too….

There was a Christmas room….

We really liked the displays.

The house part was more crowded but not bad.  There was so much to look at.

My apologies.  The lighting wasn’t as good in the house part of the shop.  Adequate for shopping but not photo taking.

Kelli found the cutest dachshund fabric.

I had to snap a photo of the sign….”Anger is only one letter short of Danger”  How true!!

In the front porch of the house was the batik section….it was slim pickings but that’s okay.  All the other areas of the store were plentiful.  It’s actually a good thing as there were no batiks for me want to buy…that means I could spend my saved money on other goodies.  I’ll tell you what we got tomorrow in my stash report.

Kelli and I loved these little towels with just a little embellishment.  Does anyone know how they would launder?  I was tempted to get the pattern but didn’t as that make me nervous.

We loved these primitive pincushions….I always see tatting pieces and the like at thrift stores.  What a great way to use them.  We were told the pattern was a Cheri Payne pattern but no longer is available.  Anyone know where we could find one??

We were in this shop WAY longer than we ever intended.  It was so fun though….so fun.  We were inspired and excited about quilting and handwork as we left.  In fact there was a clothing store we had intended on stopping at on our way home and Kelli said, “I don’t care about clothes mom.  I just want to make all of the things!!”  That’s my girl!!  I felt the same way.  What fun and inspiration!

If you want to see even more about the shop check out their website.  They have also put together a video showing off the store.  You can find that here on Youtube.

I am doing to do a 1-5 rating system….five being the best-I’m going to be stingy with my fives.  This is just my impression on the day I visited and took pictures.
Warm and Friendly:  5++
Selection of Goods:  5 Although the batik section was small, I can’t discount the wide variety.
Neat and Organized:  5
Parking:  4
Cozy and Cute: 5
Outside Appeal: 2

We will make a special trip to come back someday.  What a great shop.  Since Country Threads closed, I’ve not had a favorite shop.  I think this one just might be the favorite.

As will all quilt shop tours, if there is something that you see that you like or want to order, please don’t contact me.  I can’t help you.  Contact the shop.  This is the link.