Do you remember saying those words when you were a teenager? Well, I am not a teenager any longer but I did find myself saying those words while I was at the Houston Quilt Festival. It’s a good thing that what happens in Houston can be blogged about!
As you know I sell batting to customers and students by the yard from my batting stock. Earlier this fall, I had a client purchase a bolt of batting which is 9 yards to use in three of her quilts. I was thrilled that I had a prepackaged bolt of the batting and I didn’t have to measure it and cut it myself! Just a hint of foreshadowing~~~being lazy always comes back to haunt me!
Anyway, she called and said there was a problem with the batting. Some areas of the scrim didn’t even have the batting material punched onto it. I was mortified. I assured her that I could take care of the problem and asked her to bring me a sample of the problem batting. Then I realized that it would be a little more challenging than I thought, as I had quite a chain of sales to go through. My batting connection gets the batting from a large distributor who in turn gets it from the company. I knew I could track down the parent company at the Houston Quilt show so I planned to take care of it while I was there.
So I pack my very lightweight sample (remember it doesn’t even have the batting on it) and met with the representative at the booth. She was very gracious to me and offered right on the spot to replace the bolt. That was awesome! I could follow through with my promise to my client that I could take care of the problem. So I quickly take my bolt of batting which is close to the size of two sleeping bags stacked on top of each other and leave the booth.
Many of the quilt show attendees praised and coveted my batting, asking me if I got a really good deal to have bought it at the show. What I didn’t know was that they were feeling sorry for me and couldn’t believe I was carrying such a large and bulky item all through the convention center. It didn’t take me long to wise up~~maybe the length of three booths that this was awkward and just maybe there would have been a smarter way to handle this situation. I cheered myself up by praising my wise move to visit the booth at the end of the day so that I didn’t have to carry it all day long.
Once I met back up with my travel mates, their eyes widened to the size of saucers and they asked how in the world I was going to get the batting home to Albuquerque. Oh yeah, this was much bigger than the sample I had left with the representative. All I could answer was, “it seemed like a good idea at the time”
Once back at the hotel I was faced with the problem of packing it. It did fit in my suit case perfectly! However, with the exception of my socks, nothing else did. We finally wrapped it with the free give away bags from the opening night of the show, taped it securely with packing tape and checked it at the airport as my second piece of luggage. Had I been smart, I would have designed a strap or handle for my new bright pink awkward piece of luggage. I must have been quite the sight with it under my arm, dragging my suitcase on wheels, loaded down with heavy carry-on bags.
I was never so happy to complete my promise and deliver the batting to my grateful client who praised me for going the extra mile for her in Houston after hearing the story. I just smiled and responded, “it seemed like a good idea at the time”.