Beehive Shop Hop: My Heritage Fabrics

Welcome to My Heritage Fabrics. My name is Marlene Lewellyn and I have been in business since 2008. Unlike other shop owners who always dreamed of owning a fabric store, I didn’t! Oh, I have always sewn, made the majority of my children’s clothes and some of my husband’s, and have always loved fabrics. I grew up playing under Grandma’s quilts, as she always had one on the frames in her small, two-bedroom house. So, I had a great appreciation and love for her handmade beauties. At the time of her passing she was working on her 50^th quilt for grandchildren—all hand quilted. She worked the farm, took care of her 11 children, quilted to make money and raised chickens to sell the eggs. She was awesome.

I learned to hand quilt from her, my cousins and my mother, but had never pieced a quilt. While my husband attended class at the War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, I took a class and made my first pieced quilt. I fell in love with quilting, the whole ball of wax—piecing, hand quilting, etc. Quilting was one thing I could do as we traveled around with the Army.

From 1997 to 2008 I was a Realtor. First in Tennessee, then here in Ogden. When it wasn’t fun any more I had to decide what to do since I was divorced and needed a job. I toyed with opening a store after the JoAnn’s in the north part of Ogden closed. The more I thought about it, the more appealing it became. So, in September of 2008 My Heritage Fabrics opened its doors. It has been such a great experience. I love my customers.

In September of 2011 we expanded, moving to our current location inside Rainbow Gardens. We are so lucky to be here! You can come and eat in the Greenery, browse Rainbow Gardens or Planet Rainbow, and then spend some quality time here with us.

I have a great staff of knowledgeable people who are friendly, know quilting and can help with many things. They are: Barbara Cook, Deanna Treadway, Evelyn Smullin and occasionally my sister LaWane Boltz and my daughter, Brooke Grama. We offer great customer service. We will look up items on the computer, find patterns and help you in any way we can. We want My Heritage Fabrics to be a comfortable and fun experience when you are buying fabric. It is easy because of you, our customers. Every day I am amazed, grateful and overwhelmed with the generosity of quilters and sewers.

Every two months we highlight one customer and her quilts in a trunk show in our classroom. During February and March we had the quilts of Dorene Parker. What an inspiration! Many ooohs and aaahs! April and May the quilts have been made by Karen Phillips. Again, great success with a totally different style of quilts. June and July we will show quilts made by Verla Hasler. Everyone can get inspiration from the different styles and techniques. I hope you can all come and see these quilts during the year. What a fun thing this has been for us.

We look forward to having you visit during our “Summer Buzz.” Here at My Heritage Fabrics we’ll be having a Hawaiian-good time! I can’t wait to see all the quilt blocks that will be given out by the different stores. I hope you are excited, too.