Anatomy of a Quilt Show

It's been almost two weeks now, but I'm finally getting around to posting some photos from the quilt show.  I helped coordinate the set-up again this year, and it's just amazing that what takes an entire day to come together comes down in less than an hour.  It's all worth it, of course, to see the amazing work created by guild members, to earn funds for the guild's programming, and to get to know the other quilters better.  But the amount of work that goes into pulling off this two-day event is unbelievable.

First, a few photos from set-up day:

Our car loaded with some of the racks we used:

The main room at Mount Mary, empty at about 7:15 a.m.:

The stack of racks and poles after we carried them in:

Progress putting up racks and quilts, taken at some point mid-morning:

Hanging curtains in the smaller room (to which we would pin the wall hangings):

Hanging quilts in the hallway:

Having a good time:

After a long day's work, it was great to see the fruits of our efforts in the nearly 350 items hung.  Ben did a great job photographing all of the quilts; if you weren't able to attend, here is a slideshow with images of everything in the show.

More Quilt Show Photos

As promised, I'm blogging today about some of the other fabulous quilts that I saw down in Chicago at the IQF last weekend. There were many more that I would have liked to have photographed, but show rules prohibited photographs in some areas. In particular, I'd loved this set of three quilts that were part of a sense of place-type theme and showed the San Francisco Bay area and what floodplain recovery might look like. They looked like topographical maps and were beautiful.

So are all of these: a veritable feast for the eyes. Enjoy!




left:
Red Spirals
by Connie Watkins
Waco, TX
(close-up of central medallion below)















left:
Fantastic
by Helen Remick
Seattle, WA
(this woman clearly loves black and white and red - there were several of her quilts there and all used this three-color combo)






right:
Ma, How come she gets all the attention?
by Helen Remick
Seattle, WA










left:
Turbulence
by Dianne Firth
Turner Canberra, Australia








right:
The Bungle Bungles
by Beth Miller
Kambah, Australia




left:
detail section of Family, Flower and Music
by Harumi Asada
Chitagun, Japan







right:
Solar Flare
by Rene Jennings
Grover Beach, CA

IQF - Chicago

Yes, I do realize that nearly half the month has gone by and I have yet to post in April. Life's been just a bit too busy for quilting and blogging of late. Boo hoo! I did drop two quilts off with Sandi last week to be quilted, so you can look forward to photos of those before too long.

However, today I thought I'd share photos of some of my favorite quilts from a trip down to IQF Chicago yesterday. Ben was a trooper and agreed to accompany me down for the day. We started off with the vendor area because it was furthest from the door and that area was mobbed when they let the entire crowd in when the doors opened at 10. I'll share photos of my purchases later in the week...

Apparently I must be ready for spring (although the weather clearly wasn't yesterday as we ran into a bit of snow on the drive back up); the vast majority of the quilts I took photos of featured flowers.

Caladium Study #2

B.J. Titus
Coatesville, PA

left:
The Meadow: Camas
by Jean McLaughlin
Silver City, NM

below:
Colorful Caladiums
Sandra Werlich
Carbondale, IL

right:
Spring's Greeting
Frieda Anderson
Elgin, IL

below:
Just Dandy
Ruth Powers
Carbondale, KS

right:
Standing Tall
Sue Holdway-Heys
Ann Arbor, MI

below:
Air: That Which Surrounds and Influences
Patricia Gould
Albuquerque, NM

right:
Evening Star
Maria Elkins
Dayton, OH

below:
Dancing with the Chinook
Linda Beach
Chugiak, AK

right:
Anthurium
Heidi Stegehuis-Ihle
Cadier en Keer
The Netherlands

below:
Teacup
Maria Elkins
Dayton, OH

right:
A Better Home and Garden
Elizabeth Armstrong, quilted by Marcia Bowen
Arlington Heights, IL

below:
Spring Dreaming
Peggy Brown
Nashville, IN

right:
Summer Squash Garden
Judith Trager
Boulder, CO

This post is getting REALLY long and I'm getting tired of mucking around with trying to create a decent layout for these in Blogger, so I'll include more photos in another post soon, once I've gotten my patience back.

Quilt Show Photos

Whether you missed our quilt show last weekend or want to see the quilts that were there again, you're in luck! Ben was a sweetheart and took photos of all 300+ items at the show. I think this took him longer than he expected. He killed the batteries on both of our cameras and had to borrow memory from Lisa, another quilter. But he was going to get through all of those quilts!

And then he spent a good portion of Sunday fixing the shots, uploading them to his Picasa album, adding all of the information from our program book so that people could search by quilt number, category, quilter, or quilt name. I think that probably took longer than he expected, but he was totally into it. I wasn't going to complain or intervene! What a sweet guy - a keeper - as one of the guild members described him!

I've also linked to his album to create the slideshow running at right. Enjoy!

Quilt Show - Recovery

It's hard to believe it, but our quilt show is over already! Lots of work, but a fabulous show, and everyone came together to make it happen. I feel lucky to be a part of a group that makes such fabulous works of art.

I entered nine quilts in the show; some of which I've shared previously on this blog, others of which were made before I began the blog, and one of which I finished up last week and have yet

This first quilt, my French Braid Quilt, is the one that I just finished and have yet to share. I started this quilt in a class at Fabric Fusion last fall. I fell in love with the fabric I selected for the outer border and used it as my starting point for this quilt, based on the Oriental Palms pattern in French Braid Quilts by Jane Hardy Miller. While most of the images in the book featured one-color palettes, I chose to work in both the blue and green ranges because I didn't want another blue-only quilt. The quilt finished at 68x96 and was quilted by Sandi Goulet.

I bought the fabrics to make this heart bargello for Ben just before our fifth anniversary when I was in New Hampshire for my fifth college reunion and had the opportunity to go shopping at Keepsake Quilting. Unfortunately, I was a bit slow in getting around to it and finished it about two years later. While the colors aren't exactly masculine, Ben does love the quilt, which is based on the book Bargello Hearts by Nancy Podolsky. The quilt is 76x95 and I had it quilted at Patched Works.

I finished this Lone Star quilt shortly after our last quilt show, and just before the Cutting Table quilt shop closed. I was looking for a challenge and the Lone Star is a good one with all of those inset seams and this arrangement also uses some curved piecing blocks. Alicia Avila taught the class; the central portion of the quilt is based on the book Lone Star Quilts and Beyond by Jan Krentz, but I modified and enlarged a paper piecing pattern from Quilter’s Newsletter for the outermost corners. Juli Meeks did an awesome job custom quilting this piece for me (final size is 47" square). I had it professionally appraised at the quilt show and was surprised at the value placed on it.

When 3 Sisters first came out with this Vienna Nights line and pattern, I fell in love with it. The red in this quilt is one of my favorite colors ever and I’ve used the colors in this quilt to pull together other items for our living room. I was a bit annoyed with the kit for this quilt: I didn't have enough of some of the fabrics in the borders, but had WAY more than necessary of the interior fabrics. To date, I've made three table runners from the leftovers and still have a fair amount of fabric remaining. The quilt finished at 76x92 and was machine quilted by Julie Meeks.

This Twisted Sisters quilt was begun in a guild-sponsored workshop with Ami Simms two years ago. Up until the day before the workshop, I was undecided as to the colors to use; in the end, I went into my closet, touched fabric until something really spoke to me. In this case, it was the luscious sea greens and blues. The finished quilt is 56x75 and was quilted by Patched Works.

I just loved this sweet pattern (Taffy Treats by Bunny Hill Designs), especially because it gave me the opportunity to learn how to create a scalloped border and use bias binding. Once I saw the pattern, I knew I had to make it in these sweet April Cornell fabrics. Julie Meeks quilted this one, with a finished size of 56x65.

I took a Drunkard’s Path class at the Cutting Table just before they closed to practice my curved piecing and to spend more fun time with Alicia, the instructor. For the central portion of the quilt I used only fabrics that I had received in the guild’s batik and dots exchanges earlier in the year. I machined quilted this 37" square project myself, using some yummy King Tut variegated thread by Superior Threads.

The other quilts I entered were the Country Stars and Civil War reproduction quilts I wrote about earlier this year. No ribbons for any of my quilts this year, but that's okay. I'm inspired to begin work on a whole bunch of stuff and to finish up some other projects that I just knew wouldn't make it in time for the show.