Quilt Show today

I went to the local quilt show today and I looked at quilts differently than I ever have before. First, I topped at the sales table to check out the fabrics and books/magazines. I was disappointed with the scrap fabrics. Last time I remember them having tables of scrap fabrics for every cheap. This year, they had some fat quarters and some bigger pieces but the prices were nothing to write about. And I don't need more fabric. I checked out the books and picked out 6 I didn't have and 1 I did, but love so much that I can give this one to a friend because the patterns are really easy and the quilts turn out nice. Then, I picked out a bunch of magazines for 50 cents each. I spent $14 so far. I put all of those things in the car and then started the quilt exploration.

This year, I was most interested in the quilting on the quilts, so I examined each quilt carefully, looking for interesting quilting patterns. There were lots of quilts with simple meandering which made me feel pretty good about my own machine quilting. Hey, I could do that! I picked up some good ideas for new things to try. I found that I wasn't impressed with the obvious pantographs. There were several quilts that had the same pantograph used on them and although the quilting was nice and uniform, when you have so many quilts side by side with the same overall design, it loses its specialness. I like quilts that have been freemotion quilted with all of their mistakes and unique drawings. There was one quilt that had animals quilted into it. You couldn't see the animals unless you stared at the quilt for a while because the thread color blended in with the background, but I thought it was really neat that they did that with the quilting.

This quilt won best in show. It is a One Block Wonder or Stack and Whack quilt and there were several of those there. I am going to make one of these sooner or later, because I just bought a book a couple weeks ago and have to justify the purchase. I think what the judges liked about this quilt was the ovement of color across the quilt with the different blocks making a wave of color.

This quilt was the favorite of everyone at the quilt show. Everyone who stopped stood to admire this one for a long time. It has animal prints as the focus and is also a stack and whack quilt. I like the different color background and wonder if that was planned or happy accident :)

This is another of my favorites, with red being my favorite color.

When I look at this quilt all I can think of is the amount of time it must have taken to coplete. I love the stained glass look of it with the black sashing and the wide borders with the patchwork outer border.

I told you there were quite a few of these type of quilts there.

and another one.

This one is my style. Small, simple, but makes a nice statement. I also love the colors in this quilt, very relaxing and restful. I could take a nap right now...

There were quite a few of these quilts too. I think the pattern is called Pick Up Sticks. I think I have this pattern around somewhere. What a great way to use up some scraps.

another great scrap user, this one takes more work, but WOW!

And finally, my all time favorite. Love the bold colors and did I mention, my favorite color is RED?

After walking through the quilt show the first time, I realized I hadn't looked at any of the quilts. I couldn't remember what any of them looked like since I was standing up so close to see the quilting on them all. So, I had to make a second trip around the whole show to actually see the quilts this time. It is strange when you look at quilts from two different perspectives how you get a whole new view of them.

I stopped by and picked up 20 more magazines, mostly Fons and Porter the second time around because for 50 cents each even if there is only one pattern in the whole bunch, I think I did well for myself. I will be keeping busy with ideas for a while now.

And when I got home, the mailman was waiting with a quilting DVD for me! What a happy quilty day!