Me and Karen McTavish
8:30 am - 10:30 am - Thursday started with another class with Karen McTavish. Victorian Feathers!! She worked with a white board and a longarm. She had a camerman there so what she drew or quilted was shown on a screen. I like to think I'm proficient in quilting feathers and it was fun to see another way to make them unique. It was a packed 2 hours with quilting and drawing! As Karen would draw, so would we, and then she would quilt the feathers out. I have pages of drawings to continue practicing on. Soon I will be making time on the longarm to play with these fun feathers!
11-12:30 - Luncheon and fashion show. The theme for MQS this year was South Of The Border. So lunch was taco salads. Dawn Cavanaugh was the MC for the fashion show and it was a fun event. Kim, Betty and I met up for the luncheon. Then it was off to the next class...
Me and Sue Patton
1 pm - 3 pm - Sue Patton http://www.canadianquilterschoice.com/ Edge to Edge quilting designs. Again it was a fast paced 2 hours. Two women left after 40 minutes and that is a shame. Granted, not everything Sue does is for everyone, but the second hour she also discussed how to keep quilts square on the frame. For a longarmer, that is very important!! Sue's free motion technique is one I will have to practice more on fabric than paper to get then swing of it. She was also a fun teacher! A voice that carries throughout the room without the need of a microphone. She says she is banned from using them. LOL She also demonstrate on a white board as we followed along with our handouts and drew along with her.
Since we had a little time, we went in search of the mall we didn't find on Tuesday. We managed to go to Penney's and that was all. LOL But, Kim, Betty and I managed to find a few things there we couldn't live without. Then we saw a Burger King and stopped for burgers. Nothing fancy but it worked for us. :-)
Now it was time for the evenings event, the Audacious Quilt Auction. The money from this auction is where the grant money comes from. IMQA offers grants to those that apply and are awarded one. When one applies for a grant, they agree to make a quilt for this auction, either the year they receive it or the following year. I am a lucky recipient of a grant this year and I wanted to make something that would hopefully garnish a fair amount of money to help this very worthwhile program.
Kool Kaleidoscope front
I designed this Kool Kaleidoscope from the directions from Ricky Tims Kool Kaleidoscope DVD. http://www.rickytims.com/shop/product/kool-kaleidoscope-dvd/ It is all made in batiks except for the blue background. I hadn't planned on doing much for custom quilting on it but when I got started on it, I knew it needed to have special quilting done to it.
Kool Kaleidoscope back
The back turned out just about as pretty as the front did! It was very difficult for me to give this away, but I made it for the auction and that is where it went. I sat with Karen McTavish during the auction, but she has to leave mid way through. I asked if she would mind looking at my quilt and give me her opinion on it sometime. She left and then came right back. She had taken photos of the quilt and had a couple questions for me. One was, why didn't I stitch in the ditch on one section. I told her I didn't now I was supposed to. Then she asked me why I was giving it away. I told her about the grant I received. She told me this was a show piece and couldn't understand why I was giving it away. Ok, so these few minutes with Karen validate (to me) that my quilting is good! I am good at what I do! She could not have been more gracious to me then she was at that moment. I mean, honestly, Karen critiqued my quilt!! At that moment, I was so pleased to have made this quilt for the auction. After she left, a young lady I had met wanted to see the quilt, so we went over to see it. I bought my Nolting http://www.nolting.com/ from the company and had been to their factory 6 years ago and met the owner, Dan, at that time. The men of MQS (the vendors) were all involved in the auction in one way or another, mostly holding a quilt as it was being auctioned. I saw that Dan had mine and when I told him it was mine, he told me he knew that when he saw the label and that is why he was going to carry mine. I was so pleased with that! The quilt sold for $400 and I was brought to tears with it. I don't know who bought the quilt. I hope they enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it.
The end of the 3rd day was amazing!! I was on a high that I can't put into words. And there was one more day to go!! Until tomorrow, Happy Quilting.
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