Sew Batik Challenge at NQA

We traveled to the Midwest and East this summer for some quilt shows. One of the shows we did was NQA (National Quilting Association) in Columbus, OH.Our good friends Bruce and Diane from Sew Batik sponsored a challenge at this show. The show had a patriotic theme so that was the theme for the challenge quilts. I have been to a lot of shows with a lot of challenge quilts. These were among the best quilts I have ever seen at a challenge. I want to share them with you here.

Look at all of those star points in the quilt on the top right. 

The quilting on the award winning quilt is amazing. You can see the texture of the extremely close lines of quilting. All of the parts of the fighter jet really stand out because of the way it is quilted.

I like the braided border in the Statue of Liberty quilt. The wine glass has an organza overlay to make it more realistic.

Two of the quilts in this grouping won ribbons. The flag has charms in the center of all of those tiny red squares and there are a total of 50 stars in the blue squares. Here's a close up of that quilt.

Stars and Sunbonnet Sue - What could be more Americana than that?

I love, love, love this mini Storm at Sea. What a great way to take a traditional block and change it up.

Here are a couple very non-traditional entries. The one with the faces probably has the most of the red challenge fabric that isn't a solid piece of any other quilt in the exhibit.

The top right hand quilt is a fun way to celebrate America and stitching, sewing and quilting. There's a pair of scissors, a pincushion and a quilt block in the design.

Quilts of Valor is such a worthwhile cause. It is great to see it represented in the Challenge Quilts.

This quilt incorporated crochet which I thought was very interesting so I wanted to share that detail here.

Isn't that Route 66 quilt fun? We drove along part of that road in our travels this summer. We had some free time one day and drove along a stretch of it in Albuquerque.

This is getting to be a very long post and this is only half of the quilts. I will do a second one with the rest of them soon.

Happy Quilting,

Carol

Minnesota Quilters Quilt Show

If you saw my last Blog Post you know that we had a LOT of unpacking to do. We did manage to get everything in our booth. Here's a picture of the booth all set up.

At one point I had to take a break from the chaos of set up so I took a power walk through the quilts on display in the aisles right near our booth. Unfortunately that is all I was able to see of the quilts during the show but there were some gorgeous quilts on display. There were some that I have seen several times. This one really caught my eye though.

Look at all of the Half Square Triangles and points.

When you see the next photo you'll be even more impressed with this piece.

I'm not touching it

Don't worry. I'm not touching the quilt. I had to put my hand by the quilt so you could get a feel for how small it is. Turns out it won First Place in the Miniature Category. Those are a lot of triangles and points in a full size quilt. I can't imagine doing it on such a small scale! Very impressive!

Just had to share with you.

Happy Quilting,

Carol

Heading to the Midwest

We left on Saturday for the Minnesota Quilters Quilt Show and Conference. This is our first of three shows in the Midwest. One of the biggest challenges in getting ready for the trip was getting the truck packed for these shows. We had to order extra product since some of our vendors don't drop ship.

Fortunately my husband, Alan, is really good at packing. We were recently at a show and when another vendor drove by our packed truck he asked if we still had room for a can of sardines. This trip we have even more in the truck.

This is what the back part of the truck looked like the day before we left.

Those two orange straps are what holds our hand truck on the back of the truck. There might be a tiny bit of room above our poles on the right side but if there is it isn't much.

You can see our two DMC thread chests.They sit on top of the boards that give us some elevation in the back of the booth. Underneath that is all of our grid wall. Anything that is skinny enough to fit gets stuck in the little "dead space" created by the wheel well.

Crates are stacked on top of each other and small boxes that hold patterns are piled on top of them. You can see our tables and the racks that sit on the tables with our tea towel models on them.

Tuesday is set up day for the show. We will unload everything and get all of this in our 10' x 20' booth. I did a Blog Post about that process awhile back. That was before we added Bird Brain Designs and all the RedWork Accessories. But you'll get an idea of what is ahead of us tomorrow.

Happy Quilting and Stitching,

Carol