Charleston Quilt Show

Today I went down to Charleston SC with my good friend and my daughter and we spent the day at the Cobblestone Quilters 2012 quilt show.  

There were a lot of wonderful quilts and a few vendors, which I avoided since I already spent my fabric allowance this month.  There was also a representative from Nolting Long Arm Quilting Machines at the show and I tried out my very first long arm machine.  And boy was it wonderful.  It puts my Bernina stitch regulator to shame.  I want a long arm even more now.   A couple more weeks and my attic rooms will be finished.  Then I can move some kids up there and take one of their rooms for my own sewing room and a place for a long arm.  I better get saving my money, won't be long now!

This quilt was titled "The Place I love" and is a topographical map of the Charleston and surrounding areas.

It came in third in the Art/Innovative category.

I took a lot of pictures at the show today. Lots of inspiration.

This one was titled "Gone With The Wind" and won First in the Art/Innovative category.

 This one took first for "Wall - Mixed Technique"  It had beads all over it, even on the edging of the binding.
It is one of my favorites.

 There were quite a few Bargellos.  My friend and my daughter liked these a lot.

This one was titled "Ice Crystal" and took first for Wall-Pieced.

For some reason I didn't get the whole quilt on this one, just the quilting. Which is lovely.

This one didn't win anything, but I thought it was quite stunning with all the tiny fused applique pieces. The cutting on each one was very precise.

I couldn't resist taking a picture of the cat quilt.

This quilt made good use of huge buttons for fish eyes.

This Kaliedascope quilt took first in the "Duet Wall-Pieced" category.

There were lots of Duet quilts in this show and I like how they give ribbons to both the piecer and the quilter.
In my opinion, the quilting is just as important as the piecing and sometimes it can turn a boring quilt into a stunning one, not that this one is boring.  It is quite spiffy.

There were quite a few 3D elements on this quilt.

This won for "Best of Show-Bed Quilt" and First in the "Duet Bed - Mixed Technique".

It was also the Opportunity quilt for the Cobblestone Quilt guild.

I didn't feel lucky though, so I didn't buy a ticket for a chance to win it.

Close up of some of the machine stitching.

This won "Best of Show-Wall Quilt".  It was all hand appliqued and hand quilted. It was extraordinary.

It also won the ribbon for First in the "Wall-Applique" category.

View of the back of with the hand quilting.

I love the really thin vines done with embroidery on the border.

Some close up shots of the handwork.

While I was zooming on this quilt some guy commented to me, "You are a purist aren't you."  

Not quite sure what he meant by that, but I will take it to mean that I like the traditional quilts best,
which is true.  :)

Best Interpretation of Theme.

Best Hand Quilting.

First in Bed-Applique category.

Best Machine Quilting (Track Machine)

Best Hand Applique

First Place Duet Bed-Applique

Look at those perfect berries!

There were so many beautiful quilts to look at and a lot of them were large ones.

I was really drawn to  the Appliqued quilts.

Particularly the hand turned appliques.

Must be the "purist" in me.  

I voted for this one as my People's Choice.  All the pieces in it are 1/2 an inch big.

It was wonderful to look it.  It was titled "Omigosh!"  It took First in "Bed-Pieced Category".

First place for "Duet Bed - Pieced"

A couple more lovelies.

This one didn't take home a ribbon, but it is another favorite of mine.

The miniatures were wonderfully pieced.

I asked my daughter to pose next to this one so I could have a scale reference.

This quilt wasn't in the judging.  It was on loan from the Charleston Museum.

My daughter vote for this one for her Viewer's choice.

It took the ribbon for Best Use of Color and Second for Landscape/Pictorial.

Seeing all these ribbons makes me want more to go with the two I already have.
This guild allows anyone to enter their show.
Perhaps I will enter some of my quilts next year and try for some more ribbons to hang on my wall.  :)

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Guild BOM for March

The pinwheel block was the March BOM for my guild.

The only rule for this month was that one of the pinwheels had to be green.

I mixed my green with some lemonade fabric.

 Below are all the blocks that were turned in.
I didn't get a shot before they took them all down, but luckily Lorene got a good photo for me.
They didn't draw my name this month, perhaps next month I will come home with all the blocks.  

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7th Finish + More

I finished the Mariners compass last night.  This makes finish #7 for 2012.

 I was going to put it off finishing this indefinitely because I didn't like the top fabric I picked out and I hadn't decided on a way to fix it to my liking.  You can see what it use to look like on the left.  

Tomorrow is guild meeting and they asked everyone who took this class to bring their finished project to the next guild meeting for show and tell. Nothing like a little pressure to get my butt in gear. So I made myself come up with something I liked and appliqued it on, then I put on the binding.  I am liking it a whole lot better now.

I was going to paper peice a smaller star for the center, I even had the papers printed out, but I got lazy was just ready to be done with it, so I cut out a circle instead and sewed it down.

It's looking good now, I actually like it and will put it out on display.

Before I worked on the mariners compass yesterday. I whipped up these two small quilts.  These are the ones I am going to teach the girls with at church tonight.  I have been assigned the task of teaching them how to tie a quilt.  They are small, 24 x 36 ish and I will turn them into the guild for our charity project when we are finished.

This morning I needed some batting for the two tops above, so I basted two bigger quilts knowing I would have enough left over batting from that process for these two smaller quilts.  Funny how one project motivates me to work on another project.  While I was at it I basted my i.s.t.h. quilt too.

With these three basted that makes a total of 6 quilts ready for quilting.  I better get busy... but first a little housework is in order.  Yeah, I did sweep and vacuum the floor this morning so I could baste in a clean room and I got two loads of laundry done on Monday - which isn't much with a house of 6 people - but the rest of the house has been neglected the past couple days.  Though it pains me to step away from the sewing machine when I am in such a good grove, I better get some other stuff done.

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