Learn Something New Every Day

Oy Vey!

Learn something new every day?

My brain is exploding. It is good to learn something new. But why is it when life is easy, breezy, nice and comfy, some of us, like me,  insist on adding something new to make it complicated? 

 Something that gives us a headache and agita.

I spent a few hours today at a local quilt shop called Quilter's Corner, located in Chadds Ford, PA.

I was not the teacher.  I was the student of a very patient teacher named Deb.. 

They have a long arm quilting machine for rent.  For those of you non-quilters, it offers a unique way of quilting.  Instead of you moving the quilt and folding and scrunching with a home sewing machine, the machine moves and your quilt is stationary.

I have thought about purchasing one for quite a while. 

 It is quite an investment and the rails are 10-12 feet long.

 Where would you put it and how many quilts would it take to justify the cost?

So this option of being able to rent quilting time is very appealing to me.  Today was my day to take my lesson.  In 2 1/2 hours, I was taught the complicated and time consuming steps to load your quilt, how to quilt it using a pantogram and how to free motion quilt it.

This was the pantogram that I used to stitch across the width of my practice piece. You follow the line with this red laser light and it moves the needle that stitches the quilt. 

It looks much easier than it is!

This is what my practice piece looks like:

and close-up.

Really more square than loopy. Will my quilting ever look loopy? Is there hope for me?

 It's like the the old joke -  How do you get to Carnegie Hall?  Practice, practice, practice.

I won't even share my free motion quilting.  It was pretty sad. 

There are benefits to continually challenging yourself.  It's a good thing.  It leads to personal growth and builds confidence as you surmount the challenges, but there is a fine line between challenge and frustration.

I had a bit of both today! 

Road Trip - Quilt Odyssey

If you are anywhere near Hershey, PA this weekend, you must go to Quilt Odyssey.  You will not be disappointed.  In its 11th year, this quilt show has the most amazing, highest quality quilts for such a small show.  Several of the quilts I have seen either on the cover of a magazine or having garnered the highest honors at much larger quilt shows.  The predominant trend is beautiful applique with unbelievable quilting.  Long arm quilting is the quilting of choice.  And on most of these quilts, there was only one person listed in the write-up. This means that the quilter making the quilt is has also mastered long arm quilting.

To stay with the theme of beautiful applique with amazing long arm quilting, the quilt made by a group of women volunteers (I think it was 35 volunteers) at Longwood Gardens won a well-deserved second place ribbon for their quilt, "Seasons of Pollination".  It was machine quilted by Lisa Calle.  A couple of my friends were involved in this collaborative  project.  The quilting can best be seen in the light colored background.

There are 147 judged quilts in the show.  In addition, there was an extensive display of 4 block quilts from the late 1800's, early 1900's.  These quilts were predominantly applique and red and green. 

This was my first time at this show.  So I was quite surprised when we left the ballroom with the quilts.  The quilts were in one room and then we headed to the other room that was FULL OF VENDORS!  So remember I just counted the quilts listed in the program and they numbered 147.  There were 83 booths in the vendor hall.  It was shopping heaven.  I bought things I didn't even know I needed.  And more.

As my gang left the show, laden with bags and bags of goodies, we congratulated ourselves for doing our patriotic duty and supporting the economy.  Now to get to all those projects.