Our quilt show in general was a great success. More about that later. Now I must brag----I won a blue ribbon, Best Pieced Bed Quilt for my Civil War Love Letters quilt. This is the quilt with 121 foundation pieced blocks based on the book by Rosemary Youngs. Yes, I know you want a picture but that would require updating my web site which hasn't been done in years.
I served as chairman of the raffle basket committee. The raffle baskets made about $2400. Big money makers were anything with fabric and the American Girl Doll. The guild purchased a doll after our request for a donation from the company was denied because our charity was not for a child under 12. Guild members had fun making clothes, bedding, etc. The second highest money maker was the batik basket. Bright's, novelties and 1800's followed in that order. I had pushed for baskets without a quilting theme but they didn't do very well. In the future I would recommend a "Night on the Town" basket with gift certificates to local restaurants and maybe a generic teen basket with their type of gift certificates. Even the baby baskets didn't do very well. The baby girl basket had a size 2 quilted jacket and a crib quilt along with a stuffed animal and bedtime books. The baby boy quilt had a hand knit sweater and a quilted play mat along with the stuffed animal and books. All the baskets looked wonderful thanks to my friend Docia who owns The Quilt Merchant in Winfield, Illinois. Display is one of her gifts. I gathered the stuff, divided it into the themes and she arranged each basket so that everything could be seen. She is amazing.
The weather was our friend. We have had a stormy start to the month. Thursday afternoon set-up was dry, sunny with temperatures in the low
60's but very windy (more about that later). Friday was beautiful which brought the dedicated quilters from longer distances. It was a great day for a drive. Saturday was too rainy to work in the yard but dry enough that you didn't mind going someplace. This was great because if Saturday had been as nice as Friday everyone who worked during the week would have wanted to spend the day in the yard. This would have been our first good Saturday since the snow melted. For those of you who live in no-snow zones there is always a mess to clear once the snow melts. Attendance was up 150 over our last show in 2006.About that windy set-up day. . . .One of my quilts almost blew away as it was being carried inside. A friend was helping me carry my quilts into the show. There were two stacks in the back of my van, the larger two quilts in one stack and the miniatures in a second stack. My friend took the larger quilts then told me to pile the miniatures on top. That was my mistake. When the wind caught the top miniature she didn't have a hand on top of the pile. Each quilt was in a separate clear plastic bag which had been given out at our last guild meeting. I had laughed when they gave me such a large bag for a miniature but wanting to cooperate with the sign-in committee I dutifully put each miniature in a bag. The wind caught the top bag and it just sailed across the parking lot. The miniature quilt came out of the bag with the bag sailing one direction and the quilt another. Of course this miniature was made with 30's feed sack fabrics and solid white. When I reached the miniature it was wedged under the rear wheel of a car. Trying to stay calm, I just shook it out and walked inside. Fortunately there was no waiting line so I calmly checked in all but the dirty quilt and ran home to rinse the mud off. The front is OK. The back has a few shadowy stains left. I will try washing again to see if those marks will come out. The quilt was dry by morning and it hung in the show.
The entire show was a nice break for me. My husband worked from home on Thursday and Friday. Thursday I was only gone from the house for about an hour. Friday I left at 7:00 a.m. and returned at 9:00 p.m. Saturday I was gone from 8:30 to 5:30. A friend stayed with Mom on Friday. My sister came Friday evening so was there with Mom on Saturday. Sunday was Mom's 94th birthday. My older son cooked a great birthday meal for her. My younger son brought his new camera to take special pictures. We had to move a few things to get an uncluttered background for the pictures. I had just dumped everything in the living room when I returned from the show Saturday night. Sorry I don't have a picture to show you but Mom enjoyed her day.
Monday I finished the raffle basket paperwork before I forgot things. Yesterday I cleared the mess from the living room. Today I can get back to work in my studio when Mom is napping. Life is good.
Susan