AQS Show success and #35

Well the AQS Show last week was a success!  I learned a lot from my classes from Sue Patten and looked at a ton of awesome and inspiring quilts.  I tried out longarm machines (more about that later) and I met up with Karen who passed off a couple quilt tops for me to quilt.  I took lots of pictures of amazing quilts, but then realized that I needed permission from the quilter to post them on my blog, so ummm no pictures here.  But if you mention it in a comment, I will be happy to send you some via e-mail! 

This was the Des Moines Quilt Guild Show that was in the Wells Fargo Arena. 

A lot of these quilts could very well have been included in the AQS show, they are that good.  There were a few I recognized that were entered in the Iowa State Fair this year too.



This one is called "Mt. Hood".  It uses 5" squares.  A lot of them!  My sister made this one looooong ago (like maybe almost 10 years), and now it's finally finished!  (Got that binding sewn on yet Sis?)

The quilting design was my free-hand attempt of this pantograph. 

Talk about a pieced back!  And this was quilt #35.

AQS Show

Last weekend I attended the AQS (American Quilter's Society) Show in Des Moines.  My head is STILL spinning from the overwhelming amount of quilt gorgeousness.  You could spend an entire day just looking at the show quilts, then another entire day shopping at the hundreds of booths and vendors from across the US- and still not see nearly all of it! 

I also took a couple of longarm quilting classes from Judy Woodworth- an award winning quilter and super nice lady.  Boy, does she make it look effortless!  We watched as she demonstrated numerous designs, then we were able to attempt some of the designs on the HQ18 machines they had set up. 

This is a wholecloth, quilted by Judy and painted by her husband.  What teamwork!

This quilt is called "South of the Border".  I thought that this was the front of a wholecloth quilt, but this is actually the BACK.  wow.  The front of the quilt is pictured in her book- Freemotion Quilting. 

I decided that I really need to upgrade my machine to one with a stitch regulator.  Maybe next year I will take one home with me!  I need to start saving asap.  Anyway- Judy was really encouraging and she even signed my book!  If you get a chance to take one of her classes, I would recommend it. 

The AQS Show will be in Des Moines each year until 2013.  If you can swing it- Its definitely worth the trip.  It will provide you a humbling kick in the rear to up your quilting techniques and inspire you enough to last the whole year through.