Let's get quilt blind & shop at the FoQ

Last year I went to the Festival of Quilts at the suggestion of my dear friend Rats as Big as Cats having only really made a few hexagons myself, but nevertheless firmly hooked. I bought my first cutting mat and rotary cutter and a few pieces of fabric there.  Quilt-blindness kicked in several times and we had to have a pint of beer break or two. Yeah yeah I know but honestly I was dazed and confused by the assault of colours, patterns and techniques of patchwork. In fact I was dizzy before I'd taken more than a couple of steps inside - and that was just from the women who had turned up wearing it. Wearing it! Wearing patchwork jackets, patchwork bags, dresses... like camouflage. It is not okay to wear the band's t-shirt to the gig and it's not okay to wear patchwork to the FoQ. The leopard print dress, laser-cut necklace and black studded shoes I wore was, I got the impression, received much the same way by those ladies, so what do I know.

So entranced was I by the monochrome eye quilt I kept just drifting back over and over again to gaze into it, it was awesome, like the untempered schism. Who knows what that did to me!

RasBaC has submitted a quilt this year and I am super excited to see it on display. I will also be trying to over-hear what the quilterati think of it!  If you think "OOoh that's big and white and looks like it'd drive you crackers" that's hers! It's so thrilling to think people will be looking at it now! Not for Ratty mind, she'll be elsewhere trying NOT to hear.

My Google Reader now reveals a loOOoong list of creative makers including people I've actually met, in the real world and interacted with online. The quilt life has become such an enormous part of my life and I'm SO excited to go get back there with a real appreciation for the work, the chance to talk to people and of course the shop-rtunity.

Maybe next year I'll enter something myself, you never know. For now - roll on Sunday!

nbnqx