AQS Lancaster

Road tripping is always a delight.  Road tripping with 3 friends is priceless.  Our first stop: Ladyfingers Sewing in Oley PA.  Well our first “stop” was Wegmans for provisions, ie chocolate and fruit.  I just missed Gail, however I did not miss one of my very favorite fabric lines, Robert Kaufmans Radiance.  I picked up these beautiful gray pieces.  I have plans, plans I say.  I may pair them with the cheddar orange dupioni silk and I may not.  We’ll just have to see what happens.  The color choices may seem odd for this quilter however I’m planning thread play on each one of the pieces of gray that I have.  I’m not sure of size yet, that will come later.

Arriving at the quilt show I was delighted to see Jan Magee, the Editor of  The Quilt Life.  The Quilt Life is quite refreshing for a quilt magazine and, I think, is leading the way in encouraging quilters to really grow their skills as quilt makers.  I’ve written a couple of times for them and plan to submit again soon.  Unfortunately I didn’t get a photo with Jan.

I did get a photo with Alex Anderson.

Alex has been part of my quilting  journey nearly from the beginning.  Now that she and Ricky have The Quilt Show.  We get to see more of her joy and exuberance in personality.  I really love how different The Quilt Show is compared to SQ.

One of the gals brought home a new Bernina 350 Special Edition with the cool skin on the front.  Alex signed it.  How cool is that?

Before heading over to the show on Saturday we stopped at Kitchen Kettle Village to shop at The Olde Country Store, Zooks and the Village Shops.  My first stop: the Lancaster Yarn Shop.  Oh my!!  This shop is delightful, friendly staff and lots of beautiful yarn.  First of all how can you go wrong when the shopping bags are lime green with metallic purple writing?  So stinkin’ cute!  And then I picked up this lime green and gray kettle dyed yarn.  And this time I have a plan.  A friend showed me a herringbone infinity scarf.  I can’t wait to start stitching this.  I want to finish a couple of other projects first though.

When I saw this quilt the first time I stopped in my tracks and had to take a photo.

Then saw the artist, Sue Reno.

Sue and I have been friends on facebook for a few years and the last couple of AQS shows we stand on line and chat while waiting to pick up our quilts.  This year was, delightfully, a bit different.  We talked for a bit, went to see her quilt and Sue shared the process a bit with a family admiring her quilt.  The silk used comes from a particular town in India where Sue studied in the 1970’s and again on a recent visit.  The ornamental ginger leaf is dyed using a cyanotype process (a type of  light reactive dye – left in the sun for a period of time for the desired effect).  The family asked great questions about how Sue put the quilt together.

Sue and I talked a bit more about her quilt after the family left.  I really love the groundedness and freedom of this quilt.  It speaks to roots and growth.  At least in my mind.

I am once again grateful to see Tilde hanging in a show.  I have a few more shows to enter Tilde into before shipping her off to Keith as he has a couple of shows to enter into.  Thank you John Anderson for taking this photo.   John also took the photo of Alex & me.

I was able to share with quilters about the making of this quilt a few different times, which is always a pleasure.

Tilde is one of my favorite quilts to date.

Jeanie Sumrall-Ajero and I did the great quilt hand off with a long conversation at the Superior Threads booth.  I can share that the quilt Jeanie pieces is off the hook gorgeous uses Radiance as well as some commercial batiks.  I know roughly how many hours she has invested in the quilt so far and know I’ll probably meet her in hours quilting.   We won’t know until later when we’ll be able to share the quilt, it just depends on when I get it finished and which show we decide to enter first.   A very special thank you to Gina Reddin who spent a good 20 minutes with us offering a few great suggestions.

Happy Quilting!

Teri