Visit to PIQF

Today I went with my husband to the Pacific International Quilt Festival held in Santa Clara, CA in the San Francisco Bay Area. I am fortunate to have such a large show so close to where I live. Due to recent traveling and recent illnesses neither of us had a lot of energy but I did not want to feel I had missed anything so off we went. I took only a few photos of quilts that caught my eye, and my purchases were minimal (yay), but we had a pleasant day out.

QUILTS
This three-dimensional quilt titled Snack Spread was an original design by Liz Piatt, a local quilter. It was a lot of fun but maybe it had an extra appeal to me because I am currently in Weight Watchers and was drawn to the food aspect . This quirky quilt was hand pieced, hand appliquéd, and hand quilted. This year's theme was "That'll Be the Day" prompting entrant to complete the sentence. Snack Spread won a blue ribbon for "Best Interpretation of Theme".

This next quilt Seashore Restores My Soul to Eternity caught my eye because of the combination of technique and fabric selection.

Using a wavy striped fabric assembled in hexagons gave a sense of movement and flow to the quilt that inspired me to try that technique on the background of one of my own quilts in the future.

The designer was Cynthia Sojourner, also a local quilter.

I was in awe of the quilting in this tri-color wall hanging. I cannot bring myself to work with solids because I love prints too much. With a skilled hand at the long arm though, it might be worth forgoing those prints to show off the swirls, diamonds, orange peel, and other texturing on this beauty.

Pieced by Kathleen Robertson of Reno, NV, she reveals that double batting is a great help in having the quilting by Vicki Ruebel "sing" in Fly Away.

PURCHASES

I start off my list of purchases with a non-purchase. My husband and I arrived at the show about one hour after it had started and a vendor booth was having trouble with some quilts not hanging properly. I overhead them saying they needed somebody tall so I volunteered my 6'4" husband who helped willingly. They were so happy they offered me a pick of a free pattern. I picked this Christmas Card Holder.

I really did limit my fabric purchases. This three yard piece of 108" wide fabric appealed to me for the back of a blue quilt I have planned or the back of a beach themed quilt. It is subtle and yet not blah and the scale of the print is large enough to be interesting. It was $15 /yard, not too bad for an extra wide width.

In the same booth this one yard piece of a musical print caught my eye. At $6 for one yard, It will make a nice pillowcase or pillow. The clarity of the print is so striking.

I have at thing for cloth books although my grandbabies are getting too old for them. I could not resist this penguin cloth book.

I was thrilled to find this crinkle material to put inside the book and have it make noises that the babies love. I have been stingily hanging on to one piece I had to special order at an exorbitant price over the internet a few years ago. I only made one page of each book crinkly. This package will make two books worth,  with an insert in every page!

As I was walking past a vendor booth, this Halloween quilt made me stop for a second look, and Halloween is not even my favorite holiday. But the grey and orange colorway was strikingly different from the normal Halloween colors – softly eerie without being ghoulishly garish – and I found it very appealing. They were selling the kit but I had sworn to myself I was buying no more kits. 

I asked though and the vendor agreed to sell me just the pattern. Had I seen just this pattern I would not have been so wowed. Once home I looked into the pattern and learned each house can be made from a square out of a layer cake. All the better! I am excited about this Halloween special and hope to make it up  soon... perhaps for Halloween 2019?

A sample was also made up in this colorway. This grabbed my attention too – not so much as the grey toned background but still pretty attractive. To me the gold tones call out Thanksgiving rather than Halloween. I also think the vertical channel line quilting is effective and would not be a stalling point for me in the quilt's completion.

After seeing a recent episode of The Quilt Show by Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims, the guest Susan Cleveland, a "stickler for impeccable piecing", highly recommended this pressing mat claiming it helps give superior pressing results since the wool material clings to the blocks and retains the heat. I decided to give it a try at show prices.

I do not like to mark my quilts and so I am a fan of Angela Walters' Dot-toDot quilting technique. On a recent video of hers however, she suggested using a stencil grid to mark those dots. I got the pounce pad at the show but was unsuccessful in getting a stencil grid. I will search for that elsewhere. I am sure they are readily available.

And finally I saw these adorable little critter gadgets. The fluffy tail pulls out for a tape measure. In the frog, his left eye pulls out to reveal a tape. I got five different ones for five grandkids. Yes, some kids are too young for them, I know, but they will grow into them. Does not every kid need to learn to measure sooner or later, even if it is just their own height?

Mary Poppins measures Jane and Michael's height with her own special tape measure fished out from the depths of her carpet bag.

And we all know that Mary Poppins was "Practically Perfect in Every Way". So you see, I had to buy all those tape measures! I was channeling Mary Poppins.

OK my PIQF visit was not perfect but it was practically perfect in every way where "Every Way" equates to "Seeing Quilts, Being Inspired, and Minimizing Purchases ". Now I will link up to Let's Bee Social #245 and share what sparked my interest.