Oh What Heights We'll Hit

On with the show, this is it! The AQS Lancaster Show that is.

 view from our room at the Marriott

What a trip! It was well worth the LONG bus ride (with 44 wonderful ladies from Maine) to experience my first AQS show.

First things first. We unpacked the necessities – Kathy’s strips!

 Then on to the show! I dragged Kathy down the aisles until we came to the most beautiful quilt in the show!! “My Style Log Cabins” by Kathy Boudreau of Gardiner, ME (my friend and roommate!!). It was so much fun to see it hanging. I stood by listening to the comments while Kathy was busy shopping and listening to demos. I am so proud!

As with any show, I found that my choices for winners did always not coincide with the judges. I know it must be mind boggling to have to make those decisions. There is a special category for hand quilted quilts. Twenty seven of the over 200 quilts in the show were hand quilted. Better percentage than most shows these days.

You can go to the AQS website here to see the winning quilts, but I’d like to share some of my favorites with you.

 “Quintal Vases” by Becky Brown of Montpelier, VA was absolutely amazing. No ribbon, but oh so perfect to me, in execution and design.

 “Old Glory Under HIS Wings” by Julee Prose of Ottumwa, IA.

“Decadent Victorian Darlings” by Hattie Williams of Boswell, PA. This had the most amazing hand quilting! 

“Midnight in Taicang” by Nancy LaPointe of St. Albans, VT. A traditional quilt in modern fabrics really does sing!

 “Wrapped up in Fragrance of Rose” by Mizue Matsuda of Kitakatsusikagun, Saitama, Japan. No ribbon here either. See what I mean about difficult decisions for judges!

 “Fun and Fancy” by Zena Thorpe of Chatsworth, CA won third in the hand quilted section. Zena’s quilts are always wonderful!

“Infinite Glow” by Renee Burston of Port Orange, FL was very modern, and oh so beautiful.

 “Stripe Tease” by Jennifer Emry of Arlington, VA was my favorite modern quilt. Most likely because it was hand quilted and it does have a traditional feel.

If I were to give one critique it would be that I would like to have seen the “story” behind each quilt either on the card or in the show booklet. When you enter an AQS show they do ask for a brief description so I wondered where this info was and why it wasn’t on the description card.

The vendors catered mostly to machine quilting so I was beyond thrilled to see the sign for “Lancaster Traditionals” as I rounded the corner. Joe, the owner, used to vend our show in Maine along with a few others in New England. I was always delighted to see him and always spent all my money there. Joe passed away a few years ago and his daughter, Yoko is helping the family to sell his inventory. 

Yoko was a delightful young lady and I was so very happy to do my part to help deplete her supplies.

Another bonus of the trip was that there was another show just down the road with antiques. So, we hopped in the shuttle bus and found these beauties hanging in the foyer. 

I hope your year is full of wonderful quilts and quilt shows!