Quilters Bearing Gifts

I've been doing a bunch of this lately....packing and unpacking. My travel schedule has been heavy. That makes for lots of work, but also for opportunities to connect with people and learn from them. I've been in Albuquerque and Minneapolis over the last couple of weeks speaking and teaching and both were inspirational experiences.

Everywhere I go I'm experiencing the generosity and spirit of the quilting community.  In Minneapolis, the MQG members volunteered to be my testers for the Hexagon class I'll be teaching at QuiltCon.  I learned so much from them and because of their feedback the class will be much better for it.  They were amazing sewers and mastered the cutting and sewing technique in no time.  That was a gift in itself, but in addition they presented me with a bouquet of fabric roses.  Each person contributed a piece of fabric in my favorite color.

I don't know how they knew I had a pitiful needle case, but no longer.  Karen made this exquisite one for me complete with needles, grippers, and a fabulous pair of thread snips.

I'll always remember this trip.  The fabric on the needle case was carefully chosen to maintain those good memories!

In addition to my class, Sewtropolis, an amazing fabric store in Minneapolis, hosted a book signing and trunk show.  I was happy to see a familiar face in the audience and throughout the weekend I was able to connect with old online friends and make new friends as well. Thanks to Flaun and Nikol for organizing the trip and turning one little email exchange into a fabulous weekend!

In Albuquerque I did a talk and trunk show and did some teaching as well.  These are some talented students and we had a wonderful day!  During a break we all got inked.

My visit was part of the four year anniversary celebration for Hip Stitch, another great fabric shop and the headquarters for the Albuquerque Modern Quilt Guild.

 I arrived at Hip Stitch and found that the shopping center had been "quilt bombed" which is quilter talk for wrapping pillars in quilt tops.  Amazing!

The local guild set up a mini quilt show in the venue and had a wonderful catered affair for my talk and trunk show.  I returned to the hotel to find flowers in my room (by sneaky little quilty elves) and a handmade basket, Lois's amazing handiwork, filled with goodies to welcome me.

I was treated to a little taste of New Mexico.  Being a coffee addict, I was pretty excited to try that Pinon coffee!

Bralia, who works at the store, used some of her special Samoan fabric to make me these great microwave mits and...

this potato baking bag.  Who knew you could get really great baked potatoes out of the microwave?

You can see how much fun we all had.  Thanks to Suzanne, Carla, Melissa and the whole staff at Hip Stitch for making it an amazing weekend!

I haven't had much time for sewing lately.  Things will settle down eventually and I can continue my mini obsession with hexagons.  I have these cut for another low volume hexie quilt, but this one will be much larger.  I'm hoping this will be a couch quilt in the new condo.  Still no news on when we might move, but I'm trying to stay hopeful.

Suitcase is packed again.  Off I go.