A Wonderful Week in Paducah
I spent last week in Paducah, KY, at the AQS Quilt Show. I’ve been lucky enough to attend the Spring Paducah show twice now. Once as a spectator, and once as an Instructor. I taught at Fall Paducah six months previously so I thought I had an idea of what to expect. As usual, I was wrong. I really enjoyed Fall Paducah. It was busy and full of events just like the Spring show, but in the three years between attending and teaching at the April show, I forgot just how many people attend.
I started the drive from Lincoln, NE, to KY, on Monday. It is possible to do the roughly 10-11 hour drive in a day, but it’s not a lot of fun. I drove roughly half way the first day and stopped for the night in Kingdom City, MO. The plan was to get some computer work done and get an early start the next morning.
When I checked into the motel, I discovered an email from Andrea Ray the quilt show coordinator. My quilt “Star of India” had won something! The email they send is pretty generic. It says you won something, but not what. Now I wanted to make sure that I got checked in to the hotel and all my teaching stuff unpacked in plenty of time to get dressed up for the awards ceremony. (Those of you that know me know this means I put on my boots and a nice shirt to go with my jeans.) Traffic was really busy coming in, and by the time I got everything unloaded, I had about 20 minutes to get dressed and over to the show. (This part will make more sense later. Remember I was running, as usual.)
I met up with friends and we found a place to sit. I am more of a hide in the back sort of person. They were more of a sit in the front kind of people, but I went with the flow. I know that just getting into the quilt show is pretty cool and winning anything at Paducah is a real honor. Let’s be honest though, everyone wants to make it out of the dreaded Honorable Mention category and place in their category. So, I will admit, when they got through that section and they hadn’t called my name, I was feeling pretty good.
Then they got to my category; no name. Now I’m wondering was that really my category? Maybe I had entered it in a different one and just thought that was my category. Quick check of the rules on my phone, nope that was mine. Now I’m not just excited; I’m getting nervous. By the time they were down to the last four awards I was positively hyperventilating. When they called my name for “Best Moveable Machine Quilting” I was ecstatic, but I told myself “just be cool”. Yeah not so much. I thought I would go up and graciously accept my award, but I just couldn’t help bouncing up and down when I got on the stage. (There is actual video footage of this on YouTube, (1:23.28 mark) Yikes!)
Now I know that AQS is being really classy by giving the winners something besides a ribbon, but I’m not sure in my case this was such a good thing. Here I am totally freaking out, shaking with nerves and excitement, having just managed to walk up the stairs and across this big stage in front of hundreds of people without falling on my face and what do they do? They give me a crystal vase. Sure, it’s beautiful and awesome, but now I have to figure out how to get back across said stage and down the stairs with out tripping or dropping it. This may not seem like such a hardship to most people, but I’m lucky not to trip over my own feet on a good day.
After managing to make it back down the stairs, I called my husband. Apparently, I was talking even faster than normal because he and my son thought I had been in an accident and not that I was sharing really cool news with them.
I finally got them to understand and made my way back to my friends. It was at this point that I realized I had forgotten to buckle my belt. (Remember when I was talking about running to get ready earlier?) Biggest night of my career and I’m walking around with my belt unbuckled! Only me LOL. Now what I really wanted to do at this point was head over to the premier and check out my quilt with its ribbon and my new chair. (For those of you that don’t know, this is the only quilt show that gives the top four winners their own studio chair with their name and everything on it. These are highly coveted in the quilting world and valued almost as much as the prize)
Instead, I had to be good and go to the teacher’s meeting. I’m sure that it was important information, but all I could think was “got it, we’re good, let’s go people”. (You may have guessed patience is not my strong suit.)
I finally got to go see my quilt/chair and talk/bask LOL in front of it. (It’s nice to hear all the compliments, so when you go back to your real life and your teenagers roll their eyes at you and go “yeah, right mom, whatever” you can think back to more tranquil times.) By the time I got back to my room and finally got calmed down enough to sleep it was around midnight. I was back up by 6 the next morning as I taught 8-8:30 Wednesday and Thursday, 8-6 on Friday, and Saturday 8-3. I had an absolute blast teaching all my classes and met a ton of cool new people.
I always start every class by asking my students to introduce themselves and tell me why they are taking that particular class. Normally I get a lot of “I want to improve my feathers”, “I want to learn to freehand better”, or “I need ideas on what to quilt.” In my Quilting Mehndi class, I got an answer I honestly can say I never heard before.
One of my students introduced herself as Roxanne and told me that she had discovered my blog and thought it was really funny that I thought my quilt machine was a boy because it was a back-seat driver and whined a lot. (See “It’s a Boy” in the archives if you are curious.) She told her husband about it and a few weeks later he came back and said “Do you know people make money doing this? Would you like one?” To which she of course said “Well, Yeah”. Upshot was she got a longarm for Christmas and thought she would come take my class. When I told my husband about this he said “People read your blog?” Ha, Ha. Everyone thinks they’re a comedian.
I loved every minute of the quilt show. I was still on cloud 9 from the awards ceremony and I don’t think I came down all week. When I wasn’t in class, I spent as much time as I could over by my quilt. As my only free time was during lunch, I managed to lose 5 lbs. while I was at the show. (Not the best way to lose weight, but I’m not complaining.)
I had awesome students in all my classes and got to reconnect with old friends and meet some new ones. What I didn’t get to do a lot of was sleep. Now I don’t need a whole lot of sleep, but I do need to get some occasionally. My plan was to hit the road right after I got done with the All-Star review at 3 on Saturday, drive to O’Fallon (about 3-4 hours) go to bed early and sleep till I woke up. No alarms, phone off, just sleep.
Unfortunately, the universe had other plans. I wound up staying until a little after 4 so that I could pickup my chair and take it with me. On the drive to O’Fallon I got held up in traffic for about ½ an hour. No biggie, these things happen. Then I got to my hotel. Apparently, the universe decided that I had had a good ride and it was time to bring me back to reality.
I check into the Holiday Inn only to discover that they were hosting the regional peewee soccer tournament. There were a couple hundred 9-12 year-olds practicing in the courtyard, the elevator, the hallways. Lots of enthusiasm but not a lot of parental supervision. Upside, I got an early start in the morning. I made it home to an empty house. Everybody was either at work or doing something for school. I got to unload everything and chill on the couch for an hour before people starting arriving home. (at least the ferret was happy to see me.)
And, If I needed any additional proof that I was back in the real world, my messy studio, the 10 loads of laundry and the sink full of dirty dishes brought me right back to earth. I’ll just have to enjoy the memories until the next quilt show adventure.
Congrats Kris! I took one your classes and learned a few tricks, thank you! Your quilt is beautiful! Love the spring Paducah show!
Thank you. So glad you liked the class.
Congratulations. Your quilt is wonderful.
Thank you.
Congratulations Big Time! I took your Garment Class at Paducah and have been inspired ever since.
Thank you. I’m so glad you enjoyed it. I hope you’ll send me pictures of anything you do.
Congratulations. I love your blog too, because I live in the real world also. You do need to bask in the light of your accomplishment a little more though. It is a beautiful quilt and your work is exceptional.
Thank you. I’ll try.
Congratulations! Amazing quilt