And I get this mental image of the inaugural meeting of the Argentinian Quilt Guild, with all the members belly-dancing before sitting down and sorting out business and quilt a little.

Shucks, Lorchen! I'm just glad that Teresita's a member of our TQS "guild"!!

I'm glad you made it back home alright, Teresita, even if it's cold.

If we could amalgamate the pictures we took, we'd come up with a more or less complete show.

I can hear Margo saying: "Teresita, why don't you start a Guild in Argentina?!"

Rita, I attend the knit and stitch show at Alexandra Palace, London. That is very much a mixed craft show. It covers knitting cross stich feltmaking card making etc etc, as described on Thwisted Threads website. The same company organise The Festival of Quilts in Birmingham. FoQ is dedicated to quilts. About 90-95% of the stands are selling goods in reation to quilting. There are a large number of quilts shops with stands and also booksellers, sewing machine maunfacturers, bead and button stands for embellishment etc etc. There are always a few stand selling bags and jewelry at every show but FoQ is definitely about quilts. There are then exhibiton stand huighlighting the work of differnt fabric artists around the world as well as the competition quilts, from art to traditional. I am sure that Lorchen will add anything that I have missed.

I believe FoQ is the largest quilt show in Europe.

Hi Lorchen and everyone! I'm back in the cold winter of Buenos Aires, this long weekend (Monday's a holiday), is particularly cold, we are having 0ªC in the morning and it doesn't get higher than 10ª in the afternoon. But very sunny, really nice.
I'm finishing a little quilt which I have to give in on Friday for an exhibit organised by the Argentine Textile Art Centre (we have no Quilters Guild, yet).
Thank you for the link! I took lots of pictures myself, but apart from the winners, they are all different quilts. I'm wondering what show I've attended, some of the quilts I don' t even remember seeing! It's terrible!

I did a workshop in the Limerick Quilt Shop yesterday with Bettina Havig and she and some of the other women had been to Birmingham. They were all pleased that the 21st Century Dear Jane quilt from Ireland had won a prize. They seemed to think that there were just too many art quilts and not enough traditional. Maybe that is just their personal preference though. I think I will have to try to schedule a visit for next year. I wonder is it just the same as the Knitting and Stitching Show at the RDS in Dublin which happens here every November? This year they are moving it to Simmonscourt which I hope will mean that there is room for mere mortals to walk around without bumping into each other and knocking things off stands! Thanks for the link Lorchen. It was interesting to see some of what was on display.

Same here, Lorchen! As much as I enjoy seeing the art quilts and the amazing quilting on them in shows, it's the soft, less densely quilted 9-patch that I reach for at home!
Thank goodness the quilt world is big enough for all preferences!

And the funny thing is, Margo, that about 90% of what is on that blog I did not take pictures of because I was more impressed by others. Patchwork and quilting is so totally objective.

But, here in Europe, we are definitely going down the - what I call - 'US route': Most of the winning quilts are quilted so densely that I wonder if you could use them as a retaining wall when building a new house.

Three other tendencies: More and more art quilts, less traditional quilts, and the miniatures are continuing to be very popular.

Thanks for the link, Lorchen. What a diverse selection of quilts!

Pictures of some of the quilts from FoQ can be seen on this blog:

http://countrythreads.blogspot.com/2011/08/festival-of-quilts-part-2.html

Rosemary, I very much appreciate you trying to 'sort me out'!

But I will go for unstructured and comfortable in a very attractive (flows beautifully and doesn't crease) Italian silk. I'll share pictures eventually. And don't ask what the fabric cost per metre. But I only have two sons, and the other one is still convinced that he will never get married.

By the way, I had a very close look at the Rami Kim outfit. I really liked the TQS show when she was a guest.

I'll sift through my pictures when I get home. I'm still in Birmingham. Some friends and I always stay another day after FoQ finishes and enjoy some time together before setting off in four different directions from here.

Lorchen wrote:

sau-crewe wrote: A gift from the heart and hands is always good. I look forward to enjoying someone else's creativity in my house.

The thing I like about making ATCs, is that a) you can finish them very quickly, and b) like choclate, 1 is never enough so you usually make (and finish ) several at once - Yay!

I had a wonderful time at the FOQ. It was great fun meeting up and chatting with fellower TQS folks. I'll add my big 'thank you' to Rosemary for the wonderful quilted trading card. I had not seen that before. I will try to make some up for all when I finally get all of my belongings in September. Teresita, you surely when the award for having come the farthest!

I'm going to have so much fun here in the UK!

Lorna