Hello...my name is Karen...

...and I....I'm a...a quiltaholic!  <sob>

I took Emma with me today to go to the quilt show in Monroe (this ended up costing me a lunch and about $70 in manga books).  The show used to be held in the dingy, dark 400 building, but it was moved this year into a new, light, clean, high-ceiling building.  What an amazing place!  They had hundreds of quilts hanging up--I'm guessing 400 or more--in 10 or 11 different categories.

While I can't post *all* the pictures, I will post a few of my favorites.  I didn't catch all the names of the creators, there were so many stunning pieces!  Some of the pictures are a little blurry...I changed the settings on my camera about half-way through. Some of the photos looked clear enough while I was there, but appear much less so now that I'm home and can see it on 'the big screen'.

This one I just liked for the black and white simplicity.

A scrappy hexagon quilt.  There was another one just like it...

Loved the black and white and bright splashes of color.

I made a quilt similar to this called Majestic Mountain.  This one has an extra strip that has a triangle on the end to make the pinwheels in the middle.

I think this one said it was an antique...all hand sewn and hand quilted.  WOW!

This is a pretty bargello type quilt that reminds me of warm wool plaid blankets.  I have to wrap my brain around how this is made.  I'd like to make one, but I'm hoping it will turn out as pretty as this one.

This is a great way to use coordinated fabrics that are too busy to lay next to each other in a traditional pattern.  Just a little strip of black breaks up the busy fabrics and sets it off beautifully!  I have some aboriginal fabrics--I think they're Australian--that I've been struggling to find a way to showcase.

Another great scrap quilt.  So many of the quilts I liked best were scrappy.  Maybe it's because I have so many scraps, I am looking for ways to use them up.

This one had a sweet story to it.  You know on Valentine's Day, there are so many couples who go up to the top of the Empire State building to propose...this quilt was the Proposal Quilt...

Complete with a ring!

This one is hard to see, but it's called Flower Boxes--all the fabrics are florals.

This is the same kind of pattern that I used to hand out for a Friendship Block, except instead of brown, I used black and asked for bright colors.  Now I'm inspired to find all the blocks and sew them together...and maybe use up some more of my scraps!

This one I found striking because of the bright splash of color in the middle...but it's also...

3D!  I don't know how they did this fabric folding, but it's AWESOME!

This one was just so darn sweet!  Delicate ginger jar prints and tea service for four!  I just imagine four little girls playing teatime on the living room floor...

I love applique.  I even love doing it, but I always think it's more work to do and get absolutely perfect...so I don't do it very often.

More bright scrappiness.

This one is just awesome!  The photo, to the right, is of a bunch of trees in the Bayeux.  She recreated this using fabric and a special fiber called angel hair. Or angelica.  Or angelina.  Or something like that.

or possibly some yarn, but I think it's the angel stuff.

LOVE LOVE LOVE this!  Just a bunch of boats in the harbor.  Makes me think of Heide's Grampa Porgy.

This was an astounding 3-D quilt.  It's only about 24" tall, but dang!

More scrappy lovelies...

This one really tickled me--she used old silk neckties!  That's right...a SILK quilt!  Can you imagine how great that must be to snuggle with?!

Zig-zag quilt...kinda makes me think of Charlie Brown's shirt...again, these are made from scraps using a simple "flying geese" block...over and over and over.

This is some detail of a quilt that was machine quilted...those hearts are only a couple inches high.  Seriously small!!  This is something to aspire to...

I love the diamonds...they are, as they say, a girl's best friend...especially a girl with a lot of quilt scraps.

More scrappy bits!  

This, likewise, was a scrap busting challenge.  They took the scraps and made small squares--probably 4" square--and put those into a quilt top!  It's amazing how far you can stretch your stash!

More scrappy strips!  I really want to make some scrap quilts.  Both of these are stunning, and can show how you can set the blocks differently and use different border techniques.

This is a crazy quilt style.  Karen M. makes quilts like these, foundation piecing her scraps.  This one doesn't really have a place for your eye to rest, but it sure would spice up a boring bedroom!

This one is a show-stopper.  This one, I think, is going to take home quite a lot of ribbons, like Best of Show.  All the creatures are based on local art from the Pacific Northwest museum (with permission, of course), all appliqued, and then machine quilted with the most detailed patterns...

This is around the heron's legs!  Look at that fish!

 And this is the back of it!  I mean...wow!!!

This one is really stunning, too...lots of little tiny hexagons.  Also visually interesting because it doesn't have flat edges on two sides.

They also had a featured quilter, Klota Underwood, a very sweet lady who is undergoing cancer treatment again.  She had a number of quilts there--all of them were exquisite, as evidenced by the ribbons adorning the edges.  I took photos of a number of them, but these were my favorites:

Jacobean floral thingy on a purple-ish fabric (it looks a little brown here)

New York Beauty--I love these patterns, although I have never attempted them...or rather, I made a few blocks, but never finished a quilt top with them.

 Applique and New York Beauty spikiness.  Gorgeous!

This one was one of my favorites...block of the month flowers!

The show will be going on for two more days, so if you're in the Monroe area, you should stop in.  $7 and you can return all three days.  There's also a food area and lots of vendors.  Great stuff!  Enjoy!