QuiltCon West, Pasadena 2016

I’m back at Sheila’s. Just like that QuiltCon is over for another year. The internet at the hotel was free but slow… So now it’s time for a Catherine’s eye view…

You know, even buying gas is different when the sun is shining and there are mountains in the background. After that necessary stop, and a less necessary but fun diversion to Brea Mall, Sheila and I made it to Pasadena on Wednesday afternoon.We checked in at the Hilton along with lots of other QuiltCon attendees.

It was actually raining when we left the hotel to go and register at the Convention Center. Umbrellas came in very handy for the three or four block walk but registration itself was painless with volunteers on hand to help at every turn…An early dinner with friends and I was ready for an early night to make sure I was all bright eyed and bushy tailed for a reasonably early start on Thursday morning.

We attended the award ceremony on Thursday which was held before the show opened at ten. Lots of happy hugs and applause for all the winners! You can find a complete list here complete with pictures.

I have to admit we went and investigated the vendors first… It’s always interesting to see what’s new even if I didn’t actually do much shopping. I bought one charm pack! There were lots of manufacturer booths with giveaways and we did come away with all sorts of good things. No pictures yet, it’s all packed away in my suitcases at the moment.

I did a little machine quilting demo in the BERNINA booth, we started looking at the quilts, and that was that for the first day!

I was booked for a DVD signing back at the BERNINA booth on Friday lunchtime. Sheila helped me get set up. It always takes a few minutes to take the plastic wrappers off.

Here I am, ready to begin.
These were the first few ladies in line. They looked happy to be there. I concentrated hard to make sure I spelt people’s names correctly.
I do hope everyone enjoys their DVDs!

On Saturday I was on the Demonstrations list for 11 AM.Sheila took a picture of the audience waiting for me to begin…
My FitBit registered a heart rate over 120 before I started my presentation but once it was underway everything was all good. I’m always happy talking about machine quilting. I had a microphone and live camera feed to help me out.Responsibilities discharged it was time to relax. More quilts, another look at the vendors…

Attendees varied greatly in age. I couldn’t resist taking this picture.
There were games to play. This one was in the Aurifil booth. Sheila threw the dice.Neither of us won anything there!

There were several places where you could make a block that would be made into a quilt for a good cause. I made this Drunkards Path block in the Marcus fabrics booth.

“But where are the quilts?” I hear you asking.

Good question!

I have to admit I didn’t take a lot of quilt pictures. The photographs on the MQG blog are great and I’m sure it won’t be too hard to find others on line.

I do have a picture of me next to my own little quilt (I warned you that this is a totally Catherine-centric overview!)And of course I have a picture of Melissa Averino‘s Best in Show, my brother’s jeans.Melissa is a BERNINA ambassador who I met at the reunion last December. The big prize couldn’t have gone to a nicer person!