2011 Sewing & Stitchery Expo

Comfortable shoes—check. Shopping bag that can expand as needed—check. Sack lunch—check. Water bottle—check. Seminar tickets—check. Cash and charge cards—check. I was ready to tackle the 2011 Sewing & Stitchery Expo.

            My friend Carol had clicked online as soon as the registration website opened, and registered us for our seminars. None of the seven classes I took disappointed. Eleanor Burns won my award for Best Showmanship. She had the audience singing Old Macdonald Had a Farm to introduce her seminar “Quilt Blocks on American Barns.” 

Laura Stark and Carol Kain meet Eleanor Burns, quilting great.

            In other seminars I learned about quilting with big, bold prints; creating landscape quilts; and making jewelry from fabric scraps. On the free stage we watched Linda McPhee’s slinky fashion show, and laughed our way through Glorianne Cubbage’s talk: A Girlfriend’s Guide to Thread. We’ve made it a point to see her since the first time we saw her three years ago in a classroom in the Milking Parlor.

            In between seminars, Carol, Margie, and I became ruthless shoppers, stalking fabric, patterns, books, and quilting tools with speed and agility. Then we’d meet back up to oooh and ahhh over each others’ quarry.

            For me, the highlight of this year’s expo was managing to get a ticket for an hour and a half seminar by Ricky Tims. In 2002, he was named one of The Thirty Most Distinguished Quilters in the World. It was a stroke of luck that when I checked on Thursday, his seminar wasn’t sold out.

So early this morning, the last day of the Sewing Expo, I ran through the Blue Gate of the fairgrounds and up to the second floor of the Pavilion to listen to this extraordinary quilt designer, and renowned pianist, conductor, composer, arranger, and music producer tell us how to make his award-winning quilts.

His Convergence quilts are based on a simple concept, take little time, yet result in quilts with a strong, modern impact. To think that he started a whole new type of quilt as a result of cleaning his sewing room is an inspiration to me, a quilter whose sewing room has stacks of fabric piled so high we may have to raise the ceiling.

Bohemian Rhapsody by Ricky Tims.

Tims’ Rhapsody quilts have a symmetrical medallion in the center. Intricate designs in brilliant colors continue in curving symmetry out to the borders.  In a sea of quilts, they will grab your attention and not let go.

Laura Stark and Ricky Tims at Sew Expo, Puyallup, WA.

            Afterwards, I raced over to the Showplex to Ricky Tims’ booth, snatched up one of his books and some hand-dyed fabric. I was so fast, I was third in line! As the line snaked around the back of the booth, I asked the Texan who wears a cowboy hat for his autograph and a photo.

            Strolling out of the fairgrounds with my tote bag refilled once again, I couldn’t resist grabbing a scone. I raised it up toward Washington’s gray skies as a toast to another Sewing Expo well done before I took a big bite.

Laura Keolanui Stark is storing her Expo goodies and planning future projects. She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.com.

Sew Expo Hangover

          The Sewing & Stitchery Expo ended yesterday, and today it feels like the day after Christmas: empty shopping bags, empty wallet, but a lot of really great toys to play with.

          This year I went for three out of the four days even though I initially planned to go for only one day. When I started scheduling seminars, Plan A flew out the window, Plan B was a mere flash, and I sent in Plan C. Plan D is what I got. Some of the seminars I’d requested had sold out, so they’d substituted my alternate requests. But, I’m pretty sure that I hadn’t listed a couple of them at all. Looking at the tickets they sent, I felt the same way I do sometimes when I reach my destination on a trip, and open my suitcase---who the heck packed this stuff?

          As it turned out, the surprise classes were pleasant surprises. In 50 minutes, Dr. Bob unwound all my thread problems in his Thread Therapy class. He explained thread characteristics, which needle to use with different specialty threads, and told a great story about how his 14 year old son used water soluble thread on bathing suits to liven up a pool party.

          It wasn’t all fun though at Expo, within 15 minutes of entering the gates, I got in trouble, my modus operandi. My offense this time was stepping over the chains to get into a seminar instead of winding around through an utterly empty maze. I just can’t seem to stay between the lines. The seminar was worth the scolding. It was “Japanese Design Basics for Quilters.” June Colburn talked about the differences between Western design in artwork and Asian design. I will incorporate many of her insights into my quilts, and finally cut confidently into some of the gorgeous Asian fabrics I’ve collected.

          In between seminars, I shopped, and shopped, and shopped some more, severely testing my creed, “Never buy more than you can carry.” Every year I tell myself that I don’t need to buy anything else. I have mountains of fabric, notions, and books. Yet every year, I add to the mountain. I blew my budget, and until next payday, my meal planning will revolve around whatever I can forage from our pantry or freezer. I’m thinking of it as a kind of creative scavenger hunt. Dr. Bob had a piece of valuable advice on what to say to our husbands when their eyes bug out on seeing what we haul home from the sewing expo. He told us to say these magic words, “There was a drawing.” And, there was a drawing at the end of each seminar. We just don’t have to divulge whether we won or not.

          By far, the best part of this year’s expo was a gift from my friend Carol: tickets for three of us to see Eleanor Burns in a Quilter’s Night Out. Eleanor Burns is one of the top quilters in America, and has her own show, “Quilt in a Day” on PBS. For years, Carol and I (and apparently a lot of other quilters) filled out suggestion slips asking Sew Expo to get Eleanor Burns to come. 2010 was the year our pestering paid off! We each got to chat with Eleanor and get her autograph at her booth. She is as delightful in person as on her show. At Quilter’s Night Out, she wowed us with her quilt show, reminisced about 30 years of taping her show, shared bloopers that had us laughing until we were in tears, introduced us to her family, and got hundreds of women up on their feet to do the chicken dance.

          Expo was crowded. Some people were rude. Some days it rained. Scones fueled me when my energy levels sagged. One day I slogged a half a mile through the parking lot to my car while packing my shopping booty with me. Overall, this year’s Sew Expo lived up to its billing of “the biggest sewing party in the country!”

Laura Keolanui Stark is starting a new quilting project! She can be reached at lkstark@yahoo.com