Birmingham

 I went up to Birmingham for a few nights so that I could visit the Festival of Quilts at the NEC. I enjoyed it last year when they retained the fourth hall to maintain COVID social distancing, giving everything a really spacious feel.  They have contracted back down to three halls  this year so aisles between shop stalls were narrower but still not too bad, and it didn't feel too crowded.  The quilts themselves were displayed on new rat-maze-like solid temporary walls in a confusing labyrinth with inadequate labels.  Category names were only shown on randomly placed banners  at the ends of some aisles, but not within aisles. So without buying a programme to understand the codes, you had no idea what category you were looking at in each aisle unless you peered at the tiny type at the bottom of each label. Nor did the labels give any credit to designers even though many quilts appear to be from commercial patterns. It was frustrating for me as a viewer (who doesn't like spending additional money on programmes) and I also found it confusing trying to work out whether I had seen all the aisles or not, due to the maze-like layout.  Despite that, there were lots of lovely quilts on display to enjoy.

The Language of the Wind, by Kaatrin Mozhi (India)

My Haven, by Danuta Owczarek (Poland)

Aoife's View, by Ethelda Ellis Erasmus (Ireland)

Emerald Coast by Nicky Hargrave (UK)

The Quilt, by Mary Mayne (Bedfordshire, UK)

Enchantment of Snow by Patrizia Sparano (Italy)

They had done a duplicate quilt all in autumn colours.

A display of Red & White quilts from the International Quilt Museum, 

some or all of these were in the famous red & white quilt show hung in Manhattan in 2011, afterwards being donated to the museum

As someone who is a bit out of the loop with the modern quilting world, it was surprising to see some quilts that were so intricately pieced that they would have been prize winners back in the day, but nowadays are not.  I was also surprised to see a large percentage of quilts hanging badly, from gentle waving on some through to significant bulges and valleys on others. I think it's because of the modern trend to quilt everything so closely within an inch of its life - if not done with care to maintain balance and even density, it can cause distortion and prevents the quilt from hanging flat when suspended vertically.

I had a day and a half at the show, so plenty of time to see the quilts, do some shopping, and attend three of the quick and easy one hour workshops.  All three workshops were a bit of a bust in the sense that within the 60 minutes there was absolutely no way to do more than just minimally start the advertised project and get an idea of how to finish it . The first one was introducing 'boro' or the Japanese tradition of mending by layering fabrics and fastening with running stitches; the second was a concertina 'book' with fabric covers that we quickly block-printed with acrylic paint and wooden stamps; and the third is mean to be a page for a sort of fabric junk journal where each page is meant to feature kantha stitching and floral embroidery. The third was the least effective as the teacher had the idea of using cheap fleece fabric for the wadding which turned out to be almost impossible to needle through.  The Boro sample is the only one I might finish. But I had some interesting chats in the classes and it was nice to sit down for an hour and make something.

I didn't buy much, steering resolutely clear of all the fabric stalls.  I bought some more woven stabiliser  that I was running low on for bagmaking, a needle minder and a couple of solid metal needle threaders to try (the wire kind always break on me), and on a vintage stall I found a bunch of hand-painted lace bobbins for only £2 each (normally these retail for £7.50 upwards). But I had fun looking at getting some inspiration.  I also had a play on the Handiquilter stand and had the Grace Cutie frame explained to me (machine quilting).

In Birmingham New Street station, you are now greeted by this impressive giant mechanical bull statue.

I always find Birmingham quite baffling, with all its changes of level, massive buildings or equally massive construction sites blocking line of sight/access routes, strange mix of cutting-edge architecture, heritage and derelict buildings etc.  I did a walk around on Wednesday using a guide I found online, and was surprised to find many attractive features such as the canalside area. I was particularly impressed by the new Birmingham Library building interior, which is apparently the largest public library in the world.  They had only a modest collection of handicraft books however.

Before I went, I finished binding quilt 1 of 6, which is the Tilda Wreath Quilt.

I also had to create this punk/goth number for the cat, after she had surgery to remove a cyst from her side.  The vet supplied a cone so she wouldn't lick the healing wound, but she was really struggling to get around or even to eat/drink with the cone on her head.  I looked up cat surgical protection suits, which are a bit expensive, and also found videos on Youtube showing how to convert a baby onsie into a cat suit. But then I stumbled across a video showing how to cut up a t-shirt and basically tie it onto the cat to create a custom fit.  DH nobly sacrificed one of his t-shirts and after a bit of experimentation, I came up with this outfit.  She can behave almost normally in it, including using her litterbox, and it has stopped her from licking the wound all week.  The vet said to leave the cone on for a week, so the cat can come out of her goth straitjacket this weekend.