AQC Melbourne

I've been busy lately, firstly with a wonderful week at the Australasian Quilt Convention in Melbourne, then a break away in Metricup, near Margaret River and now am having a last minute panic getting my QuiltWest entries ready for next week.

I went to the AQC 2013 with three friends, Julie, Carol and Brenda and we signed up for the whole 'Gold Delegate' experience - we stayed at a hotel five minutes away from the venue and had an action packed five days.

We certainly got our money's worth as gold delegates - a welcome cocktail party, two evenings of talks by US tutors, four days of workshops and a gala dinner at the end of it. We were also privileged to have an early bird entry to the vendors and quilt show before the riff-raff were allowed in! Added to that we had constant teas and coffee and a packed snack bag and buffet lunch each day.
We enjoyed ourselves so much that we are going back again next year for the 10th Anniversary of AQC.

The Exhibition Building was an incredible venue and inspiration for future quilts...















I took a three day workshop with Jenny Bowker ('Triptych') which was a design workshop and spent 2 days making a plan for a three panel quilt and only started sewing on the final day! At least I have masses of ideas and plans to go on with. Jenny was a great teacher and it was an honour to see some of her stunning quilts close up.

On the fourth day I took a machine quilting class with Deborah Louie and somehow she managed to get me sewing feathers and flowers by the end of it...

 The talks were by David Taylor and Judy Coates Perez, both from the USA.

All in all it was a great week but we were exhausted by the end of it!