International Festival of Quilts at NEC, Birmingham, day 1

After a long drive from Heathrow to Solihull last night, we could jumpstart our first day at the festival with full English breakfast, which we enjoyed a lot. It builds such a good foundation for a long day running around fairgrounds.

At 10:30 we entered our first workshop, Mini Mosaic Quilts with Paula Doyle. She showed us the (more or less) quick and easy way of working mini blocks from squares the size of 1" finished. Working with such an inspiring teacher - even if it was only for one hour - was waaaay fun.
 This is what we made under her tutelage - she had prepared and cut most of the fabrics for us:

 At home I'll finish this into a nice little mug rug, from now on it's only sewing straight seams.

After that, we visited our quilts at the exhibition. Of course we didn't win, but then, who really thought? I was absolutely proud to see my quilt hanging prominently between so many other pieces of art. See my grin?

Not that the day was over at this point... we spent long hours admiring other peoples' quilts and - of course - spending money. During the "spending money" we had our next encounter. I spied a stall selling Marti Michell templates, and I'd planned to acquire a set of her perfect patchwork templates to complement the strippers we already have at home. It took me a long while, before I realized, that it was Marti herself explaining to me why those templates were so good, and before long we were chatting happily.

Last somewhat unreal experience of the day was seeing the team of Kaffe Fassett and Brandon Mably at a stall selling traditional Hungarian prints talking to each other. And watch, how inspiration strikes. I am waiting to see his next collections and maybe think to myself "I watched him having that idea!"

So much to see, and that was only the first day! Stay tuned for more of my adventures in Birmingham!