All the Pretty Colors and how I met Kaffe Fassett

Last week while I was in Houston I went to the International Quilt Festival.  It is huge.  No, huge doesn’t really describe it.  I’m sure I walked a full marathon the first day, and then another the next day. And I don’t think I saw everything.  My feet are still recovering.

The first day we (me and some fellow crafty cousins) walked through the booths and stalls drinking in all the wonderful things that people were selling.  Skads of things.  More things than you could think of.  Beautiful things.  Useful things.  More things than were possible to take in in one day.

I didn’t take many pictures of the booths.  I made a lot of notes in my little book, and i drew a lot of pictures of ideas I wanted to try, but I didn’t pull my camera out too often.  I was on sensory overload I guess.

I don’t know how I made it out of the Convention Center without spending all of my cash.  But I didn’t.  I think it partly had to do with the amazing antiquing adventure from Thursday morning.  I’ll share that in another post.  But I guess I was saving up.

I did buy a few yards of twill tape from this shop, and a few other little bits.  Mostly I just opened my eyes as wide as they could go and looked around and soaked up all the colors and textures and prettiness.  And I wished that I had more room in my suitcase to take home one of everything.  And a money tree in my pocket that was growing twenty dollar bills.  Or fifties.

And after I saw all the dozens of shops that were selling wool in every single color and pattern I kind of wished I had a sheep farm.  You know, so I could spend every single waking moment taking care of hundreds of animals and shearing them and spinning the wool into yarn and weaving it into fabric and then painstakingly hand dying each piece.  And after I thought all that through I just wished I had the money tree in my pocket and a bigger suitcase.  And then I’d go back to a goat farm.  I’m so indecisive in my daydreams sometimes.

But the most exciting part of the day was when I met Kaffe Fassett.  Yeah, THAT one.  My cousin Liz stopped at a book booth, and noticed one of his books just sitting there.  She mentioned to the woman at the table how wonderful Kaffe Fassett was, and how amazing he was with color and fabric and etc. etc. etc… and the woman asked if she’d like him to sign her book.  Because he was sitting right there.  Two feet from her.  And a few minutes later when she told me I freaked out and went back to meet him. (I had been sidetracked by something shiny I’m sure.)   I didn’t buy his book (why? I don’t know.) but I did get a picture with him.  And I was kind of dying inside I was just so excited.  The real Kaffe Fassett.  It was pretty amazing.

Alright, I’ll have more to post tomorrow, but I should have gone to bed 4 hours ago.  And I need to eat a banana split before I hit the pillow.  I’ve got my priorities in line.  Clearly.

[Sources: Fantastic ribbons and trims in the Nifty Thrifty Dry Goods booth.  Gorgeous hand dyed wool from Mary Flanagan Woolens booth.  I was drooling. ]