I haven’t entered a quilt show for ages, largely because I haven’t had time to make a quilt that was quilt-show level. I’ve been making lots of quilts for children and daughter/daughters-in-law and some to throw over our sofa at home, but I always think it has to be a hard-enough quilt to enter a show.
I read the application and they said clearly, “no color correction.” Oh-oh. I’d taken all those photos for my quilt journal, but I had to color correct some to get the gray day out of them. And then they said “no cropping.” So I had to retake them all. I hope the judges enjoy the photo of my garage door studio. I tried to get in close enough, and covered the lock with a tissue (for disguise). Above is Come A-Round, one I’m going to enter. I’ve seen this design before in this show, and they may not want to have it in again. Plus I don’t quilt every 1/4″ all over the top of the quilt (I like my quilts to “move” a little) and that has sort of become popular at this particular show.
But still. I’m going to try. Lyon Carolings, above. This one doesn’t have the garage-door-studio look. I found out a setting on the camera to counteract the grayed photos I’d been getting, so I didn’t think that was cheating. I guess it’s only after-the-fact that they don’t want us messing around in Photoshop.
The last one is I want to enter is All Is Safely Gathered In. It’s harder than you think to get the quilt perfectly squared up in the frame, and it has to do with making sure that your camera lens plane is absolutely parallel to the quilt plane, or surface, and that your camera is also physically level with the center of the quilt. This is trickier than it sounds. (I have seven of this photo to prove it.)
Then I thought about the close-up, and what they’ll do with the close-up. We have to submit digital photos and I just know they are going to get their computer out and magnify everything. Every missed stitch, every unbalanced thread, every backstitch instead of burying the tails.
It’s like looking at your morning face in a 15x magnifying mirror. Frightening! Now to fill the application out, put the photos on a CD, write the checks for entry fees, and wait for the rejection acceptance letters.






















































