Friday, April 29, 2011

What a trip!

How quickly this week went!  I can't believe that we are back from Paducah already.  We had a great time and got to see a lot --- of water!!  The rivers and streams are full to overflowing in so many places.  We went over the Ohio, Tennessee, Cumberland and White rivers and countless streams all out of their banks.  The worst part of this was that they had to close the flood gates in Paducah which meant relocating several venues of the show.

On Sunday evening, the show organizers were advised that the flood gates would be closed and, since the convention center is outside the flood gates, it would have to be evacuated.  Many, many people worked liked dogs to accomplish this task.  Here is a picture of the river after the flood gates were closed:


We really did a lot on this trip.  We went to Threads of Time in Danville, IL, and Lori's Pins and Needles in Paris, IL, on the way down.  We also stopped at Rend Lake Artisans Center (see previous post).  Once we arrived in Paducah we went to Eleanor Burns' tent in Carson Park, Hancock's (where the back room fabric was $6/yard!) and didn't buy much.  We also went to visit Caryl Bryer Fallert's studio.  We were very fortunate to be able to go on a tour of her studio and home.  She is a most gracious hostess.  Here are a few pictures:




The top two pictures are in her living room.  The  next picture is her fabric storage room - no outside light and very organized!!  The last picture is her sewing area in her studio.   She was very fortunate to be able to buy the two  parcels of land for $1 and then had to build in keeping with the historical theme of the area.  She was able to design the inside exactly as she wanted it.  She has several guest rooms which allow workshop participants to stay on site.  She rents out the rooms during the quilt show but said not to even bother calling - one of the guests would have to die in order for there to be a space.  :)

We enjoyed looking at all the quilts and visiting all the vendor booths at the Kentucky Oaks Mall, the old Circuit City and Office Depot stores and the church where small wall quilts were displayed and classes were held.  


I was a really good girl and didn't buy much as you can see from this picture:

 Of course, I did go to Quilt Festival in Cincinnati a couple of weeks ago and wasn't quite as good there!

We left yesterday afternoon with the plan to stop as several shops along the way.  Unfortunately, the first two that we wanted to see were closed (we did call first so didn't waste too much time) but by the time we got to Evansville the traffic was pretty bad and the road to Boonville was closed so we never made it to Village Mercantile or The Stitching Post in Washington.  We'll just save those for another trip.

2 comments:

Ruthie said...

What a great photo of the flood gate. It looks like you had a great time also.

Anonymous said...

I am sorely disappointed in your Paducah stash photo! With only slightly more effort you might have come home w/20 more yds of fabric like I did. LOL

Glad to see you had a great time despite the flooding and change in venues.