I won a ribbon!!

Remember how I entered 4 quilts in the local quilt guild quilt show last week.  I about hyperventilated driving over to drop them off and why was I doing this because no one was going to like any of them.  Yeah, well, I won 3rd place for one of them.  I was going to take pictures of all of my quilts hanging in the show, but when I got there, I had forgotten to put the memory card back in the camera.  I had Hubby take this picture after I got home from picking them up.

I've been meaning to post about this quilt for a while, but it never seems like the right time.  I designed this quilt myself.  A local quilt shop sells the pattern and one of these days, I might get around to selling it on etsy or some such place.

I started quilting because I wanted to make a throw for our living room and because I wanted to make this quilt for my kids.  I didn't know exactly what it would look like, but I wanted to make a fabric wall hanging with a Christmas tree on it.  I wanted to make an advent calendar where the kids could hang ornaments on the tree each day in december.  I saw this fabric I loved at the LQS, it was Figgy Pudding by Moda.  It was just the right combination of colors, lots of blue and an olive green with hints of red. I didn't buy any because it was expensive and I didn't know what to do with it.  I thought it would be on sale after Christmas and I could get a bunch cheap.  HA!!!  Little did I know.  I went back after Christmas and all they had left was one honey bun and some 3/4 yard bundles.  I bought what they had and brought it home to figure out what to do with it.

The quilt in the picture is actually the second incarnation.  The first used narrow strips for the background, but I thought it was too busy, so I simplified the background.  I took my first version to my long arm quilter to ask her how to proceed with making the pockets for the ornaments (that I still haven't made) and she loved it and asked if I had ever thought about selling my patterns.  I was dumb founded.  I didn't have any patterns and this was only my second quilt.  I had no idea how one went about doing that sort of thing.  I still don't have any idea what I'm doing, but it sure is fun.

PS  I won a ribbon, 3rd place out of 22.  I won a ribbon!