Paducah...what can I say?

What an amazing week! Many highs and a few lows. The Kincardine Sunset Quilters Guild left early Wednesday April 22 for Paducah Kentucky. It took us two days to get there. We left the snow behind after the first couple of hours of driving and were treated to beautiful flowering trees, roses in bud, irises, and all manner of spring flowers. (Of course we did return 6 days later to no leaves on the tress, no flowers in bloom and the ice back in at the shoreline).
The group attended the National Quilt Museum (unfortunately my bad gut decided that was a good time to make an appearance). But after that episode I was able to take in most of the rest of the experience. For the quilt show itself I found there were so many amazing quilts it was overwhelming. As any of my blog followers know I am not an art quilter so really felt out of my league. The quilts were beautifully displayed and you could get a good look at them. We went early in the day before it got too crowded.
I got to meet Marie Bostwick at a book signing booth. She was a delight and I purchased her latest book, The Second Sister. I met Shannon of Fabrics 'n Quilts. We were in the same tester group for Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks magazine a couple of years ago. She now runs a Scrap Quilt Challenge. Visit her blog or her store web site for further details (http://fabricsnquilts.blogspot.ca/)
Our bus driver was a quilter so we had not trouble convincing her to make a couple of stops at Hancocks of Paducah. Our hotel was actually quit close to Hancock's. Our hotel was the worst thing about Paducah. Our entire bus was made up of non-smokers so it was a horrible shock to find out that our travel company had signed a contract permitting the hotel to put us in smoking rooms. Our poor tour guide was totally blind sided. 10 women from our group went to another hotel altogether for the second and third nights of our stay.
This was likely my last big trip of this kind. I am getting older and the knees don't want to wander around as much as they did a few years ago. The younger ones on the bus were talking about Houston in three years so never say never. Piecefully, Joanne