Yesterday was a beautiful day for a drive. Mom and I got in the car and headed to Harrisonburg to meet up with Mary, her sister Deb (art quilter) and their Mom. The last time we met up was at least 10 years ago. It was so much fun to catch up again. Mary lives in Georgia but spends a lot of time in Virginia now so hopefully we will be able to meet up more often.
We met for lunch and then visited the Virginia Quilt Museum and Patchwork Plus, a great fabric shop that’s been around for years. On the way home we stopped near Waynesboro to visit some of Mom’s old neighbors. It was a really great day.
It was a treat to visit the Virginia Quilt Museum in their new location in Dayton, VA. In the early 2000’s our quilt club was very involved in the VQM. We used to do docent duty on a regular basis but, honestly, it kind of got less and less fun. Until a year ago, the museum was located in a historic home in downtown Harrisonburg. It was a cool house with a lot of history but it required tons of expensive maintenance that, in my opinion, took away from the focus on the quilt collection. I had not visited the museum in at least 6 years.
It was so refreshing to see the museum in its new location. The space is so much more appropriate for quilts and the director gave us a lot of background on how they found the building and about how much better the new arrangement is for budgeting and management. I was very impressed!
The current featured exhibits are log cabins and miniatures by Amy Pabst.
I was completely blown away by Amy Pabst’s quilts! This one, called Sari Not Sari, is 31″ x 36.5″ and has 31,308 pieces!! I took a lot of (poor) photos that you can see in the gallery below but you can see more videos and listen to an interview with Amy on the VQM Website. Look soon though because the exhibit comes down this weekend. There’s a photo with my finger in it. I didn’t touch the quilt but wanted to give some perspective in the size.
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