A few weekends ago was our local Quilter's Day Out. For the first time in a few years I was able to go and participate with a big booth for Quilted Joy. We brought along a few APQS longarm machines and cut and bundled a lot of our flat fold fabrics into 5 yard and fat quarter bundles. We had a great time seeing so many of our friends and fellow longarm quilters and introducing a lot of folks to APQS's amazing machines. And by the way, how amazing are those signs Amy made? Every year the QDO committee features a very deserving charitable organization and this year's organization was the Center for Women and Families. In addition to accepting donations at the door, president-elect of the KHQS and APQS George owner Mary Bauer pieced, quilted, and donated this Opportunity Quilt to be raffled off. Everyone at QDO was raving about Mary's quilt, how beautiful it is, how much they hoped to win, and how many raffle tickets they bought. Although I didn't win the quilt :( , I did get a kick out of Mary's choice of quilting design. She actually brought this quilt to one of our longarm guild meetings to get advice on how to quilt it. Our discussion in guild gave her a few ideas for inside of the dresden plates, but she was still unsure about the background. So Mary browsed through the APQS Youtube channel until she found a filler design she liked. This design is the Groovy Buds Filler I made for APQS! I'm so tickled whenever I see someone use one of my designs on their quilts, especially from an award winner like Mary! Thank you Mary for bringing a huge smile to my face! In addition to being an award winning quilter, Mary is also an amazing teacher. Visit the Smocking Shop's website to see when she and their other phenomenal instructors will be teaching next.