Quilt Festival opens

Wow - what a whirlwind day yesterday was.  We were up bright and early and off to finish setting up the booth. While it doesn't look like it should take a long time to set up our booth, it does. That is the same for any booth that I have been in - you think, a couple of hours and all is good. Our other colleagues arrived part way through and we quickly put them to work.

We had a bit of time between finishing the booth and the show opening. Yeah - a few minutes to relax. Then it was show time.

Show time!!!

I've been to preview night in the past, but that was years ago and I honestly thought we would be staring at ourselves for the entire evening. Not so - I barely made it to the booth when people were starting to line up to spin our wheel to win prizes. And you know what?  I was at that wheel for almost FIVE hours without really taking a break. It was unbelievable.

The others were chatting up people for our latest Chip Pack Challenge or manning the iPads.  It was totally insane. I mean totally. I shouldn't have been surprised because I know this is one of the largest consumer shows around, but the noise of that wheel sure does attract people.

It was so much fun to interact with the guests. And a few of them were Chicago fans and if anyone stopped wearing Chicago gear, I asked the score. Not that I'm into baseball, but this series was pretty exciting. One lady who stopped was about to spin the wheel when her phone went off. "It's the baseball score",  she said. I said, "STOP the wheel. We need to know the score."   All in all, we had a lot of fun with the baseball thing.

Several people that I knew stopped by the booth. I was hoping to get a picture of each of them. I did manage a couple, Jan please come back - I want your picture!!!

Mary Beth and me and Holly

We got back to the hotel after the show closed at 10 PM.  The baseball game was still on and even though I was exhausted, we sat in the bar watching the game.  Oh - it was crazy, but very exciting when Chicago finally had that last out. Rain delay - you name it!!!

I was so exhausted by this time, I think I literally fell into bed. I meant to shut off my alarm, but when I finally woke up  - it was almost 7 AM. I slept right through the darn thing which is something that I never do!!!!

Now it's time to get ready for another day.  I do believe that we can get into the show one hour early so I'm off to go and wander the halls to see some of the quilt displays as I haven't seen any of them in real life. It's going to be tight to zip around the floor and see the vendors and the quilts. And I do know one shop that has license plates so that is a priority!!!!

On that note, I'm out of here.

Have a super awesome day!!!

Ciao!!!!