My Aunt's Star Sampler Quilt and Fun with TSA

In early August, my aunt from CT brought me a bag of 5 of her quilts for finishing. She's a semi-prolific quilter, who I suspect has a fabric stash orders of magnitude greater than my own. I have a few of her sampler quilts as well as others. This one I chose to do more custom quilting on the star points and the border. The 12 sampler blocks are all done with a uniform filler pattern.
I had to be especially careful on the green border because my thread was not quite as dark as the fabric. Unfortunately, every now and then, I find that I just don't have quite enough thread colors (yes that does happen when you only own 100 cones!).

I love the look of feathers as well as stitching feathers, so it's no surprise that I really love this quilt finished. I hope she does too.

I think with a nice burgundy binding, it will be just fab.

So, are you wondering what Fun with TSA really is all about?...or were you smart enough to read between the lines??

So, in the afternoon before I left Handi Quilter, I opted to pack up all my immense goodies to carry back on the plane. I was too anxious to leave them and wait for UPS to come next week; I wanted to use them this weekend! The box was heavy and I fully expected to send it through with my suitcase as checked luggage. I arrived at SLC airport 2-1/2 hours early. I was already a bit irritated to be there so far ahead, but another gal going to the airport with me has 2 replacement knees, and she needed extra time to go through security and to get to the gate. Me, I arrogantly assumed I'd cruise through security. When I checked in, the agent told me that the box was small enough to fit on the plane, so I opted not to pay another $25 to check it. I got my boarding passes and proceeded to security. As I approached, I realized that I may have packed a pair of batting scissors in the box. I waffled as I was in line as to if I ought to just fess up my mistake or just turn around and caugh up the $25 and go check the box. I clearly made the other choice! The TSA person at the line before the xray told me that the scissors were probably OK. Many pair are allowed now, if they are 4" or under. So I went on. As I put my shoes and box on the xray conveyor, I was (of course!) singled out by the xray person for a random personal xray check. As she is pulling me aside to run the wand over, I can hear the xray people saying "oh, what are these?...they look long. Are they scissors?..." Oh, I thought, this is not going to end well. After hearing horror stories from my roomate on this retreat about security stealing from her, I was hyper vigilant about my purse and box. Soon, me and my belongings were all in a not-so-private part of TSA security, only separated from the gauking public by a couple of glass walls. One rather butchy female (or so I thought)TSA agent was wanding me, and patting areas I reserve for only special persons, while the other two TSA men were going through my alleged contraband box of quilting supplies acquired on this retreat. They found the quilting shears (ONLY AFTER UNPACKING THE ENTIRE DAMN BOX), and then intelligently comment to me "you must be a quilter". Gosh Golly, whatever gave them that impression?? Was it the 5 yards of fabric in that box? Or the $200 in quilting templates? Or the 7 latest editions of all quilting magazines I was given?? They are sharp, aren't they?! Anyhow, butchy woman had to give me a way too personal pat down. She whispers in one of my ears "Is that an underwire bra?". If I was not shocked to be standing with both arms out to my side for this unnatural interrogation, I might have been more amused. She probably just wondered why someone that clearly shops in the juniors department for bras really needed an underwire! I hope she got some gratification from confirming that it was not a u-shaped weapon, because I sure did not! Anyhow...long story short, we retaped up my box. TSA walked me to the giftshop opposite security and let me buy an envelope and stamps to send myself the scissors. They have not yet arrived, but a girl with 25+ yards of batting downstairs can dream. And then he whispers in my ear "I really should have taken your toothpaste, but I let that go"! Like I didn't have enough humiliation that night! And I have Carrolyn to thank for making me be to the airport so early so that this bump in my plans did not make me miss my flight! Oh, the absolute joys of flying!!

Have a fun week sewing whatever you have!