International Quilt Show of exhaustion

I have just come limping back from the Houston International Quilt Show at the convention center here. I can't quote numbers or winners or vendors because, really, I was just a quick visitor. Another world spread out before me in dizzying splendor.....and awesome talent.

I thought I might look for some felt in the enormous vendor section, and when i found my way out again I was wishing for a stretcher. This is very serious stuff with extremely serious but happy people shoulder to shoulder and stomach to stomach within it. I was awash in prints and buttons and embellishments and ruffles and fabrics and embroidery and rug hooking and Christmas ornaments.
Not to mention jewelry, purses, silk scarves, do it your self kits and huge quilting machines with people driving them furiously. And about 70,000 women. Even the men's restrooms had been relabeled "women". Perhaps I will go again some day......in a few years.