I,too, have occasionally looked at the contests - and then at the requirements. Actually, for me, getting the final item photographed and the image on to the QB has been one of my big stumbling blocks.

How about a few themes being color based?

Such as green dominant or purple dominant?

Are "holiday-themes" discouraged? (Such as Christmas, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, etc?)

How about quilts made from old jeans/denim? I've seen some great ones on the QB - that were NOT rag quilts.

Or innovative rag quilts?

The size restriction - seems reasonable to me - somehow putting a potholder in competition with a bed-spread king-sized creation/quilt seems unreasonable to me.

As to the skill level issue- I consider myself an accurate advanced beginner - I look at some of the projects and totally ooh and ahh over them.

Maybe contests with limits as to the total number of pieces in the finished item (excluding backing and binding)?

I forgot to add that i too only handquilt so it takes me longer to finish a project.

I have never seen the posts, I might have joined in if I had....

I have never seen the posts, I might have joined in if I had....

I would also like to join, I've only been quilting for a 14 months now and still learning the ropes, the reason I didn't join in the contest were, I don't want to compete against another quilter who's been doing it for years, I don't think thats fair.
Maybe you could post Beginners 1-2 years quilting experience
Intermediate 3 to 5 years experience
Advance Quilters 6 to ? years experience
Maybe something like that I really wouldn’t know how you would break it up to be fair…
Love what I see so far as contest sounds great...

I don't know if "years of experience" is a very accurate way of determining "skill level"

Some "first quilts" are truly awesome - and some quilts made by people with "years of experience" still look like they have "room for improvement"

Some of us are very unadventurous in what we do - some of us have physical limitations that impair what we do with what we want to do - some of us are limited to what we have available to work with

I think the guidelines should be: type, style, size

I've seen "simple" quilts that I loved - I've seen quilts that I know were very complicated to put together - and while I respected the work that went into making them - I did not particularly like them very much.

You've given me a lot to think about. Thank you all for your input.

I would love to join in, but I never see the announcements until they are over! And I've been looking, too. Where are they listed?

Where do I find the contests?
Thank you!

I would like to see something for FMQ on a domestic machine but maybe divided into catagories for newbies to FMQ and others that are more advanced. I think the main reason there has been little participation is most of us haven't seen the contests posted.

Maybe having the link posted in the daily newsletter would get more particiation. I don't know about others but I rarely go to the Main page. I click on the items of interest in the newsletter.