Laura Wasilowski,

Laura Wasilowski is a well known quilter whose bright compositions are mostly fused, not appliqued.  She was today's speaker at the Bayberry Quilt Guild's final meeting of the season.  Although most of her luggage didn't arrived in Providence, R.I., when she and her husband landed yesterday, and hasn't caught up with them yet, she had her computer with a well arranged slide show and she had her very funny stand-up comic routine. 

Speakers usually tell us about their methods or their quilting history, show us some of their work (which she could have done had it arrived) but most speakers don't have the sense of humor and the prepared material to do a half hour or more of really very funny talking about her self and her quilting -- throwing in quite a few songs about everything from adopting her husband's Polish name to her mythological Chicago School of Fusing.  She is a sponatneous artist, she dies all her own fabric and thread and simply gets an idea and begins cutting up fabric that has been fused.  She keeps the trimmed scraps and incorporates them in future work.

It was a complete surprise to most of us that we would be so entertained and laugh so much -- we loved it. I wish all the speakers had her poise --  it's impossible to wish for her sense of humor because that is a totally personal trait.  And her delivery was perfect.  She will not fade in my memory as so many other speakers   already have.