FLORENCE, Ala. » The closest Marion Williams has ever been to Hawaii is through a photograph.

She’s always wanted to visit the islands, but there is a problem with getting here.

She won’t fly in an airplane over the ocean, "and I don’t want to take a ship because if I do, it will probably sink and Jaws will get me," said Williams, of Greenhill.

She is crossing her fingers that an interstate will connect the 50th state to America’s mainland one day. Until then she can dream.

Using a photograph of a Hawaii sunset, the sky filled with vibrant pinks and yellows shining through palm trees on a beach, Williams painted the scene on fabric, which she quilted and submitted to the Shoals Piecemakers Quilt Guild’s Quilt Challenge 2010. This year’s challenge topic? "Dreams."

She won Best in Show, Best Use of Color and tied for Most Imaginative in her first year as a competitor for her quilt "Sunset in Hawaii," one of 17 in the contest this year and on display at the Kennedy-Douglass Center for the Arts in Florence.

A few entries are traditional, but most are art quilts, covered with embellishments and textures and depicting scenes such as outer space or a beach house. The variety is important for those outside the quilting world to note, said guild member Karen Risner; quilters have a plethora of style options.

"They don’t have to do just grandmother’s quilts anymore," said Risner.

Quilting as a craft appears to be on an upswing, Coker said, gathering steam as the knitting fad slightly declines.

"It may be something to do with the economy, too," Coker said. "When you think of quilting, a lot of people think about scraps and pieces and bits and using what you’ve got to make something."

Some of the guild members learned the craft through family members, but others, such as Coker, learned to quilt by attending guild meetings. The guild has its younger members, though when Coker, Risner and Williams say younger, "we mean, like, 40," Coker said, laughing.

Women in their 20s generally do not have the time, they said, but time typically comes with age.

But even now, Williams said, she still runs out of time when quilting. If she’d had more time for "Sunset in Hawaii," she would have added silhouettes of her and her husband to her dream, she said.

"My husband smoking a cigarette, and I’m sitting there drinking a Pepsi," she said, laughing.