March Meeting

We had a very nice turn out for our meeting, and a lot of people brought there machine for the afternoon quilting workshop. Over 20 cat quilts were made and thanks to all that participated and to those that took home some quilt to serge the edges. I"m sure the SPCA will be very happy with them.
Our retreat at the Victoria Inn, room 101, is set for April 18 and 19. Please bring your sewing machines, extention cords, a floral/spring fat quater for the exchange, two copies of a cookie recipe for the recipe exchange, a half dozen goodies for us to nibble on and of coarse a quilting project to work on.

We discussed the Quilts of Valour project and made a motion to donate our maple leaf quilt that was finished last fall to the project. I have contacted the organizer and she will be sending me inforation on where to send it. Their website is www.automatedquill.com/QoV

We had a fanastic show and tell. Here is Blanches Bow Tie quilt with the blocks that she had won a few years ago. It is hand quilted and the Bow Ties are sashed with attic windows!


Here is Adele's Northwoods quilt that she also hand quilted.

Lori made a banner for her church, i'm sure they are going to love it.

We had a great response for the kids bags for Family Services...way to go ladies!

Our program for the evening was curved piecing and everyone got to sit down and try one. Our new comfort block has curved piecing, it is a cute turtle block that will make a great kids quilt. The guild provided the background fabric and members use their own fabric for the turtles. I have posted pictures of the three i made on my blog if you where not there to see them.

The complete block for our Mystery quilt project was revealed at the meeting and next month you will get the border instructions. We are all looking forward to seeing how everyone's turned out.

Have a great month quilting!

March Meeting Reminder

March 17 is our next meeting and i just want to remind you that we will be having a machine quilting lesson in the afternoon from 1 to 5pm. So if your interested in practicing your quilting we will have small cat and dog quilts for everyone to work on. Bring your sewing machine, extention tables, extention cord, basic sewing kit ( scissors, bobbins, etc), thread that you normally quilt with, and most importantly your walking foot and darning foot. If you have Machingers gloves bring those, i have two pair and the guild had a pair if you have never tried them. Also some paper and a pen for taking notes and for practicing drawing designs before you try them on the quilt.

My plan is to show you how to baste the small quilt on a table, then play with the tension on your machines using your walking foot and darning foot and then start quilting. I think the main goal of the afternoon will be to learn how to adjust tension on your machines ( different threads and feet need different tension) and to get your stitches even when freemotioning. The guild does have pounce and stencils if your feel like trying to follow a design too.



I wanted to add this photo on the last posting but i could only post 5 pictures. So here is what we do after the meetings when we are cleaning up. A few months ago Sandra had told us the story of the quilt her daughters made with fabric from her high school grad dress and we asked her to bring the dress. She brought it to the February meeting and i just had to try it on...see how my sweater matches the binding!! This is such a great picture of Sandra!

See you all at the meeting!

February Meeting

We had a small group out during the day to work on the vintage quilt, just have the borders left to add on. A lot of finished quilts were getting labels sewn on and bindings finished so we have a nice collection of comfort quilts again that need a good home.

We decided that we should have a machine quilting workshop in the afternoon of the March Meeting. We pieced together small quilt 'sandwiches' for members to practice on and then these quilts well be donated to the SPCA...so no pressure for perfect stitches! I'm hoping this will be a fun practice and help boost members confidence in there machine quilting. We would like to see more members taking home our comfort quilt to quilt. So bring your sewing machines and extension cords to the March meeting and we will quilt from 1 pm to 5pm. We will have plenty of quilt sandwiches to work on but if you want to bring your own the cat size quilt is 20"x20" and the dog size is 36" x 38". We will show you how to baste the small quilts too.

We have a retreat planned for April 18 and 19 at the Victoria Inn. Hope to have another good turn out for that event.

Some of our Bargello blocks were turned in at the meeting and they look amazing! I look forward to seeing the rest at the March meeting.

(Humm...that picture took me 10 minutes to upload, and it won't center...i'll have to get a lesson from Sandra when she comes back.)

We had one of the best Show and Tell's in a long time, a lot of members participating. I guess we are all keeping warm by our sewing machines this winter. Here is Lorna's Northwoods quilt and a purse to match!

(Yah, i got it centered!)

Here is Audrey with a table topper.

Here is Marg teaching us how to make Attic Windows and also giving us some information on sewing needles.

And finally here is Lori and Kathy's Trend Tex Challenge that will be sent to Quilt Saskatoon 2009. I think the sanity of the Trend Tex employee who picks these fabrics is in question, don't you.

Have a great month of quilting and we will see you in March.

Keep Fondling Fabric!

February Meeting Notice

Just a reminder that our next meeting is on Tuesday, February 17 at the United Church from 9am to 9pm.

During the day we will be working on putting together a quilt using the paper pieced tree blocks we made last year...remember those.

Also at the last meeting we started putting together a quilt using vintage blocks that are hand and machine pieced. These blocks were originally bought at a garage sale and after many years of being stored away and not made into a quilt they were going to be thrown out by there owner. But instead they were donated to the guild and I think they are going to make a beautiful quilt.

If your having trouble with your Bargello block bring it the afternoon workshop and we will be happy to help you with it.

The program for the evening is Attic Window and Marg Faktor will show us how to put an Attic window sashing on our hand appliqued flowers.

Hope to see you all on Tuesday.

Bargello Blocks

While Sandra is away this winter i'll be taking care of the blog so i just wanted to test that i can add a post. The day after the guild meeting i was excited to get working on my Bargello blocks, it's good to take a break from the longarm...once in awhile. The blocks turned out great, this is going to make a fantastic quilt!

If anyone else would like to be able to post on the blog so they can share pictures or ideas about their quilting projects just let Sandra or I know and we can invite you on. It would be nice to get more activity on the blog.

January 2009 Meeting

The break in the cold weather saw a small group of quilters turn out to work on our comfort quilts. We had a very productive day. We tied and completed the flannel quilt from January 6th comfort day, and spent time working on the paper pieced tree blocks. These are the last of our comfort squares. But as you can see in the photo below the new squares are almost all in. I think there are a few squares still out, so if any of you have got your square, please either bring it to the meeting or send it with another quilter.

Our next square for February and March is the Bargello, demonstrated by Marg. If you missed the meeting and want a kit, they will be available at the next meeting. Don't they look like fun?

We had some show and tell, her is Alta with a baby quilt.

And Yvonne with her show and tell.

Lori and Kathy demonstrated the next phase of the Mystery quilt. It is starting to get interesting.

Yellow fabric that is to be included in the Bird House blocks is available at the meetings. A reminder that the blocks should not have fusible web applique. We are finding that they become too thick to quilt, when there are several layers of fabric.

The winter issue of the Canadian Quilters in now in the library and contains the photos of Adele and Alene with their CQA Rosette winning quilts from our 2008 Quilt show.

Happy Quilting!

Tamarack Shack

At last Kathy has her long arm quilting machine.
To celebrate the event she had an open house on Sunday January 11.
The Guild sent her this floral arrangement.


Here are some of the ladies enjoying cookies, punch, tea and coffee in the house. Lorie was our most gracious hostess in the house.

Since the Tamarack Shack is just the right size for Kathy, but not all the quilters we took turns going out to see the demos.

Some of us were brave enough to try out the new machine, and some just looked on.

Good luck Kathy, I know we are all happy.

Happy quilting for 2009 everyone!