March Meeting Misses

There seemed to be a lot going on at this meeting.  I took notes, but they're kind of confusing to me now.  Joanna reported we had 69 paid members.  One new member joined tonight.  Lauren, Elizabeth, Lynn and Amy? won door prizes. 

We all voted on our favorite name tag.  Last month's challenge was to make a new one and wear it.  Many did.  Kelly's was the favorite. 

We had a report from those that went to QUILTCON.  Everyone who couldn't be there really appreciated the pics.  All agreed the lectures were incredible and offered their opinions on the best.  We're still looking into alternate locations for our meeting. 

We had some volunteers for committee heads.  Say thanks to Ellen who will be running retreats and Evelyn who will be heading up swaps and challenges. 

Next month will be our spring retreat.  Final payments were due but there were still openings. See Sarah R if you want to go.   

There was a drawing for those who are participating in the Fancy Forest Quiltalong.  Bunnies were due this month. Next is owls.  After owls the QAL will take a break to allow others to catch up.  During the break, some will be working on the Legendary pillow/quilt block.

Jen reported she received 135 NICU blankets for Threads of Love during Feb-Mar. The Quilt Shop in Castroville sponsored that challenge.  She will continue to accept donations all year.  There's a blog post with instructions. Apr-May Charity challenge is for Days for Girls bags for hygiene items. Watch Facebook for charity sew-ins.  This one is sponsored by Mesquite Bean.  There's a blog post with instructions.

Jen reminded everyone they could donate quilt tops to be finished for charities.  If you have some hanging around and want to declutter, she will take what you go.

Rebecca talked about the President's challenge.  She brought in the art that inspired her and her interpreted quilt.  For April, she'd like everyone to bring in their inspiration for the challenge. Quilts aren't due until August.

These were the blocks for this month's BOM.  Mary Ruth won the blocks.

This is next month's BOM.  Loretta had the corner fabrics on hand and the instructions will be posted on Facebook.  You can see below what a quilt can look like made from this block.

We had a great presentation but I'll post that separately.  Hope to see you at next month's meeting.

February is for Love

And if you missed the February meeting you missed a lot of love. 

Jen Eskridge, our VP for Charity and Outreach was handing out NICU kits to anyone who wanted to make one or two or ten.  She had quite a few.  The finished quilt is only 21" square and requires very little quilting and no batting if you use flannel.  Threads of Love provides these to preemies.  If you want to donate to this worthy cause, use your own stash, or ask Jen for a kit.  Jen has put on a 2-month challenge to see how many we can all get done.  And she has made it very easy for you. There will be a sew-in on Feb. 18 to finish up many of these Threads of Love NICU quilts.  Watch for the invite on Facebook.

She also had invited folks to bring in charity quilts in any stage of the process and others will work together to finish these for some other charities.  If you're decluttering, this is a good way to find a home for those unfinished projects.  There were a few on display at this meeting.  Guild members will do everything if you just want to donate fabric.  If all the top needs is quilting or binding and it's not something you'll ever finish yourself, you can let your fellow guild members finish for you. Decluttering netted our charity efforts some real beauties.

If you are willing to donate your skills, you'll be able to pick up tops that just need quilting, or maybe just binding.  If you have some UFOs you've given up on,  you can drop them off with Jen, and she'll be bringing these to meetings so folks can pick one up and finish it and donate it to a good cause.
 

If you missed the meeting you also missed all the loving humps and bumps folks contributed to the block of the month.  Jen Eskridge was the lucky winner and I'm sure she'll make something awesome -- maybe multiple awesomes.  And Loretta, our creative BOM committee chair, brought some suggestions of how to use the blocks.

Our next Block of the Month is a red bird on a yellow background.  It was adorable and you had two choices (with or without wing). Loretta will be posting both in multiple sizes on Facebook soon.

It's already posted on facebook, but in case you missed it, we have added a new page to our blog called resources.  It includes listings and links for our guild member businesses, links and addresses for local quilts shops and no-so-local quilt shops, and a long list of links to other Modern Quilt Guild websites. Show some love to our fellow guild members when you can, and don't forget to love local and not so local small quilting businesses too.  And if you need some inspiration or motivation.  Check out what other modern quilters are doing at their own guilds and see if you can't find something there to love.  Rebecca also asked if we could make a list of member blogs and list them on our blog.  If you'd like your blog listed on the guild blog so others can check in on what you're doing and show you some love, provide your blog URL to Cathy by email or FB messenger.

You also missed one of the things I love most about our guild, the announcement of our next Quilting Retreat at the Main House in Kerrville.  All the details are on Facebook.  If you didn't already reserve your slot, you can send a deposit to Sarah to hold a spot just for you.

Rebecca, our fearless president, announced two challenges.  For the first challenge, she provided everyone at the meeting a ribbon with the SAMQG logo and a pin to be used to make yourself a modern nametag.  We have quite a few new members and to help get to know each other, we are asking everyone to wear a name tag.  If you don't have a home made fabric name tag, there will be paper versions for you to wear, but we're hoping everyone takes the time to participate in this challenge and make themselves a new name tag even if they already have one or two or ten.
 

The challenge is to make any kind of modern design  name tag in any size you'd like, somehow incorporating the ribbon, and bring them to the March meeting. If you need a ribbon, contact Rebecca, she had plenty of extras. We'll show off our new nametag at the March meeting  and members will vote for their favorite tag in different categories.  Prizes will be awarded.  Don't we all love prizes?  And I know I love meeting new members. So a lot of love on this challenge.

The second challenge is her President's challenge for this year.  She admitted that being able to host this challenge is the main reason she wanted to be our leader.  She loves this challenge so much, she's already made her quilt for the challenge and had so much fun she's thinking about doing another.  The challenge is to create a quilt based on someone who inspires you (you can read this as someone or something you love).  An author, musician, poet, artist -- check out your favorite (aka most-loved), get inspired and make a quilt of any size, color or technique. You're sure to love it and we'll love seeing it.  In April you'll be asked to bring in your inspiration, whatever/whoever it is.  Then, at the July meeting, the finished challenge quilts will be revealed.  I'm sure we'll all love the eye candy that results.

Sew-n-Tell was great this month.  I loved it and I'll post that in a separate blog post.  And you'll be able to find some on facebook, some on Instagram, and others here on the blog. We'll continue to do that in the future.

In an effort to receive feedback from our members and not send out another survey, poster boards with questions were placed around the room for you to provide some input to the board on improvements or ideas you have about the guild, building community, education opportunities, and community service/charity.  If you're interested in providing your feedback, let one of the board members know and we'll provide you the questions too.

Our presentation, Technology's Role in the Quilting World, ended up being a round robin as there were some issues with the technology in the room.  Guild members shared loads of information and tips on using Instagram, Periscope, Blogs and other technology.  The provided a lot of reasons for quilters to love technology.  I'll add some of the tips I picked up to the Sew-n-Tell pics in another post.  I know some of our members have found so many ways to use technology to support their quilting but this opened my eyes to other things I could do myself.  Thanks to all the presenters.  I loved it (bet you saw that one coming).

Enjoy the month of Love.  Hope you get time to quilt.