May's Modern Mercado

I wasn't sure what to expect when I heard our May meeting was going to be a modern Mercado. I've lived in San Antonio long enough to know that a Mercado is a market, so I figured this would be similar to the "sewing room sales" I've experienced at other quilt guilds in the past. A kind of flea market. But as often happens with this guild, I was pleasantly surprised. If that was a Modern Mercado, I have to say I liked it. I made the money back that I spent on my table, even though it was a dollar at a time. I came home with one bag less than I went with, so that felt good. And I bought some awesome stuff for myself. All-in-all an exceptional night. In case you missed it, here's some pictures.

Scrappy Bits Applique by Shannon Brinkley

At our February meeting, we were lucky enough to have Shannon Brinkley as our presenter. Shannon told us how she got into sewing and quilting, right up to when she published her book last year and started doing workshops.  She has a great blog and puts out a newsletter.  She also let us know she's starting fabric designing, so look for her at Quilt Market 2015 in Houston.  She had a volunteer (thanks Kristen) work on a heart collage for us  (perfect for February) to show how easy her raw edge applique process is.  She went through the whole process and showed us some of her quilts.  Shannon really made the process seem very easy.  She had her book Scrappy Bits Applique and other patterns/animal templates for sale at the meeting and sells them on her blog.  Shannon started out as a teacher and you can tell she was good at it.  But how great for us that she moved into quilting and brought this unique, fun and easy technique to the quilt world.  It seems Shannon's motto is do what you like.  And many liked her way of making quilts.

In addition to the guild presentation Shannon held a Menagerie workshop on Friday and a World Map workshop on Saturday.  Pictures from those events will be in a separate blog post.