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We had so much fun sewing in the beautiful bright recreation room at Island View Retirement Residence on Saturday, January 11th. We were a total of 5 volunteers and we accomplished so much. We completed the sashing on one quilt, made 4 touch quilts, labled an Island View's resident's special quilt, and cut over 40 blocks for the background of the new charity block. We had lots of residence visitors... and they teased us and said we were loud with lots of laughter!!!! Delicious coffee, tea, cookies and muffins were supplies by Island View. Thank you for your welcoming hospitality. -- Vickie MacNabb, Vice President and Charity     Three beautiful Bethlehem Star block quilts made by our guild members were recently donated to the Safe Shelter for Youth program which is offered through Family and Children's Services of Renfrew County. The quilts will be distributed to local couch surfing homeless youths. Representatives of the Safe Shelter for Youth program were delighted to accept our donations which were made just before Christmas. For more information about the important work of this valuable program refer to their web site.  
    A Guild Sewing Machine President Frank unveiled a newly acquired sewing machine for the guild. It's a basic Pfaff model and will be much appreciated by the members doing the break time demonstrations at our meetings, who will longer have to haul in their own machines in addition to the supplies for their demos. It will also be very handy at our hands-on sewing meetings. Thank you Mary deVries for the suggestion, Vickie for acquiring it, and to Nancy (Sew Inspired).  Black & White Block Exchange After dinner the people participating in the Black and White Challenge distributed their blocks to the other people in their groups. The 43 participants in this challenge were divided into 4 groups, so each quilter made either 10 or 11 blocks to distribute among their group. 
 Entertainment Anne Cruickshank led another round of the annual game featuring Anne's story about fictitious quilter Jenny Right. The fat quarter and lovely thread prizes were passed to the right, left, and across the table at a whirlwind speed as we heard those 3 words in the story. At the end the happy winners were holding their prizes. Thanks Anne! And thank you Joyce for a funny story that rang true with many of us! Draws Our meeting wrapped up with the draws and as usual, some very happy winners! Guess the number of pages in the book: Betty R 50-50: Marion M Name tag: Joanne K Gift Basket: Marilyn E Door Prizes: Liz C, Vickie M, Barb D, Diane A, Joanna V, Barb H, Julie C, Mary D, Paulette M, Anne C, Georgene B, Jane E Merry Christmas! What a treat we had at our November meeting. Kudos to our Activities team who calmly dealt with a late cancelling ill speaker and enlisted Bruce Young to entertain us with his fascinating 30 year quilting journey and his amazing quilts.  Left, Bruce Young and our president Frank Some of the interesting information Bruce shared with us:
Bruce showed us more than 60 of his creations! A selection of Bruce's pieces that reflect the diversity of his work are pictured below.and You can see photos of all of Bruce's creations in his trunk show in this photo gallery.          Hooked rug More photos - You can enjoy photos of the other pieces that Bruce showed us in this photo gallery.  Taking a close up look at Bruce's work Charity The hard work of our members on our various charity projects was in evidence at this meeting from the holiday placemats for clients of Arnprior Meals on Wheels, the large stack of Christmas gift bags for the local food bank, and 20 premie quilts for the little babies in a neo-natal unit. Several of these premie quilts were Christmas themed.  Placemats and git bags  Christmas premie quilt  Christmas premie quilt  Christmas premie quilt Coffee Time Demo Members enjoyed Shirley Fedoruk's demonstration of how to make bags for baking potatoes in a microwave oven.   Draws
Our meeting wrapped up with our draws and as usual, some happy winners! Guess the number of pages in the library book: Joyce T 50-50 draw: Daria H won $51.50 Gift Basket: Barb D Name tag draw: Eleanor K Door Prizes: Julie C, Louise V, Margaret F, Penny C, Mary D, Tina M, Jane E At the retreat, November 3 - 7, which was attended by 17 ladies at Providence Point in Lanark, a good time was had by all. We played a game with 2 1/2” strips black and white which were won by Ann Poll and Mary DeVries. There were also door prizes won which were donated by Sew Inspired. It seems that each time we come together for a retreat someone always goes home with a new technique learned or a simpler way to make a block. It seems that we do all get many projects started or completed. We do all enjoy spending this time together. -- Joanna Vlaming, Retreat Coordinator    The game!  Ann and Mary - Winners of the game             Click or tap on a photo in the gallery to see it in full. The excitement of a new guild year was still very much in evidence at our October 23rd meeting amongst the 62 attendees which included 6 guests. We have 84 members registered this year and we especially welcome our 13 new members. Guest Melanie MacDonald
 Chasing Dreams  Bright Star         Click or tap on an image in this gallery of more of Melanie's quilts, to see the image in full. New Challenge The Block Party challenge was announced with fabric kits ready to go, and many were snatched up. See the Challenges page for details. Coffee Time Demo Mary DeVries was the break time demo lady and she attracted a crowd of interested observers.   Block of the Month The new format Block of the Month program resulted in a variety of interesting Churn Dash block creations. Members constructed an item of their choice in their choice of colours, and showed them at the meeting. Draws Our meeting wrapped up with our draws and as usual, some happy winners! Guess the number of pages in the library book: Liz G 50-50 draw: Betty R Gift Basket: Marion M Door Prizes: Penny C, Rennie, Cathy F, Debbie C, Eleanor, Marilyn R, Barb D, Marion M, Agathe, Jane E We kicked off our 2019-2020 guild season on September 25 with a high energy, information packed initial meeting led by our incoming president Frank McCarron. We heard about this year's exciting challenges, charity projects, Sew Days, and Block-of-the Month, and we saw lots of amazing quilts during our guest Jen Swallow's trunk show, and at Show-and-Tell. We were delighted to welcome 11 new members and one guest to our meeting, for a total of 67 attendees.  Guild President Frank McCarron Guest Jen Swallow Guest Jen Swallow First up was our guest Jen Swallow, the enthusiastic owner and operator of Happy Wife Quilting, an online and retail store located in the front of her home just outside of Carleton Place. Jen showed us many of her quilts that she has made, and illustrated some of her favourite tools that she used in making her quilts. Jen's colour choices illustrated her recommendation to use colours that we love, and included a quilt that brought her to this conclusion. Her quilts highighted her patience for fussy-cutting, and hand work, including hand embroidery and hand appliqué. She also included several quilts that are the product of the various classes that she teaches. Jen showed us a quilt with 2 layers of batting - one wool, and one cotton. She likes to piece her quilt backs to use extra fat quarters and scraps. And she included a quilt with a digitally printed Santa Claus panel to highlight the advantage of getting more than the standard 16 colours in in a fabric, and a more environmentally friendly manufacturing process. And she included a feathered star quilt made by her great, great (great?) grandmother. The many tools Jen showed us included a seam roller that can replace time at the ironing board, and a seam ripper that has made her a self-confessed expert seam ripper. And Jen recommended fabric manufacturer web sites such as Henry Glass & Co (and others) for free patterns for our projects. Click or tap on an image in this gallery of Jen's quilts, to see it in full. New!! Coffee Time DemoOur new coffee-time demonstration were introduced during the break by guild member Ada Gawlik who showed us how to make microwave bowls. Thanks Ada! We look forward to seeing other guild members presenting during the break at each meeting.   BOM Prize DrawAmanda Vajda drew the name of one of the 5 last year's Block-of-the-Month block winners who completed a quilt top or quilt from the blocks. The prize was won by Joyce Trafford for her quilt using the Festive Flocks blocks that she won at the March 2019 meeting. In Joyce's absence (due to her Carp Fair commitments), her friend Cathy Russell happily accepted Joyce's prizes.  Cathy Russell accepting Joyce Trafford's prizes  Joyce Trafford's "Festive Flock" block quilt DrawsOur meeting wrapped up with our draws and some happy winners!
Guess the number of pages in the library book: Liz C 50-50 draw: Geraldine L Gift Basket: Paulette Door Prizes: Diane A, Patti M, Lori B, Tina M, Nancy H, Claudette T, Bonnie M After our exciting quilt show at the end of April we bounced back with lots of energy at our May meeting. And what a treat our Programs team had in store for us. Instead of one guest we had 4, all members of the Kanata Quilt Guild who each shared their quilts and their interesting and amusing quilting stories with us. Kanata Guild Trunk ShowOur first inter-guild Show-and-Tell was a huge success. The four visiting presenters from the Kanata Quilt Guild were introduced by our guild's Past President, Brigid Whitnall, who is the current president of the Kanata Quilt Guild.  First up was Beth who included 2 slab block quilts reminiscent of our past contributions to the Canadian Quilters' Association (CQA) for quilts for Ronald McDonald House Charities, in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday. Beth sells patterns and her lovely nature and geography themed quilts on her Etsy web site. She left us with the thought that "value is more important than colour." The first quilt that Beth showed was the Kanata Guild group quilt for their concurrent show at Quilt Canada. It was made by many members of the guild specifically for Quilt Canada in Ottawa, and it's the first quilt in the gallery below. Click/tap an image in the image gallery to see it in full. Then Lynn showed us her lovely quilts which included a shop hop quilt, and a mystery quilt in "the ugliest fabric in the world" (her words!) Lynn's Duck quilt is a David Taylor appliqué pattern. She has taken many of his workshops and made many of his patterns. Debbie was unable to attend our meeting but she generously sent along her stunning quilts for Lynn to show us - a row-by-row farm themed quilt, a round robin quilt with multiple borders, and a French General star block quilt. Judy was up next and blew us away with her 19th century patterns with vintage and Civil War fabrics of beautiful needle turned hand applique and hand quilting. Her hexagon quilts were interesting too - many of us were reminded of the fun we had learning how to make hexie blocks at a guild activity several years ago. This amazing trunk show was finished up by Leslie, the "colour lady". Leslie's travels, her work around the world with aboriginal peoples, and her interest in endangered species was in evidence in her quilts. Her animal sampler quilt was a President's Challenge. Kanata Guild Trunk ShowDrawsAnd as usual our meeting wrapped up with our draws and some happy winners!
50-50 draw: Liz Carroll Gift Basket: Katrina Kahn Door Prizes: Dawn M, Geraldine L, Gwen P, Mary M, Lynn J, Amanda V, Betty R, Joan M, Nancy H, Rennie H, Pam R Two Sew Days were held in May to work on the Bethlehem Star block quilts that will be donated to various local charities, including the Arnprior & District Memorial Hospital, and couch-surfing homeless youth in Arnprior. Led by our charity project co-ordinators, Ada Gawlik and Jane Wickware, some dedicated guild members gathered in the lovely bright, recreation room at Island View Suites, a retirement residence in Arnprior, to sew away. They made excellent progress and assembled 3 quilt tops. They also welcomed visits by a number of the residents of Island View.    There were 8 ladies in the last of this year’s workshops on Saturday May 11. 12 had signed up but only 8 could make it to the class. Chris Gordon instructed and the ladies spent more than half the day cutting and gluing villages together. This workshop involved a lot of patience and creativity. I think the majority enjoyed learning a new technique, based on the work of Karen Eckmeier. -- Chris Gordon    |
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