A very well kept secret is the very talented Valerie Miller of nearby Renfrew, who combines distinctive fabrics with traditional artistry and contemporary style to create table. pillow, and wall covers, each individual and unique. She was our guest speaker at our March meeting and her trunk show highlighted her lovely and distinctive fabric creations. Valerie's "Origin and Evolution" presentation highlighted how she evolves her designs from an initial idea to a final piece by making small incremental changes and never throwing anything away! She often starts out not knowing what the final design is going to look like and designs as she goes.
Valerie was inspired by her very creative and resourceful grandmother and her great-grandmother's quilts. Valerie creates dramatic pieces by very often using a dark coloured background to pop the colours on top. She uses a very thin and somewhat stiff compressed batting, and a cotton backing and very minimal quilting of the layers - just enough to hold it together. The batting is sewn to the top and then turned to produce a refined, tailored finish. Guild members were delighted that Valerie offered her patterns, kits and batting for sale. For more information see Valerie's Quilted Covers web site. Our learning activity night was our chance to learn some new hand sewing techniques for embellishing our quilts. With 4 new techniques offered - wool applique, 3D pinwheels, hand stitches for embellishing crazy patch quilts, and hexagons, we had a chance to learn 2 at this meeting and we'll learn the other 2 at the May meeting, providing ample time to learn each new technique. We wasted no time in getting down to work! Half of us learned wool applique and hand stitches for crazy patch quilts. And the other half learned 3D pinwheels and hexagons. Instructors Mary DeVries, Brenda McLeod, Joanna Vlaming, along with Brigid Whitnall and Donna Sheaves (who stepped up at the last minute in place of an ailing Chris Gordon) did a great job teaching us.
It was a big month for preemie quilt donations - 17 beautiful new little quilts. And we heard a touching thank you from a grateful mom whose premature daughter received a quilt in the fall of 2016. We enjoyed the photos of her daughter as a newborn covered by the quilt and another as a one year old sitting on her quilt! We kicked off the new year with our annual hands on charity project night at our January meeting. It was a very busy evening with three activities to choose from:
Thanks to all of the members who took kits for blocks for the auction quilt at our December meeting and then brought in the completed blocks. Our guild receives a lot of generously donated fabric so there was lots of fabric to cut up and assemble into kits for wheelchair lap quilts and preemie quilts. It was a whirlwind of activity with many hands (and cutters) at work! Fabric for preemie quilts is coming together into kits for members to pick up and assemble. And here are some completed kits for members to pick up to make wheelchair lap quilts Click on an image in the gallery below to see it in full. This lovely quilt stand was generously donated to us and won as a door prize by this lucky lady. And 9 darling preemie quilts were donated bringing our total for the year to 33. Several of them are included in the gallery below. Thanks for your generous donations to this important initiative. Click on an individual image to see it in full. Our quilt guild closed out 2017 with our annual Christmas potluck dinner and meeting. As always, there was an extensive and delicious selection of main course foods and desserts. The hall was festively decorated with a Christmas tree and several of our members' Christmas and holiday themed quilts. After dinner we welcomed special guest Reverend Andrew Love of Grace St. Andrew's United Church in Arnprior who introduced us to "Arms for Hugging", a project for the seriously ill that we will be working on in 2018. A huge thank you is extended to all of the guild members who completed wheelchair lap quilts for residents of The Grove Nursing Home in Arnprior. Several of these colourful and creative quilts are pictured below. And a big thank you to guild members who have been making little preemie quilts for the babies in the Rich Little Special Care Nursery at the Civic Campus of the Ottawa Hospital.
We saw lots of quilts at this meeting from our guest speaker Sherri Hisey, our own members' show-and-tell, and completed preemie quilts, along with many participants in block-of-the-month and the decorative stitch exchange. And Mary deVries shared some of the work done at the recent sew day for the raffle quilt for our 2019 quilt show. Here are 2 completed "around the town" blocks designed by Mary. Read more about this very productive day in an earlier blog entry. Sherri Hisey, our guest presenter is a quilt designer with her own company Border Creek Station patterns. Sherri shared with us the importance of balance in a quilt's visual space, how to keep it simple when decoding the math and some basic rules of thumb of quilt designing, and guidelines for setting quilts and borders. Getting it together in a unique and personal way is key to Sherri's distinctive teaching style-- there is always a way to process your creative thoughts and ideas into a finished project just let your imagination soar! We appreciated her very detailed hand out that documents various terms such as coping (the addition of fabric strips that build up or correct sizes of blocks, quilt centres, or borders to achieve a desired size), along with "quilt math". And her tips such as photocopying a quilt pattern in black, white and grey, to really see the design values, and volume (the difference between the lightest and darkest fabrics in a quilt to ensure sufficient contrast), and to help you decide where you need print and solid fabrics. Sherri's quilts showcased a number of her quilt patterns, many of which she brought along to sell. Click/tap an image in the gallery below to see it in full.
Our guild was in full swing at our October meeting. Many members have been busy making block-of-the-month blocks, blocks for the decorative stitch exchange, and for our charity outreach initiatives, little preemie quilts and wheelchair lap quilts. Our guest speaker Wendy Foster Birch educated us on the usage of different types of threads and offered a multitude of tips and techniques for machine quilting. Wendy illustrated thread and machine quilting concepts with her entertaining and informative trunk show which featured her beautiful and creative art quilts and her love of free motion quilting. Her work is bright and is often inspired by nature. She uses a wide variety of materials in her quilts and all types of threads including cotton, polyester, metallic and her preference for varigated threads. Wendy kindly provided her detailed notes on thread usage and also a link to a Superior Threads Troubleshooting Guide. Wendy's quilts vary from traditional patterns to modern and often with a whimsical touch. Wendy's personal quest for a wide variety of threads led her to become a Superior Thread supplier. Her threads were welcomed at the meeting! More of Wendy's quilts are pictured in this gallery. Click or tap a photo to view it in full.
Our 2017-2018 guild season kicked off with lots of information about this year's exciting and creative challenges, a new decorative stitch exchange, and the opportunities to contribute important charity projects. We enjoyed a fascinating and inspiring presentation by Krista Zaleski, a local creative pattern designer, and long arm quilter. Krista took us along her quilting journey from her first quilt to her latest modern designs. Krista's quilts often feature curves and circles - all pieced. Krista is an active member of the Ottawa Modern Quilt Guild. Krista frequently mentioned the inspiration she took from Judy Laquidara's Patchwork Times blog. You can keep up with Krista's projects, read more about the quilts pictured here, and purchase her patterns on her blog. More of Krista's quilts are pictured in this gallery. Click or tap a photo to view it in full. Our final meeting of the quilt guild 2016-2017 season featured a delicious pot luck dinner and a great opportunity to visit with fellow guild members before our summer break. Show and Tell, as always, featured several lovely quilts made by our talented guild members. And we easily surpassed our goal of 25 Canada 150 themed preemie quilts for the tiny babies born in 2017 and cared for at the Rich Little Special Care Nursery at the Civic Campus of the Ottawa Hospital. A selection of these adorable little quilts were shown at the meeting and are pictured below. Thanks to everyone who made one or more of these lovely quilts! The meeting and dinner was enjoyed by 55 guild members and one guest. Many members registered early for next year and 2 very lucky members were rewarded when their names were drawn to win free memberships. Due to the success of the quilt show fundraising, an extra free membership was offered this time. Congratulations to Barb Devries and Marilyn Erskine! Happy summer everyone and we look forward to seeing you in September! Laura Piggott on Modern Quilting
Laura's fast moving and inspirational presentation was peppered with many tips that included:
Quilters mentioned by Laura who have inspired her and who are prominent in the modern quilting community included:
Laura is an Ontario Certified Teacher and quilt workshop leader. Her workshops focus on originality, creativity, colour theory and improv piecing. You can find Laura on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/wafflekisses/ or #wafflekisses, and her older web site Laura's quilts are pictured below and included innovative modern Advent calendars, and her sailboat quilt which was headed off to Quilt Canada. Tim Hortons T-shirt QuiltOur guild was enlisted to make a quilt to assist the Arnprior Tim Hortons outlets in raising funds for their Send a Kid to Camp programme. They provided a number of Tim Hortons themed t-shirts which Marilyn Erskine and Brigid Whitnall made into this 60" x 70" quilt which they shared with us at show-and-tell. Moving ForwardAll of the executive and key volunteer positions were filled for next year. They assume their responsibilities on July 1. Special thanks to Past President Anne Cruikshank for her work in recruiting people for these very important jobs.
A highlight of our meeting was the display of this year's challenge projects and voting for our favourites. See the April Meeting Highlights - Challenges blog post for all the fun, including the winning projects. Congratulations to guild member Rennie Hickey whose "Refuge" quilt has been accepted to the Canadian Quilters' Association Quilt Canada 2017 national juried quilt show in Toronto in June. If you're going to the show, be sure to see it. Congratulations Rennie! Our guest presenter was Ann Coulas, a textile and fiber artist who often combines quilting and spirituality in her projects.
Ann showcased her traditional quilts in the first part of her trunk show. More of Ann's quilts are pictured in this gallery. Click on a photo to see the full photo. Ann then showed us her art work. Incorporating a number of creative materials including pop can metal treated with a heat gun, beading, mesh, sparkles, thread, and "Angelina" copper coloured special effect fibre, and a variety of techniques such as thread painting and painted fabric, her art truly showcased her unique talents. Her banners, which she teaches in weekend workshops, are often on a particular theme such as elements of water, earth, wind, and fire, seasons (winter, spring, summer, fall). Another theme is seasons - winter, spring, summer and fall. Ann also specializes in spiritual themed liturgical banners which often represent the seasons and festivals of the Christian church year including Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost. See more of Ann's work on her Facebook page and her guest artist page at the Purvis Gallery.
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