Did you know September is national sewing month? Being a quilter, you likely didn’t. Every time I mention I’m sewing, or I plan to sew….a close quilty friend reminds me “I don’t sew”.  But she really does. She has a sewing machine (or 2 or 3, maybe 4….enough to have a little sewing school in her sewing room with her grand daughters), she has sewing notions, and sewing tools, well, you see my point.

All quilters have basic sewing skills in order to quilt. Perhaps we learned to sew in middle school or 4H as my great-niece just did.  We probably made dish towels or maybe an apron. Maybe we tackled a zipper or buttons, or made doll clothes or a superman cape for our dog. Some of us stored our mothers featherweights in our closet. Maybe we didn’t warm up to the idea of sewing until we saw that first quilt that drew us in like a mosquito to a bug zapper.  You remember the moment….the shaft of light coming from the heavens illuminating that first pieced quilt with beautiful design and colorful fabrics? At that moment your life changed forever. You raced home, flew into the attic through the boxes and dust to find that old sewing machine.  You located your sewing box (no, we don’t call it our quilting box) and got to work.

Sew……since it’s national sewing month, maybe we can give our humble sewing beginnings some respect. Even if you haven’t sewn a thing…..other than a quilt, since.  Anything that lets me celebrate the idea of sewing and friendships that have grown from it is great by me!

To learn more, like tips to buy a machine…….

http://www.nationalsewingmonth.org/index.html

BRQG member and blog contributor,

Barb Schippa

Change in Plans: Due to illness, we have had to make a change to our
plans for next Monday night. We are grateful to Mary Smallagan from
Fennville for agreeing to fill in with just a few days notice. Mary is
known to many of you from visits to her store Custom Quilts Unlimited.
She is also an AQS teacher. She will do a trunk show and lecture and
also talk about a few new items at the store that she is excited about.
Please remember to thank her for coming at such short notice.
Please also remember to stop by our Program Committee table.
1. To sign up for our October Machine Quilting class with Linda
Thielfoldt.
2. To find out what you can do for our September guild fund
raiser, a rummage sale, auction and bake sale.
3. To suggest a future guest lecturer

BRQG September Meeting: September 25, 2017

Sale Time!

We have combined fun and fund raising in one big event.  We will be hosting a rummage sale and auction of quilt related items and a bake sale. This is one meeting where you can definitely bring a friend at no charge.  The rummage sale will run from 5:30 to 6: 30 PM. From 6:30 -7:00 PM we will have time to socialize and finish paying for our rummage items. The auction of our bigger items will run from 7:00-9:00 PM. A bake sale will run concurrently with the other activities.  

We hope everyone in the guild will contribute to our efforts in some way. Start cleaning out your sewing rooms now. It’s good to take inventory now and then so you don’t forget what you have. If you have duplicate tools; if you have finished with a book or pattern; if you no longer like the fabric you once loved; if it’s a UFO you will never finish, why not give someone else a chance to love it.  If you would like to make a couple pincushions, a tote bag, a needlebook…we would love the donation!

If you have an old sewing machine, serger, or other large items, we will have a consignment area. The guild will receive 25% of the sale price that you set.

We will only have the lodge for the day of the sale so we hope everyone will help by bringing your items early in the day. We will open the lodge at 8:00 AM and ask that you bring your items as early as you are able. If you cannot come that morning, we will have several places for you to drop off items earlier.  The drop off locations will be announced in September.

We also ask you to bring your items arranged as attractively as possible. That means if you have fabric that goes together well,  arrange it so each piece shows and put in a plastic bag or tie a ribbon around it. If your  fabric doesn’t go well together, bring it  folded neatly.  Anything you can do to help the display of items go easier will be so appreciated.

And that comes to volunteers. We have Betsy and Kris lined up to be auctioneers. Becky will be money collector and Dee Dee will be her scribe. Kathy will be an auctioneer’s assistant.  We need people to take in and arrange items during the day, someone to be baked goods coordinator, someone to handle consignments. I’m sure we’ll need a few more people to help with the auction.  Please let a board member know if you can help or sign up at the August meeting!  

Hi Everyone!

It’s that time again!  We have a Sew-in on Monday night, July 25.  We will be meeting in The Lodge at Beechwood Church from 6:30-9.   Bring hand or machine sewing or just stop in to say hello and see what everyone is doing.

Our new year will begin in October.  Membership forms are available on our website at bigredquiltersguild.org     Avoid the lines waiting to sign up at the October meeting.  Please sign up early!

We have openings for the following positions.  Please consider volunteering.  It takes a lot of volunteers to make a successful guild.   Contact any board member for more information.
Program
Membership
Publicity
Greeters

Upcoming events-Mark you calendars!!
August 28  Tim Latimer lecture and trunk show
September 25    Sew-in
October 23. Linda Thiefoldt-“Confessions of a Crappy Quilter”
October 24 Class-“Taking the Fear Out of Quilt as You Go” machine quilting class
November 27      Sew-in
December  No meeting
January 22, 2018   Sew-in
February 26  Sue Cortese lecture
February 27  Workshop
March 26, 2018    Sew-in
April
May 28, 2018    Sew-in
June 25  Weeks Ringleader or Bill Kerr lecture-Modern Quilt Studio
June 26  Workshop
July 23, 2018   Sew-in
September 24, 2018   Sew-in
November 26, 2018   Sew-in

For more information check out our website or Facebook page.

bigredquiltersguild.org
https://www.facebook.com/groups/bigredquiltersguild/

See you Monday night!
Sally Leep

Each time we have a speaker at our guild meeting, you can overhear friends huddled afterwards talking about the “mad skills” the speaker has. It may be expertise in machine quilting, hand appliqué, color, or design…..it doesn’t matter. We highly respect and admire their experience and skill.

The next thing you overhear is…..”I could never do that”. Someone asks if you signed up for the workshop the next day, and we reply “no, I’d be so intimidated”. So what we are saying is we have to already be highly skilled in a technique to take a class? Now I’m confused…….we can’t take a class because we aren’t good enough? Isn’t that the point?

I am not a spokesperson for MODA but I do enjoy their daily posts. Today’s asks some of today’s well-known quilt design names what intimidates them. Yes, highly skilled quilters can be intimidated and insecure just like us. Each have different issues.

I find all this fascinating because one thing I’ve observed with fellow quilters/sewists is…everyone is SOOOOO willing to help another quilter by sharing techniques or knowledge. Someone at a bee, a class or retreat yells 911, and immediately you’ll be swarmed by the quilting paramedics helping you resolve your problem. Thread tension, needle problems, corners don’t match, can’t get the pattern to work, the color is awful……what did I do wrong? Help! We rush to the rescue (perhaps too eagerly sometimes, but forgive us for that….we only want you to get “unstuck”).

Give a sewist a bunch of fabric scraps and they’ll whip up a quilt. Give them a problem and they’ll figure out how to solve it. Someone else has a problem and we will run thru fire to save them. Bottom line ……quilters are a lot like superwoman!

Happy quilting!

Barb Schippa

BRQG member and blog contributor

We were delighted to have Sandy Klop at our guild last night ! She talked about her career as a quilter and fabric designer and displayed her dellightful quilts using her designed fabrics- American Jane. She began her sewing career when she was growing up in Holland,  Michigan by first saving her nickels and dimes to purchase small amounts of fabric to sew clothes for her Terri Lee doll. She loves vintage toy look plus French influenced designs in fabric.

Hi Fellow Quilters!

I hope you are all enjoying the summer and all the sunny weather we’ve
been having!  Don’t stop quilting…you can still quilt at night and
enjoy the weather during the day.

Our next meeting is Monday, June 26 at Beechwood Church at 895 Ottawa
Beach Road.  Sandy Klop, designer of American Jane Fabric will give a
lecture titled “The American Jane Story in Fabric”.  Social time for
the night begins at 6:30 and the meeting begins at 7:00.

Barb Walsh and Marie Yutendale have volunteered to bring treats for
the meeting, but we could use a few more volunteers.  Thanks everyone!

There are still openings in the workshop on Tuesday, June 27
with Sandy Klop.  The cost is $50 for members and $60 for guests plus
the $9 pattern.  Join us, it should be lots of fun!   

It seems Hallmark missed a perfect opportunity to sell cards to a large population of us sewists. I mean, today is National Sewing Machine Day, and I have not sent a single greeting card to my quilting BFF’s noting this.  So this blog post is the fastest way to communicate and celebrate the technological advancement we enjoy today…our sewing machine(s)! Many of us might be shy to admit we enjoy multiple machines, some old and new, small and large, for heavy duty or classes, low tech and high tech, to get the job done.

According to Carrie Nelson of MODA, since the invention of the sewing machine  sewers save 14 hours for every 1 hour of time spent at your machine.  Many of us treasure our grandmothers hand sewn quilts because they were done by hand. This puts their skilled efforts into a completely different context……14/1 hours. We are fortunate to have so many options when our predecessors had none. Imagine a stunning Baltimore Album done entirely by hand!

Carrie shares a wealth of history thru the years of sewing machine evolution.  For more info check out her post:

http://blog.modafabrics.com/2017/06/one-hour-versus-fourteen/#more-15751

And…….Happy National Sewing Machine Day! Give your machine a hug!

Barb Schippa