Saturday, December 28, 2013

January 2014 Meet-Up - A Slight Change of Plans

Voting on the New Leadership Team
Greetings everyone, and an early Happy New Year!

There is a change to our January meeting. Ginger will no longer be teaching her Free Motion Design Class. The design workshop has been rescheduled for the February meeting, which gives all of us an extra month to practice our free motion skills. (Let's all breathe a collective sigh of relief!) Instead of Ginger's design class we will be fulfilling two of the suggested program ideas shared at our holiday party...

Everyone that attended the holiday party was asked to provide three suggestions for 2014 programming. The following list was created based on those suggestions. For those of you unable to attend, we are still taking suggestions. Please post a comment here or shoot us an email.

2014 Programming/Activity Suggestions from Guild Members

  • ·       Color theory (2)
  • ·       Up-cycled materials fabric challenge
  • ·       String piecing
  • ·       Joint project or collaboration (4)
  • ·       Donate group project to The Pittsburgh Project or other organization (2)
  • ·       Quilt journal
  • ·       Planning/Completion Tips Workshop
  • ·       Completed projects competition
  • ·       Improv piecing continued
  • ·       Modern quilting/artist trading cards- suggested as a possible challenge for quilt show and/or fundraiser
  • ·       Community outreach with local focus
  • ·       Scrap fabric swap (2)
  • ·       More lectures and workshops (5)
  • ·       Sewing together (2)
  • ·       Retreat (4)
  • ·       Sister guild partnership
  • ·       Scrap sewing
  • ·       Block exchange- round robin concept (2)
  • ·       Shop hop participation (3)
  • ·       Mystery quilt
  • ·       Quilt show (2; but when discussed the entire group wanted this to happen again)
  • ·       Creative ways to piece backs of modern quilts


At our January meeting your new leadership team will go over a suggested program calendar for 2014. In lieu of the free motion design workshop, we will also host our first-ever modern fabric scrap swap and challenge. Here is how it works:

  1. The swap: Fill a gallon-sized freezer bag with modern fabric scraps to the meeting (Please bring scraps that are large enough to work with.)
  2. Every participant will dump their scraps in a heap, which will then be mixed up
  3. We will then each take our turn filling up our gallon-sized bag with new scraps 
  4. The challenge: Before the February meeting take your new scraps and make a quilted item
  5. Share the quilted item you make with your swap scraps on the guild's Flickr page and/or February show & tell
This is a great opportunity to do a little scrap house cleaning at the start of the New Year, and add some new gems to your scrap collection!
Holiday Party Attendees Showing Off Our White Elephant Gifts
In addition to discussing programming for 2014 and the modern scrap fabric swap we will also have show & tell. Please bring newly completed projects or WIPs to share with the group.


Feel free to drop us a line if there are any questions about the January meeting. As of January 1 Gina, our newly elected President, will be answering guild emails. We apologize for the change of plans, and we will get a list of required materials for Ginger's class during the month of January.

Again, we wish you all a safe holidays and Happy New Year!!!

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Sherri Lynn Wood is Looking for Volunteers!

Before we get to some extremely exciting news, we've got some exciting news:  all nominees for officer positions were unanimously approved.  This year's officers are:
  • Gina, President
  • Kathy, Vice President
  • Sarah, Secretary
  • Lauren, Treasurer
  • Melissa, Social Media
We look forward to working together and with the rest of the guild to accomplish some wonderful things in the new year!  

On to some super exciting news!  Sherri Lynn Wood, creator of the Mod Mood Quilt that we worked on this year, is coming out with a new book.  Even better, you have an opportunity to have your work featured in it.  The book is called THE IMPROVE HANDBOOK FOR MODERN QUILTERS: A Practical Guide for Creating, Quilting, and Living Courageously.  For more information on how you can get a sneak-peek at part of the book and make a quilt for possible inclusion in it, please see her latest blog post here.  Keep in mind that your work will have to be kept confidential until publication of the book.  We hope to see a few PghMQG members featured!

-Melissa

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Holiday Party Reminder

The Pittsburgh Modern Quilt Guild will be hosting its annual Holiday Party this Sunday, December 8, 2013, from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm at Sarah's house.  If you didn't receive the E-vite with the details, please let us know by sending an e-mail.  Please bring an appetizer/finger food.  Dessert and beverages will be provided.  We will be exchanging small quilted items (mug rugs/potholders) this year.  As always, feel free to bring show and tell items!

We will also be holding elections.  Gina is running for President; Kathy is running for Vice President; Sarah is running for Secretary; and Lauren and Melissa are running for their second terms as Treasurer and Social Media Coordinator, respectively.

As we embark on another year, please let us know what you'd like to get out of the Guild - bring your ideas to the party!  If you can't make it to the party, please send us an e-mail with your ideas.

We look forward to seeing you there!