January and February 2015 Swaps

I am Cricket Harris and with the help of Yvonne Campbell, we will be arranging the swaps for this year.  

As a reminder, January's Swap is a F8 low volume swap, maximum of three different yard cuts.  Don't forget the meeting is this Saturday, January 10th!!!  

Bring your yard of fabric cut into F8s, each yard in an individual zip-top bag, and label the outside of your bag with your name.  At the meeting, drop your fabric off in the designated place.  Before you leave, you will receive your ziplock back with an assortment of F8s.  

For those still needing to cut fabric, here are the instructions posted earlier in the blog by Wendi Mihalik, last year's swap coordinator.

Cutting Modern Fat Eighths

1.  Press your fabric to remove the center crease.  Do not remove the selvages.
2.  Rotary cut your fabric lengthwise through the center.   This results in two pieces, each measuring approximately 22" x 36".

3.  Cut each 22" x 36" piece in half again lengthwise.  This gives you four pieces, each measuring 11" x 36".  

NOTE:  Solid fabrics are sometimes milled to wider widths than prints.  Be sure to measure the width and cut equal quarters.

4.  Cut each 11" x 36" piece in half crosswise.  This gives you eight pieces, each measuring 11" x 18".  A modern fat eighth.  


As always, if you have questions regarding the swap, or this tutorial, you can email me at cricket at superiorinhomecare dot com (M-F between 7 to 4:30) or harr703 at cox dot net anytime.  Your best bet is to text me on my cell phone or call me on my cell phone.  I am on the guild roster.  

February's Swap and our meeting lands on Valentine's Day!!!

For February, we are going to do a "Sweet Pouch" swap.  It will be a drawstring bag with a sweet treat for your partner.  

This will be a secret swap.  You will only know who you are making a bag for, and not who is making one for you.  

Sign ups are at the bottom of this post and close Saturday, January 17th.  I will assign partners on Sunday, the 18th, by the end of the day.  

There will be a program on this bag at the January 10th meeting.  I will be available after the meeting if you have questions, or would like assistance in making a test bag.  Materials needed, in addition to the normal notions, to sew a bag:  

- 3 fat quarters
- 2 yards of ribbon, or 1/8 yd fabric
- Coordinating thread
- Interfacing if you want to use it: enough for 2 cuts of 12.5" x 10.5" 

This is the lined drawstring bag we will be using for the swap.  The tutorial for the bag can be found on the blog, In Color Order by Jeni Baker. 

The only thing we would like is for the bag to made by the general pattern and finish close to the dimensions of the bag in the tutorial.  For example, you can piece the main fabric section of the bag, as in this tutorial, or if you want to make your bag striped, another tutorial is here.

Never done a neat nifty cut corner?  The tutorial is here.

All these tutorials are from Jeni Baker's In Color Order blog, so please pop over and let her know what you've made.  And maybe a "thank you" for the tutorials she worked so hard to give the quilting/sewing community.  

Hope to see you at the meeting!

Thanks!

Yvonne & Cricket
Swap Coordinators

Sign Ups:
Reminder, signups close January 17th!

Name:

E-mail:  blank at wherever dot com

Favorite colors:

Favorite sweet treats:

Name:  Cricket Harris

E-mail:  harr703 at cox dot net

Favorite colors:  all of them!  I know, no help at all...

Favorite sweet treats:  semi-sweet dark chocolate!  No red dye, no nuts please....allergies...other than that, I don't discriminate!

July Meeting/Sew

At our July meeting, Melanie talked about participating in craft fairs, since the Niceville UMC World Bazaar and Benefit is coming up in October, and some of us will be participating in that.  Melanie participated in the bazaar last year and learned a lot of great things that she passed onto us.

For instance:

*Smaller items (like bags, key fobs, burp cloths, etc.) sell better than bigger items (like quilts)
*Since this bazaar is in October, a lot of patrons will be looking for seasonal items (tree skirts, seasonal pillow cases, etc.)
*If you sign up for a SquareUp account, they will send you a device that you can attach to your phone to accept credit cards (with a fee)
*If you don't want to sign up for a SquareUp account, you can get paid through PayPal on your smartphone, but only if your customer has a PayPal account

Melanie has reserved two booths - one is primarily for her items, and the other booth is for those of us who don't think we can fill an entire booth, but still want to sell things.

I know a lot of us are looking forward to participating in this event!

The blocks for our charity quilt are starting to come in.  So far, we have 5 out of 12 blocks completed and turned in.  It's looking great!

We're looking to complete this quilt sometime in October.  Once it's complete, we'll be setting up a page on FirstGiving to raise money for our charity, Children in Crisis.

Here's some pictures of our Show and Tell...

Marcy's "Swoon" quilt.  She didn't use a pattern for the blocks - she figured it out on her own!

Marcy's iPad covers - again, her own pattern.

Another quilt by Marcy

Mary's quilt

Kelly's lined drawstring bags, using Jeni B.'s pattern

Kelly's quilt top, using a pattern in Modern Minimal by Alissa Haight Carlton

Kelly's block for the QuiltCon Block Challenge

Another WiP of Kelly's

Leslie's not-quite-finished block for the QuiltCon Block Challenge.  It's going to be amazing when it's done!

Some things to keep in mind for August:

*Our Sew Day is on Saturday, August 18 at First Baptist Church in Crestview from noon to 6 pm

*Our meeting i at 10 am on Friday, August 31 at Lynn's Sewing Center in FWB), we'll be doing another scrap swap, like we did back in December.  At our August meeting, bring in a sandwich size ziploc bag, filled with scraps.  We'll swap those scraps, then make something out of them, bringing back the finished item to the September meeting (which is our one year anniversary!), and giving the item to the original owner of the scraps.  Basically, we're making something for someone with their own scraps.  What could be better?  Also, if you have a block for the charity quilt, they are due at our August meeting, so don't forget to bring those in.