The first meeting of 2017 was January 14 at First Baptist Church
of Crestview, beginning at 10:05am when Cindy called the meeting to order, welcomed
everyone including our guest, and requested a moment of silence for those in
need.
Cindy briefly introduced herself as our 2017 President, and our
2017 Board - Natalie as our Past-President, Roxie as Secretary, Bobbi as
Treasurer. Wendi, our Vice-President,
was absent. Additionally, she introduced
Loree as our Program Captain who presented an overall vision for ECMQG programs and asked those in attendance to complete a short nine question
survey to help with planning.
Cindy explained some of the expenses we incur as a guild - insurance,
door prizes, supplies for charity projects, space rental, etc. - are paid for by our support of the block lottery and through the
purchase of door prize tickets.
Starting the year off with a celebration of birthday wishes, Cindy
asked all members who were not present during the course of last year to please
come forward to receive their 2016 birthday fat quarter. Cindy also explained a change to this benefit
of membership.
Going forward, the Board decided to simplify the fat quarter distribution from your birthday month to distribution upon renewal of ECMQG dues. All ECMQG members in attendance chose a FQ! Dues are $50, payable now.
Cindy discussed the following concerns and new procedures; changes
that have come from various conversations and suggestions with you and from
observations at previous meetings.
1 - Please show respect the person who is speaking by not talking
with the friend who sits next to you. Socializing
can be done before or after the meeting.
Many times, ECMQG members have said how distracting it is when they can’t
hear the information being presented because of talking.
2 - Start the meeting on time.
All efforts will be made to adhere to this. Ava volunteered to be our bell ringer
beginning at 9:55am.
3 - Rearranging the meeting space.
Our set-up crew will arrange entrance tables and chairs so that late
arrivals will have minimal impact on the meeting.
4 - Show and Tell sign-up that emphasizes education. Think about
where your project fits on the Modern Quilting Continuum which was our focus
last year. Provide details for the
person tasked with posting to social media.
Categorize your project as modern, traditional, or utilitarian for a
more cohesive meeting.
5 - Staying within our budget.
We will meet in the smaller room on the west side of the church most
times because of the savings benefit.
We paused for door prizes with Cindy discussing the differences in
how animals are depicted by modern fabric designers vs. traditional fabric prints. She explained that modern animals
are usually whimsical, sometimes silhouettes, often given human characteristics
– emotions, clothes, or props - while traditional prints are almost
photographic replicas.
Our QuiltCon East top was shown with several details to be
finalized. Thank you to Marcia who agreed to be our quilter.
Natalie is the project manager for our Q1 charity
project, a memorial quilt for Emerald Coast Hospice. They are the organization we
made this quilt for last year, which was extremely well received by the families it represented. Natalie has chosen a design that will accommodate
the 330 names and dates needed; the colors are taken from our logo – mulberry (purple), salmon, bright yellow, violet, turquoise, dusty
blue, pistachio (light green), and white.
We plan to assemble the quilt at our February meeting with ECMQG purchasing the iron-on transfer supplies and additional white fabric. We have backing
fabric in our charity fabric stash. All sewists who
wish to contribute blocks, Natalie will do the math and provide details via the
Facebook group and Instagram.
Other charity project ideas proposed for consideration were quilts
for Project Linus and local wounded service members. This led to Cindy reviewing our 2016 group goals
and charity projects, and a discussion on the need for a Charity
Captain. Sherri agreed to fill that
vacancy. Please bring ideas and
suggestions to Sherri.
Moving on to new business, suggestions were made for 2017 programs
and swaps. Possibilities are a UFO sew-in; a program for hexies, decahedrons, and hand sewing; a program on sashiko.
Loree spoke about programs, the talent we have in our guild, and rquested volunteers who are willing to present short, informative programs on topics
they are passionate about.
Larraine and Amy encouraged ECMQG’rs to be swap participants,
stating perfectionism is not the goal, but education and the willingness to try
new things are.
Cindy had red, white, and blue Plus blocks from an idea she and Wendi
had last year, a UFO, which fit nicely with Faye’s local wounded warrior quilt
suggestion. Blocks in these colors will
be collected continuously through May, at which time quilt tops will be assembled. Cindy will post cutting details and size
requirements to Facebook and Instagram.
Cindy reminded everyone that our Facebook group is a closed group,
a benefit of membership, and non-members were being deleted.
A quick discussion and show-of-hands-vote determined the first
fabric swap of the year is Carolyn Friedlander next month. We will return to three fabric swaps this
year – February, May or June, and November – because learning about modern designers
and using their fabric in our projects is important to our growth as modern quilters. Future swaps are TBD. Suggestions included Lizzy House basics
(think Pearl Bracelets), Moda’s industrial modern blender Grunge, and Kaffe Fassett’s Shot Cottons.
Natalie
presided over the block lottery, stating all who participated learned a lot from
Amy about 60° triangles. The winning
ticket belonged to Amy who went home with 12 colorful units!
She also introduced February's lottery, which Wendi had sewn together, and which we had decided upon as a group (back in November). You can read Wendi's post and find directions here for the You've Got Mail! block.
Larraine volunteered to fill the vacant Block Lottery Captain
position. Her goal is to continue as we
have, with guest presenters and their ideas for modern blocks. She will work with you on how to make this
happen.
February’s program, a short introduction to color theory, will be
given by Natalie. February’s hands-on-on
workshop after the meeting will be facilitated by Mary who’s going to provide
her tips and insights for constructing this yoga bag from Modest Maven. Mary regularly makes these bags to sell at
craft fairs and says it is good project for utilizing scraps in the
quilt-as-you-go technique.
Natalie, as back-up-to-the-Treasurer, informed us that she had
verified all 2016 entries in our accounting program. We reconciled with the bank and PayPal as of December 31, 2016. The 2015 audit is incomplete because of
scheduling difficulties.
Our January program, No Scrap Left Behind, was Cindy's presentation about sewing with scraps of all sizes. She readily admitted being heavily influenced by Amanda Jean Nyberg, aka crazymomquilts.
Sewing with scraps comes down to organization, whether you sort by
color, size, or shape. Cindy says "you
have to know your level of crazy" because the definition of a scrap is different
for each of us.
All of the items Cindy showed were made with scraps.
We ended the meeting with 15 Show and Tell items made by Elaine,
Natalie, Mary, Amy, Kim, Roxie, and Maureen, all who were good sports with the
announced changes to our format.
Respectfully submitted,
Roxie, ECMQG 2017 Secretary
