September Meeting Recap

We had a great turn out at our September meeting. We had one guest and one new member joined us.  It was a big sew day for us.  Thank you to all that came and sewed pillowcases. As a group we had 12 members creating pillowcases and ended with a grand total of 64! This is three times the amount we made last year.  In 2017, think we can sew 100??

Our current president, Ellen A. quilted our QuiltCon charity quilt. It received many oohs and aahs! It is now off to our member Adelle A. for binding! The quilt itself is not due until early next year, but we hope to see it complete next month. Our label and sleeve are already prepared for the quilt.

August 2015 Meeting - Quilt Con Charity Quilt Creation

At our August Tampa MQG meeting we created the quilt top for our 2015 QuiltCon Charity Quilt.  At the July meeting we discussed the fabric choices and style of the Improv quilt we wanted to create.  We decided to work with an alternate grid, assigning grid spaces to members.  We decided to stick to a Star theme, whatever that meant to members! Most decided have a 'wonky' approach to their star block.  A few members were fortunate to go to the previous QuiltCon and see the Charity Quilts as a whole.  They remembered that quilts that did not use white as the background color really stood out.  The guild decided to use the Aqua fabric as the main background element for this year's quilt.

For the August meeting members brought in all of our star blocks and we built the top based on our original sketch layout.  We looked to see where we could add a few new blocks for members that missed the previous meeting. We had a 'Magic Quilter' guide us in piecing the blocks together to form the top.  Many members learned how to sew Partial Seams for the first time.



While half of the  members created the top, the others started using the left over fabrics to create a pieced back.  Crafty Threads, the quilt shop where we meet donated three yards of the aqua to help fill in the holes of the background quilt top. Our current president, Ellen A. volunteered to quilt the top. We will hopefully see how it turned out at the September meeting!

July 2015 Meeting

Thanks for everyone that came to our fun Christmas in July meeting! We of course had some business items to discuss, such as collecting the midterm dues. But it was a great party of a day! Adelle showed the finished quilt for Flood Texas with Love charity project, blocks collected the previous month.

We were able to give Barb from Crafty Threads our surprise thank you quilt to her, for letting us meet at Crafty Threads! This was a secret BOM we started in February and the secret never got out! Good job everyone!

We had our biggest swap table to date! And then enjoyed swapping handmade gifts for our fun Handmade White Elephant.

March 2015 Meeting

Project Linus Charity Quilt!

Our guild decided to try something fun with one of our BOMs.  Normally, in our guild one member selects a block for the month.  All members make the block and return it to the member the following month.  For January however we decided to try something a bit different. We selected a simple block, the churn dash, and had it floating on a 12" x 12" square. All members were to make the block in their own colors. But this time, to quilt it as well! We returned our Quilt-As-You-Go panels in February and then combined the panels to create a quilt at the meeting. Hence, the fun patchwork-lattice backing. One member took the quilt home to bind. We were able to see the finished quilt at our March meeting, for Project Linus. 

Dali Museum Trip

In September of 2014, our guild took a field trip the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Pete, FL. It was a beautiful day out and many of us had never visited the new location of the museum.  The museum contained the permanent collection of Dali's work ranging in size from a standard portrait to wall size masterpieces.
 


We went to the museum for inspiration and found many areas to build from.  Dali used color, design, and perspective all in amazing ways.

There was also a special exhibit on display, Marvels of Illusion.  We saw a quilt in the making!

After our trip, we created a mini challenge.  Based on your inspirations from the museum and Dali, create a mini! Here are some of the entrants from our guild. Everyone, even members who were unable to come to the museum enjoyed it. We hope to make a museum/field trip of some sort each year with a mini challenge.

Charity Quilt - Project Linus

The national Modern Quilt Guild announced a challenge, a Charity Quilt! If guilds contributed their time and talents, the quilt will hang at QuiltCon 2015! We asked our guild if they wanted to participate and everyone agreed.  The Tampa Modern Quilt Guild had already completed great charity work during the past year.  The guild donated an afternoon and created 20+ pillowcases for ConKerr Cancer.  The guild also chose Project Linus as our designated charity for the year and donated 14 quilts to our local chapter.

Adding on a group quilt excited everyone.  We had a block of the month going for our guild so we decided to set one month for Charity blocks.  Everyone was allowed to make as many blocks as they liked, using the modern quilt guild colors. Our only stipulation was the finished block size being 6" or 12" so the blocks would fit together easily.

Everyone brought in their blocks to our October meeting and we designed the quilt together.  The major elements were all arranged and put together at our meeting.  Our guild decided to work with improv design, and not focus on a grid work.

Our current President Ellen Ault and Secretary Sandy MacWilliam took the pieces home to finish the quilt top. We had some leftover blocks and originally planned for a piece back. However, after figuring out the math and tricky piecing seams to get the top completed, an executive decision was made. They bought an extra wide backing to put it on! Our current Vice President, Katie Ringo volunteered to do the quilting on her home HQ Sweet Sixteen. She said it was like wrestling a giant ball of fiber.

Bringing the quilt back to our final meeting of the year in November, we added a fun striped binding and surveyed our work.  Seeing that our guild is relatively small but growing fast, we all are quite pleased with the final result. A few members will be able to go to QuiltCon and take pictures of it hanging. When it returns it will be donated to Project Linus as well.