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.

October 2014 Meeting Minutes

Tampa Modern Quilt Guild

October 11, 2014

We had a packed house today, with many visitors, of which we gained new members.  Welcome!

Visitors today:  Patti French, Jan Gerhart, Carol Tricka, Melissa Mathis, Deana Sola, Patty Hanson, Becky Mathis, Dianne Tanello, Flo McGee, Lisa Aubrey.  (I apologize for any misspelling of names)

Members present:  Adele, Anita, Terri, Kim, Sandy, & Ellen A.

Today, we received blocks that everyone made for the QuiltCON charity challenge.  We designed a quilt utilizing them.  Ellen and Sandy took it home to finish the piecing.  Katie agreed to quilt it.  Adele is making the binding and we will all sew part of the binding at the November meeting to finish the quilt.  It is due to MQG before February 2015 and will hang at the QuiltCON.  Can’t believe it is almost queen size with the minimum size requirement from MQG. 

Today also was our “stuff” exchange.  Lots of fun stuff came and went.  We even had shoppers come and look over our “stuff” and take some, too.  It was a fun event.

Terri shared information about a Flickr group called Add-a-Border Block Swap.  Dustin Cecil runs it.  It is a form of round robin.  You send in a block, receive another one, add a border and then send it back in.  Eventually, your block is returned to you with borders added. 

Current challenge is our Dali challenge, due at the November meeting.  A small project based on what was your inspiration at the Dali Museum.  We saw Anita’s pillow, with triangles and a mustache, how fun. 

Our Project Linus quilts are due at the November meeting, also.  Ellen has the labels for you to use on your quilt.

Block of the Month for October is for Terri.  She is using one from Tula Pink’s 100 Blocks Quilt Book.  Directions and color request are up on our Facebook page. 

News from Crafty Threads: 

Quilt Auction, December 13

Retreat, Hampton Inn, Oldsmar, November 13-16

August 9, 2014 Meeting Minutes

Tampa Modern Quilt Guild

August 9, 2014

In attendance:  Ellen, Sandy, Anita, Sara, Carol, Adele, and Ellen S.

Guests:  Pattie French, Lola Bolton, and Dianne Tanella

Our Tampa MQG flyers are on Facebook, so you can download and print to take to any quilt shop that Ellen hasn’t already.  Flyers are at Crafty Threads, Happy Apple Quilts, Keep Me In Stitches Carrollwood, Scrap and Sew.  Happy Apple is providing a 10% discount with your membership card.

Our September meeting will be at Dali Museum.  We will have a pixel challenge following this meeting.  Arrive at 10AM, have lunch either at the Museum or somewhere around it, and have our Sew & Share at lunch.

Quilt CON has 3 challenges:

1. Panasonic Bias Tape Appliqué.  Minimum size is 36 inches square.  You must make your own bias tape.
2. Michael Miller Spring Cotton Couture. You sign up as an individual online with the national MQG  and they send you the featured fabrics.  Any fabrics you add must be MM from Spring Cotton Couture or any of its solids.  National is saying, only request the fabric if you plan to create and enter the challenge. 
3. Local group challenge, to create a Charity Quilt using the colors of the MQG logo, with white and grey.  A file is posted on our facebook page containing color references to use.  We will be making either 12 inch or 6 inch finished blocks, using an alternate grid work pattern.  Bring to the October meeting, and we will then design our quilt from our blocks, collectively put it together, and have someone take it home to quilt.  At the November meeting, we will bind it and ready to be sent off to Austin for the Quilt CON in February. 

October meeting is our swap meeting, to bring in quilting/sewing supplies we no longer use and can swap with others. 

November meeting we will collect our Linus Quilts.

Block of the Month.  Everyone brought in the economy blocks for Katie.  Next block is for Sandy.  She demonstrated how to make the disappearing hourglass block.  She provided the “I Like You” 10 inch fabric square for the background, and you complete it with a bright or novelty fabric.

Demos: 

Ellen showed her cook book holder that she uses to keep quilt books open.  It is cheaper than having your books cut and spiral bound.

Adele showed her paper piecing with freezer paper.  Fascinating, that you don’t sew on the line, you fold the freezer paper and sew next to the fold, after you are done, you just lift off the freezer paper and use it again.

Show & Tell

Anita:  Tessellating stars

Ellen S:  Citrus sunshine strip ‘n flip; 18 inch origami bag; grey strips pillow in process

Adele:  little bag/pouch

Sandy:  baby quilts for neonatal unit that VanDyke Quilters make; hexie eye spy quilt

July Meeting Minutes

Tampa Modern Quilt Guild  July 12, 2014

Welcome back some folks and new folks to our group.  In attendance, Ellen A, Sandy, Ann, Katie, Kim, Ellen S, Sara, Linda, Adelle, Emily.

We have a new logo, thank you Katie for designing the Tampa skyline with hexies, terrific.

Dues for the year are due, $25.

Blocks of the Month:

Everyone brought in the red and white quilty cross blocks for Ann.  Katie gave us all a paper piecing Economy Block as her choice.

Michael Miller Challenge:

What a great job by everyone.  Katie did a Dresden appliqué, called Hop Scotch Lane.  Ann created orange peels.  Sandy made sun rise/sun set.  Ellen A made Curvy Mammoth or Curvy MF, its affectionate name.  Emily made Improv Pinwheels.  Adelle created Taking Shape.  Everyone shared their design story and how the quilt changed during the process.  We voted, and a tie between Katie and Adelle.  Katie won a package of batting and Adelle received a fat quarter bundle.  Congratulations to everyone and their quilts.

Katie will create a link on Facebook to the blogs and Instagram.

Show & Tell:

Ellen S. shared her strip star HST pillow cover and strip yellow quilt top. 

Area Info:

It was mentioned that Carol Friedlander would be at Inspire in Plant City on July 23 for a trunk show.  Her architectural fabrics are being made again. 

Shop Hops in the area, Row by Row, a multi-state shop hop.  Toscana Blending, with 37 shops across Florida.

Mass Drop online offers a way for people to collectively purchase items of all types, including fabric and other crafting items.  Check them out. Current drop is the Patchwork Threads T-Shirts!

Next Guild Project:

Moving our outing trip to our September date.  Crafty Threads is hosting a huge Konkerr Cancer event in September, so a perfect time for us to explore and find inspirations for a small project.  May be visiting the Dali museum. Consensus was the chiluly and glasst Spot may still be too ‘hot’ to visit.  We learned that the Dali museum is no charge to Bank of America credit card holders on the first w/e of the month.

Next meeting:  Crafty Threads, 10A – 3P, August 9.  Demos:  Katie & basting, Ann & binding, Adelle & freezer paper piecing.  Any other ideas of small demos, please bring them! Need help on a project? Bring it!  Sara will be the next Block of the Month.  Should be a fun meeting and learning session.