March 2017 Meeting

OCMQG March Meeting Recap

We had a full house at Cosmic Quilting for our March meeting! It is always wonderful to see so many people at the meetings!

Upcoming Workshops

Playing with Color & Fabric: Making Your Stash Work For You with Cecile Choi

We have two exciting workshop opportunities for our members. Cecile’s workshop will be held on Sunday, April 30, from 10-4 at Cosmic Quilting. This is not a sewing workshop; it’s about how to put fabrics together. You will bring fabrics from your stash. Cecile will use someone’s stash as an example and pull from other people’s stashes to create intriguing color palettes and combinations. Bring approximately 60 pieces of fabric from your stash. Using a pattern that Cecile chooses as an example, she’ll show you how she’d put the pattern together using fabrics from your stash. The cost is $60 for members, $70 for non-members, limited to 12 participants. The workshop will be open to friends if it does not fill up with members.

Indigo – Shibori Workshop & Lunch with Sandra Johnson

Sandra’s workshop will be held on June 3 from 10-3. The location is in a private home in South Orange County, and will be sent to those who register. It is $75 for OCMQG members, and $100 for non-members. To register, email Sandra at sandrajohnsondesigns@gmail.com This workshop covers:

• • learn to fold, tie and clamp resist using historic patterns

• • indigo dye is a natural fiber which is what we will be using

• • dye natural fiber goods in an indigo dye vat

• • learn a method for creating an acvite dye vat

• • all fabric for dying provided by instructor

• • in class you will learn to create a variety of paper patterns which you can use on fabrics

• includes: fabric for dying ½ yard white cotton, dye, lunch, and fun!

Scrap Swap

Bring your scraps to the April meeting to participate in the Scrap Swap with the Long Beach Modern Quilt Guild!

Quiltcon Charity Quilt

We are seeking a female veteran that we can give our Quiltcon Charity Quilt to. If you know someone, please send an email to ocmodernquiltguild@gmail.com.

Raffle Items

Sandra donated three beautiful handmade items to this month’s raffle: A gorgeous fat quarter basket, a nifty zipper bag for holding sewing supplies, and a beautiful notepad/journal cover. Thank you Sandra! We raised $78 for the guild with this month’s raffle!

March Challenge – UFO

Thanks to everyone who participated in the March Quilt Challenge! There were so many beautiful quilts presented, and it was great to see so many UFOs completed. Congratulations to our winners!

July Challenge – Library

July’s challenge is to make a quilt from a pattern in your pattern library that you have bought and never made before. It could be from a magazine or a book. There is no minimum size; it can be a table runner or a king size quilt! You do not have to post a picture of the pattern you will be using on social media, but we’d love to see what you’ve got planned – use #ocmqglibrary or #ocmqg.

Quilt Show

The Orange County Quilter’s Guild show will be held on April 21-22, Friday and Saturday, from 10-4. Location is 222 N. East St., Anaheim. There is a special preview evening with a Wine & Cheese Reception on Thursday, 4/20 from 6-8:30 PM, cost is $25 for the preview evening. Tickets to the show are $10 at the door, or $8 presale. To purchase tickets, visit their website.

Quilt Show in San Diego

Jean Wells, a quilt artist and author, is having an exhibit entitled “Anatomy of Nature.” It will be at Visions Gallery in San Diego. Jean has been quilting for 39 years and owns and operates The Stitchin’ Post in Sisters, OR. She has experimented with many different quilting techniques. She designs with line, pattern, color and texture, and recurring themes are inspired by nature—rocks, trees, grasses, flowers and landscapes. Bunnie and Kathy have taken 2 workshops from Jean and can tell you firsthand that she is a fantastic teacher and person.

Her exhibit opens on Saturday, April 22nd with a special opening reception from 5-7 PM. The exhibit runs until July 2nd. Bunnie will be going to the opening and can take 3-4 people in her car. Send Bunnie an email at bunnie@dbmsoft.com if you are interested in carpooling. For more info on the exhibit, visit here.

Speaker for the April Meeting

The Batty Lady will be giving a presentation on batting and thread at our April meeting, thank you Alicia! You will learn everything you need to know about different types of batting and thread at this presentation, so be sure to attend the April meeting!

2017 Budget

One item was incorrect on the budget presentation at last meeting, the amount for our Cosmic Quilting space was listed as $300/year and the actual amount should be $600/year. Bunnie proposed a motion to approve the space rental and this was approved by the guild.

Block Lotto for April

Thank you Lucinda for organizing this month’s block lotto! Here are detailed instructions on how to make the block.

Traditional Meets Modern – “Blue Moon”

This is a block made up of four Drunkard’s Path units, joined to make a circle.

We are using the free tutorial from Stitched by Crystal

STITCHED by Crystal: Tutorial: Quilting curves – The Drunkard’s Path

The tutorial instructions are thorough, with clear pictures of each step, and the measurements are generous to allow for trimming down and squaring up.

For each block, the guild will provide two 5” squares of WHITE, and participants will use two BLUE (prints or solids) 5” squares from their stash (a total of four 5” squares are needed to complete the block.). Prints with outer space or sky motifs are especially cute and reinforce the Moon theme, but there is no need to purchase new fabric. Any solid shade of blue will also work. Your two blue squares do not have to match. Mix it up!

You will need an 8″ circle to use as a template. Paper templates were distributed at the meeting, but if you did not get one, you can use any means to create a circle with an 8” diameter.

When making my samples, I encountered two points that were not discussed in the tutorial, which might be helpful for first-time curve piecers.

1. One of the steps is to “find the center of each piece and pin them together.” The easiest way to find the center of a curve is to simply fold it in half and make a little finger-pressed crease. Match up the center creases of the convex and concave pieces, keeping right sides of the fabric together. Pin the center first, then pin the corners, and then fill in with as many pins as you find helpful.

2. I found that I was able to get the bias of the curve to stretch more easily when I fed the fabric through my machine with the convex piece on top. The tutorial pictures show the concave piece on top. Try one each way to see which works best for you.

Individual Drunkard’s Path units will be squared up to measure 4.25” each.

Four units will piece together to make a moon block measuring 8” square.

In order to create the Half Moon look, join the units so that they form a white semi-circle.

No one expects perfection! This is a way to build our skills with curves and try something new. Let’s make it fun!

See you at the April Sew-In on 4/9 from 12-4!