Dear Guild Members and Fans –
We hope everyone will join us at our next meeting in the usual place – Trinity United Methodist Church at 1600 5th Avenue in Phenix City – park on the downhill side by our sign.
We had a great meeting last month (which I missed) including an unusual variety of ice creams at the Noon Social! We had a record number of visitors and new members which is fabulous! We hope to attract more interested quilters by word-of-mouth or social media. Please check us out on Facebook at galaquiltguild; or on the web at www.galaquiltguild.com. Cathy Poyner has been great about posting all of our news and pictures in both locations!
Our next meeting is the 3rd Saturday of the month, as usual, which is August 20th. The workshop begins promptly at 10 AM so please come early to set up your sewing spot. I am there by 9AM and always appreciate help setting up all the stuff we put out for meetings. Sunny Pedigo is teaching the workshop on making a Jean Circle project – you can do a table runner on up to quilt size. Bring your sewing machine and basic sewing supplies along with a marking pen, scissors, and glue stick. Bring denim (not too heavy or light, not stretchy) as yardage or old blue jeans. You will be cutting circles that are 7 inches in diameter. Having at least 10 would be a good number to start with. Sunny and Linda Jones are bringing lots of cut circles so if you don’t have any denim you can get some at the workshop to get started. Each denim circle will have a 5″ fabric square attached to it – you can bring a charm pack or cut your own 5″ squares. We have scraps of fabric too if you need some just to learn the technique. Sunny will show us how to cut and join the circles, so you get the technique and can continue to any size you like.
At Noon I am having a meeting for all officers and anyone on the Quilt Teacher Committee, the By-Laws Committee, and the Nominating Committee so we can get a progress report from you. We also need whoever will be working on the Guild’s participation in the Fall Festival at Fort Mitchell. If you have any interest in getting involved in any Guild position please join us to see all the backstage action and fun!
After lunch on your own (feel free to brown bag it or go to any local restaurant) we will have our regular meeting at 1:00. We will discuss ongoing business and projects, and for our program I will show a portion of a DVD on quilt history. As usual we will have prizes, the Block of the Month, and Show and Tell so please bring anything quilt/sewing related to show – could be something you made or bought or found in the attic!
We plan to have a sales table at the Fall Festival at Fort Mitchell to sell items we make for the Guild Treasury. This event will be on October 29th and is always a lot of fun. Members asked what sold well from our table at Pioneer Day – by number or dollar value best sellers included the rag wreaths, Christmas Tree wall-hangings, a variety of table toppers and small mats, bowl buddies, mini-prayer quilts, BooBoo bags, towels, trivets, mug organizers, coasters, jar openers, bookmarks, pin cushions, scissor cozies, selvage bags and thread catchers, and others. We will sell even more if we can get your help to make table signs for each item! So please be thinking of something you can donate. Fall and winter holiday themed items may sell especially well. The profits from these sales really help us pay for some top-notch teachers in the future.
Speaking of teachers, there are a few slots left for the November fabric dying workshop. The fee for Guild members is $35 and for non-members is $75. The fee includes your kit which contains 32 fat eights of fabric to dye and supplies. You may need to bring some basic items from home. We need your fees paid by September to secure your spot.
We are continuing to work on our donation quilts through this year so please show us what you’re working on. We ask every meeting for help on completing these quilts including having some of you do machine quilting (these are small and could be done on a domestic machine with simple lines), make backs and bindings, and sew on bindings. We have batting in a giant roll to use unless you donate your own.
Please review the attachments which include Juanita’s Calendar of upcoming events, and Frances’ detailed minutes from our July meeting.
Hope your summer is going very well so far and see you in a few weeks!
Linda Walker
President
GALA Quilt Guild 