What we got up to this February.

We had great attendance to both our gatherings and our sit n sew this month with lots of great show and tell. The Salinda / Nearly Insane girls are making great progress on their blocks. Thank you to the nine ladies who made it along to our Sit n Sew today. Before lunch we managed to make over 24 Scissor pouches for the Nurses in Fiji, we also managed to make great progress on our own projects after lunch.

Bridget showed us the progress on her Robyn Falloon Quilt

Nine ladies attended our Sit n Sew

Liz showed us the quilt she made out of the
butterfly blocks she purchased off Maureen at our trade table

We made 24 Scissor pouches at our Sit n Sew 

Some of our ladies showed off their summer
 homework on their Salinda Quilts

Jude showed us the progress she has made
 so far on her hand-pieced Lucy Boston quilt

Our Flikr account has been updated with some more photos from Show and Tell.

Welcome Back

It's been an interesting summer, hopefully some of you managed to get some sewing done.

Wednesday the 19th of February marks the first gathering of the year for Kilmore Quilters.  The committee have been busy firming up plans for the events scheduled for the first quarter of the year. The calendar has been updated with the current schedule of classes along with dates for several exhibitions they have been notified of.

February dates to note are as follows :

Night Gathering : Wednesday, 19th at 7pm 
Sissor Keep for Fiji / Sit n Sew : Sunday, 22nd at 9am
Day Gathering : Tuesday, 25th at 9am

This month also marks the beginning of a new project for Kilmore Quilters - the Honour Quilt designed by Maree.  We will be progressing through this quilt at 4 blocks a month.  Maree will be at both the night and day gathering this month to give us our blocks.

The ladies who were working on Dutch Treat should have finished their blocks over summer, we look forward to perhaps seeing their completed quilt tops in March.

And lets not forget our Salinda ladies - we look forward to seeing your progress too.

Coming up in March Kilmore Quilters will be hosting the Victorian Quilters Summer Gathering.  The committee has organised two guest speakers, three traders and plenty of prizes to be one.  All they ask is that you bring along a bra or two to donate to the Uplift Fiji Project, your hand sewing and $5 entry.  We will be selling baked potatoes for lunch for $5 but you will need to pre-order.

This past weekend our district and several other parts of Victoria experienced some terrible bush and grass fires.  Our hearts go out to those who have lost their homes and those who experienced the stress of evacuation.  We hope that all our members got through this event unscathed and safely.  Our deepest thanks goes out to all the brave volunteers who fought the fires day and night and who are still out there fighting the ongoing fires in Gippsland and continuing to put out hotspots and flare ups around us.

Rhonda has asked, "If anyone becomes aware of any of our community who have lost their homes in the recent fires could you let me know so that as a group we may be able to coordinate the gift of a quilt. If you have any quilts that you feel that you may be able to pass on could you let me know as well so that I can get an inventory started. A variety is always good as often quilts for males are not very plentiful."

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all our members and readers of our Blog.

I hope you've all had a wonderful Summer Break and have managed to survive our sweltering conditions here in Melbourne and have managed to stay safe from the bush fires.  The cool change has come as a welcome relief to all I'm sure.  Hopefully it lasts long enough to be able to get some time in the sewing room.

We have a wonderful year of events planned for this year, with many workshops to appeal to all levels of confidence and tastes.  Our retreat is filling fast, so those members who wish to attend will need to contact Maryanne and Bridget as soon as possible to reserve you place.  Full payment is due by the April gathering.

Our first gathering of the year is on the Wednesday the 19th of February at 7pm.  Are you ready to start the Honour Project ?

On Saturday the 22nd of February we will have our first Sit n Sew during which we will be making some Sissor Keeps before we get on with our UFO's.  These Sissor keeps will be donated to the guest speaker who will be speaking when we host the Victorian Quilters Gathering on March the 29th.

Our first workshop for the year is a hand quilting workshop with Julie Adamson on March the 1st.  Places are filling fast for this workshop, members are to contact Jenny if you are interested in attending and should pay in full at the February gathering.

This workshop will be followed up by the Vic Quilters Gathering which we will be hosting at the Memorial Hall in Kilmore on the 29th of March.  The committee are busy planning guest speakers, door prizes, trade tables and other surprises for what we hope will be a successful day with plenty of visitors from around the district.  If you would like to book a table for this event please contact the secretary on kquilters@live.com
We ask that our members and guests bring something to show and tell along with a bra to donate to the "Uplift Fiji Community Program".

Christmas Gathering 2013

Last night was our last gathering of the year.

We had a wonderful turnout with 40 of our 59 members joining us to celebrate Christmas and a wonderful year of Patchwork and Quilting

Once again country hospitality was at it's best with a wonderful selection of goodies to nibble on.

The ladies went to a great effort dress in a festive mood with plenty of Santa hats, lots of red, Christmas baubles and even the odd
Christmas vest!

Karin was rather festive

We had Show and Tell with plenty of wonderful quilts, 

Joan completed some wonderful quilts on her trip to New Zealand

This one attracted a lot of attention - she had a lot of fun doing this one

Maryanne is behind her tumbling block quilt top she is hand sewing - great progress Maryanne

Jo is making these for a Breast Cancer fundraiser

Maureen has finished another quilt top 

Jude is making wonderful progress on this one, another hand pieced masterpiece

We also had a couple of more quilt tops shown which I have added to the post about Andreas Layer cake class.

We've had a great year, 2014 will bring many more opportunities for our members to learn new techniques during our workshops and the chance to display their wonderful work at the Victorian Quilters Gathering in March and in October at our Quilt In.

Merry Christmas to all and we hope you have a wonderful New Year.

Christmas Gathering - Wednesday, 11th December 7pm

A reminder to our members that there is only one gathering in December and that it is on Wednesday the 11th of December at 7pm in the Kilmore Memorial Hall.  Bring a small plate to share.

There will be no day gathering this month.

We also have some classes starting already in March, if you would like to take part you will need to register with Jenny or Anne.  Check our Calendar for class dates.

Andrea's Layer Cake Class

Andrea's Quilt

 

At the last two gatherings we've already seen some results from Andrea's Layer Cake Class.  The ladies had a wonderful day and it's great to see the variety of quilts that come out of classes like this which provide such a quick result.

Jude's finished top - she added an extra border with a charm pack in the same range

Jenny's finished top

Maureen's finished top

At our latest gathering we were shown two more variations of this wonderful quilt

Liz's quilt top 

Joan's quilt top

Jude's Machine Quilting Workshop

A group of our members and a couple of non-members recently participated in a workshop with Jude Liebmann during which she taught them techniques and strategies in machine quilting.  This workshop covered techniques from how to put the sandwich together and basting through to hints on how to quilt a large quilt top.  Her class was very much appreciated by all who attended.  They all left with a sample of how to use each technique taught.

Maree likes to challenge us.....

Maree likes a challenge.  Over the years she has amazed us with her attention to detail, her love of intricate blocks and her amazing small quilts.  She took on the Nearly Insane quilt twice, she created two versions of her "Roebuck" quilt - one Big and one Little and has created a variety of projects for our members to take part in.  A couple of years ago Maree decided she would like to do the Dutch Treat Quilt and invited our members to join her. They were given 4 -6 blocks a week over the past two years, we hope to have those quilts on display at our 2015 Quilt Show.

Last year she tested our creative skills with a project in which over 15 members took part, these efforts were on display at our 2012 Quilt In and at our 2013 Quilt Show.  It was very interesting to see the variety of interpretations of her instructions.

Liz Kenny and Sue Cheney's Interpretations

This year Maree has a new project for our members to take on. The Quilt will be called Honour. The quilt has 49 blocks with each block being 6”. She will give 4 blocks per month and plan to start with the first 4 in February. The last blocks will be given in February 2015 so that hopefully those of you that have taken up this project can have the tops done to show at the April 2015 gathering. The committee is also hoping that we can have them completed to hang at the 2015 quilt show.  Maree will lauch this project at tonights gathering.  With this project, completion of Dutch Treat and a new group of members taking on Nearly Insane, we are sure keeping our members busy.