February meeting - never too young

You are never too young to attend the Edinburgh Modern quilt guild :-) can I have an awwwwww! What a cutie! Please meet Matthew, the next Luke Haynes?? Who knows, watch this space. Lesley, Matthews mother waited less than a month before coming back to the guild, that's dedication! we missed you Lesley!

 

Oh dear, it is safe to say that only one thing could tear our members away from this cute young chap, yep the draw for the charity quilt!!

Do you remember the quilt we made for quilt con last year??

The wonderfully talented Jo Avery made another which featured in Love Patchwork and Quilting. This second quilt was being raffled to raise funds for the Edinburgh Clothing Store. Love Patchwork and Quilting were so generous not only giving a donation but also a raffle prize of a years subscription! Jo very kindly donated a gift voucher for Mybearpaw. With all those amazing prizes on offer its no wonder the raffle tickets sold like hot cakes.

Sooooo *drumroll*

 

Can you sense the anticipation!

Three lovely winners were chosen and over £750 raised for a very worthy charity. That's a win win situation! Well show and tell might seem like an anti climax after that, but the members managed to keep the excitement going with some stonking makes.

 

First up all the fun and sweet bee blocks for Tatyana.

 

Bee blocks for next month, lovely one for Barbara.

Robin calls house for her bee block!

Righty Ho, let's get cracking with show and tell. We all love a sew together bag, how amazing is this from Janice? gorgeous fabrics.

 

Jacquie always picks colours I think I wouldn't like then makes something stunning out of them, I don't like brown but would arm wrestle you for this quilt!

Simple blocks made stunning by great fabric choice, very modern quilt from Audrey.

Are any of you in the blueberry park mini swap on Instagram? If so you might be lucky enough to get this classic improv from Jo Avery! I'm in the swap and keeping my fingers crossed for this one.

Our resident long arm maestro Tatyana had us swooning over her flowering snowball quilt. Stunning piecing, amazing quilting, this one has it all.

 

 

Awwww another cutie! This was the doggie pincushion Sheena got from the Gartmore retreat swap, he seems right at home here.

Ok, I'll admit I uploaded the pictures out of order, just checking you are paying attention! Yep it's Jacquie again! This woman is a machine! A sewing machine .... Sorry :-) again, colours I would not have picked but what a fab combination, Jacquie you always challenge my perceptions thank you!

Wow, I have always wanted to do trapunto and after seeing this from Barbara I want to do it even more, this. Was from a class by Phillipa Naylor.

More simple shapes from Jane, but how mesmerising this colour combination is.

Gartmore finishes featured a lot in this on this show and tell! Here is Ann with her lovely fresh charm pack quilt.

Quite a few of the group have made the modern medallion by Jo, here is Lesley's version, I'm loving it.

Another Gartmroe house finish from Fiona, I'm drooling over all this Kaffe.

Good grief Jacquie!! Do you sleep?? :-) yep another beauty, all those geese, beautiful colours, what's not to love.

Close up of Tatyanas flowering snowball, I did mention I uploaded these out of order! Look at that quilting!

Another Gartmore house finish from the fab Helen, another pattern from Jo, lone star rising, this was in Love Patchwork and quilting a few months ago, look through your copies if you want to make it! It is rather fabulous.

We stay in ?Gartmore for our next show, Robins incredible porthole quilt, I sat behind her while she was putting this together, it's a work of art.

Whaaaaaat?? Another from Jacquie?? Ok it's official this woman does not sleep, she just produces incredible quilts!

Let's dot back to Tatyana for her sooooo sweet heart quilt.

You getting dizzy? We switch back to Sheena for her very sophisticated bag, started at the stitchgathering and finished at the Gartmoer retreat.

I wanted to finish with this. How happy does the lovely Janice look? Well I would be happy too if I had made this incredible quilt top with Liberty fabrics. I saw this coming together at the Gartmore retreat. It is stunning.

 

What happens in Gartmore stays in Gartmore

Or you write a blog post about it telling the whole world :-)

*warning, long blog post*

It seems many moons ago that Sheena touted the idea of a sewing retreat. Lots of organisation and planning later 7 members of the EMQ rocked up to Gartmore house near Aberfoyle. They had laid on snow especially for us :-)

Nice touch!

Hmmm looks promising.

Following instructions I came to this room, wonder what's behind this lovely door?

 

 

A hive of industry that's what!!

After a gorgeous meal and a small glass of wine to two ... We had a show and tell of our first quilts. Here is a gorgeous scrappy trip from Helen.

 

Fabulous modern sampler from Fiona.

It was a bit chilly in the room!

Fresh and sweet first offering from Ann.

 

Teeny tiny embroidery from Tatyana!

 

 

 

 

 

Lovely pouch from Robin

 

 

Sheena brought along this gorgeous Greek cross quilt, part of the fun of showing and telling our first quilts is to remember what we did and didn't know about quilting when we made them, i think at this point we were trying to figure out if there was wadding in the quilt!

 

I have popper envy, Janice brought along this amazing quilted toy box holder with fabbity giant poppers.

I took along my first table runner, my very first quilted project, I was such a rookie I quilted it without a walking foot ...

 

On the Saturday morning I was approached at the breakfast buffet by a lady asking if I was with the quilters, she had seen the sign at the entrance. It turned out she was a fellow quilter who was so chuffed to come through for a chat. I *think* her husband was as enthusiastic, that was how I interpreted his eye rolling :-)

 

All hail the sewing gods!! It's ok it's not some weird ritual, many of us were suffering sore necks/shoulders. Sheena had some fab exercises to keep up moving. Some youngsters who were at the hotel for choir practice saw us through the door ... They ran off when we turned round!!

Saturday night ....

There was more to Saturday night than wine ...

 

There was the pincushion swap! There was an animal theme, we all made them and entered them anonymously then voted for the winners.

 

 

 

It was a draw!

Janice and Helen very worthy winners, sharing the prize. We each got one to take back with us

Sewing sewing sewing, lots of sewing ...

 

 

Lots of fun, lots of laughter.

Finishes!

 

Finishes! Well done Helen!

Ooohhh handbags

View from the sewing room on the Sunday.

Sheena our fab organiser has a finish!

Robins fabulous blocks

 

 

 

Tatyana our long arm quilter extraordinaire is taking some inspiration from the beautiful ceiling in the lounge.

Anne and Fiona organised a thank you from all of us for the lovely Sheena who did such a great job or organising it.

 

One of the lovely Gartmore house staff braved the elements to take a picture of us all with our finishes. I. Far left and had the most minute finish of all. A sore neck prevented anything bigger! But I had a blast. Gartmore we will return.