End of Year Breakup Luncheon

It was another lovely occasion at Ocean International Hotel for sewing friends to share together good food and good fun and good wishes and a fitting end to another year.

Thank you to our president for her hosting and thank goodness she had her little red bell to ring! We hope that broken arm heals quickly, Marilyn.

Thank you to Jan for organising the meal tickets and all the other tickets. Thank you to Julie for the prizes and activities. Thank you to Elaine for the decorations, gifts and sewn prizes - her sewing machine must have been going overtime. Thank you to all the others who helped in any way to make the breakup such a success. 

We have possibly managed to capture everyone in these general photos of the seating arrangements. Maybe any blurring is due movement  and/or excitement and not due to dodgy IPhone photo techniques.

Some of the beautiful table decorations and place setting gifts made by Elaine.

Some lucky winners!  Our "bag lady" Marlena won a bag in the pass the parcel competition. Iris was very pleased to win the raffle. Margaret won the lucky door prize and was relieved to find it was a little notebook and bright fat quarter after being told it was probably some embroidery!

And some of the lucky spot prize winners, Helen, Anne, Kaye, and Cheryl. There seemed to be so many winners but these are all the photos we could find. Congratulations to these ladies and the others we missed photographing.

The annual exchange of fat quarters was again wonderful fun. Florals, geometrics, moderns, orientals, abstracts, from places as diverse as Houston, Adelaide, Dalby and even Mackay - every fabric was unique. Now we have until the first meeting in March to incorporate our present into a project. Hmmmm. We have to actually cut the fabric and not just look at how pretty it is??!!!

And we even had some Show and Tell. Di has just finished quilting these two tops pieced by Margaret from the breast cancer fabric donated by Phillipa. The quilts will be given to Breastscreen for them to use as fundraisers. Margaret said the first one went together like a dream but the second one was a little more contrary. The first has been quilted with butterflies and swirls and the second has large heart shaped leaves winding all over. So appropriate for quilts for Breastscreen.

So this is the end until 2016. Thank you to everyone for a wonderful quilting year. Merry Christmas to all and may all your presents be soft and foldable.

Wednesday 2 December 2015

It was our last meeting in the hall for 2015 and possibly just as well as the fans were spinning at full speed today reminding us that summer in Mackay is not really the time for draping large quantities of fabric over the legs while stitching. And it seems there were quite a few ladies who were at home hiding in their air-conditioned sewing rooms!

Morning Tea today was a preview of Christmas delights with dainty smoked salmon and cucumber sandwiches, shortbread, parmesan and thyme cookies with beetroot relish, decadent chocolate and nut brownies, salted caramels and even watermelon Christmas trees among the delicacies to sample. (Yes, those ladies at home in the air-con really missed out!)

A reminder that meetings will resume in the hall on Wednesday 3 February 2016.

Next year will see lessons in a sampler quilt given by Joan. If you need a brush up on basic patchworking techniques, or you have never learnt all the tricky little patchwork hints, or you just want to have a go at a few different blocks, make plans to put this on your New Year resolution list. 

Beth used a layer cake to make this quilt. She quilted it herself using Faye's long arm machine. It is a "hope chest" item for her daughter. 

And this one is for Beth's daughter-in-law. It is made from the coordinating jelly roll to the layer cake above.  Di quilted this one for Beth in a lovely open swirl and dragonfly pattern which you may or may not be able to see in the photo.

Anne has made this from the leftovers of the piece she made from the leftovers of the wedding present table runner.  Even the backing and the wadding has been patched together as she has used every scrap. Waste not want not, Anne!

The Christmas Star BomB (Block Of the Month Bonanza) blocks that came in today. The last BomB for the year.  A simple positive /negative machine applique pattern that has a lot of punch. And learning to draft a 4-point star was all part of the 'extending ourselves' process. These were won by Deane who will no doubt make a very festive table runner from them.

The last Badge Draw of the year was won by a fairly new member, Jan, proving you don't have to be in the club for 5 years before you ever win a badge draw. Among some sewing tool goodies in the prize was the cutest ever little doggie retractable tape measure.