2013 Raffle Quilt Top

Well the raffle quilt has really taken shape - many hands have made light work. Yesterday we finished the top. We started the morning, about 10.30 am, with most of the large blocks done and about 3/4 of the small blocks. While Trudi, Dette and Val got on with finishing the blocks Maryla, Dianne and Robyn achieved a quilt that popped after moving each one about a gazzillion times. With the decision made we faced the daunting task of sewing it together. Dianne knows how long those diagonal seams are - 3 bobbins of cotton later it was almost together. And Maryla knows each of the blocks almost by name as she kept track of where they all went and kept Dianne supplied with seams to sew. Without anymore cotton in her machine Dianne passed the sewing task to the next available machine. Trudi and Robyn did the very last seam at around 3.30 pm. Libby and Margaret provided moral support and a little bit of seam deconstruction (who chose a quilt with so many points?).

The quilt has been made almost entirely from our stashes. Judy did buy some new fabric for her blocks because she ran out of variety making large blocks. In between sewing and pressing we were busy planning the next project. There is plenty of blues and creams left over for another group project. We have a few large stars left over as well. They may all end up in a Donate for Life quilt. Why is it quilters always have their eye on the next quilt before this one is finished.

The quilt will now be passed to the Show Sub Committee for photographing. Then we will be ready for the quilting and binding brigade to take over. The quilt will be professionally quilted before we have to get together again to bind it.

We are well on track to have the quilt finished for the show. Now it is time to turn our attention to second and third prize - please bring your ideas to the next meeting.

Trudi
BQI Secretary

What it means to be a mother quilt

Bungendore Quilters were invited to create a quilt wall hanging for the Queanbeyan Maternity ward with the theme What it means to be a mother.
A McKenna Ryan pattern was used to inspire an Australian Mums and Bubs quilt which members hope will appeal to many different Mothers.

A big thank you to our members who made this quilt become a reality, Claire Ayling for the exotic fabrics and to Robyn from Plain 'n Fancy for her beautiful Machine Quilting.

Photo credit to Kim Pham, Queanbeyan Age

Above Libby is presenting the finished quilt to maternity unit manger Cathy Carter and health service manager Kim Bradshaw. They were very excited to be receiving the quilt and hope to hang it in Birthing Room 1. It will certainly cheer up an otherwise sterile looking room.

Libby Taylor & Jaime Garbutt
BQI Members

Flash, the Snowy Hydro Southcare Helicopter mascot

Some months back we were asked to make a small quilt block to be incorporated into a larger quilt by our 'mother ship' the South Coast and Country Quilters Guild.

The Guild has been donating the proceeds from their Biennial Quilt Show raffle to the Snowy Hydro Southcare Helicopter Service over many years and at the end of the 2010 show, was challenged to make a quilt for the Children's Ward of Canberra Hospital.

The brief to the quilting groups was simple - make a block featuring their landscape with Flash somewhere in the block. Each block was to be A3 in size and Flash should be in the green/blue/white colourway.

We decided that the most distinct landmarks for our region were the wind turbines dotting the hills around Lake George and that we could have Flash flying around them.

Here's our progress:

Our subject - Flash the soft toy - very cuddly and colourful in bright greens, blue and white.

Line drawing provided by the Guild - could be reduced or enlarged as desired. For our block it was enlarged and copied twice. One copy became the master sheet for the applique pieces and the other sheet became the pattern pieces.

We decided to make the block in bright colours.

The completed block - hand appliqued and machine quilted by our members

I'm happy to say that the response from the affiliated groups was fantastic and last count there were enough blocks to make two quilts!

Many thanks to Bungendore members who helped in any way.

Judy Smith
BQI Minutes Secretary

When Flash arrived with me he was appliqued and the background was complete. I had the job of finishing Flash's blanket stitching and making him come to life. Given he looked a little cheeky I thought he needed some brightening up. Finishing all the applique with matching threads just seemed a little dull and a bit predictable and goodly eyes made him look decidedly creepy. Sparkly silver seemed the right choice for the white. Also it reminded me of snow sparkling in the sun and Flash is often called on to assist at rescues in the snow. That is how Flash got to look so f-laaaash.

Bernadette Finglas-Watson
BQI member

A sneak peek of things to come...

Bungendore Quilters at the Bungendore Show

The Bungendore show was very successful this year, although we were a bit disappointed in the number of entries in the Needlework section. 

It was lovely to see fellow BQI member Val's quilt take out the Most Outstanding Item in the section. 

We don't have space for many quilts, but we look forward to more entries next year of embroidery, knitting, crochet, sewing, etc - in fact Needlework, from everyone.  

Get working!  

Trudi
Bungendore Show Pavilion Committee Co-ordinator & BQI member

Added note from BQI Minutes Secretary Jaime: Also a congratulations to Trudi who took out Most Successful in Needlework however is far too modest to brag about it, not mention her hard work coordinating another wonderful pavilion display.

Making of our raffle quilt

Hi everyone!  I thought you might like to see how our raffle quilt came together.

We are very grateful to the wonderful Brenda Henning of www.bearpawproductions.com for allowing us to use her pattern ‘Bahama Breeze’ from her book ‘Mariner’s Compass Quilts – Reach for the Stars’.  We used her paper piecing patterns for the 12 Mariner’s compasses and also the wonderful Triangulations^TM  papers for the Sawtooth triangles.

Many thanks to Claire Ayling of Bali Batik Fabrics at www.mandelsons.com.au for  giving us a very generous discount on the fabric.  

Also, many thanks to all our members who contributed to the making of this lovely quilt!

Lastly, to visitors to our blog, I hope you enjoy these photos and are able to come to our exhibition to see it and lots of other beautiful work from our members!

Judy Smith

Secretary