2013 Exhibition - Demonstrations

Our exhibition this year again incorporates a section where members are demonstrating a range of techniques used in patchwork and quilting. It provides a wonderful opportunity for visitors to meet and interact with Club members.

View of demonstration area

Wendy Whellum from Legend and Lace

We also have a guest artist, Wendy Whellem from Legend and Lace in South Australia, who is sharing her knowledge and experience with visitors.  She is shown here in front of several of her exquisite needle-turned appliqued quilts.

Visitors from last year may remember Fay demonstrating techniques for making circles. She used those demonstration pieces from last year to make this quilt which is hanging in the Exhibition this year.

Playing with Circles - Fay S

Here are a few more quilts that demonstrate the wonderful range that can be viewed at our Exhibition that closes at the Salo Centre at 5pm on Friday 27 September.

Kakadu Dreaming - Marilyn C

Reminisce - Penny V

Romantic Handbags - Norelle W

Route 66 - Lyle Y

Welcome to our 2013 Exhibition!

What a wonderful weekend for the opening of our Exhibition and for the Toowoomba Carnival of Flowers!

The transition of the Salo Centre from an empty hall to a celebration of quilts in a riot of colour and design is an amazing experience.  Here is a random example of some of the quilts on display that have pleased so many of our visitors so far.

Bali Lakes - Lyn W

Out of the Blue - Chriss J

Glacier Star - Lyn C

Yellow Dahlia - Amanda H

Many thanks to all of the people who helped with the set up on Friday and all the members who will assist during this week.

Kathy R and Lyn L

Kathy and Lyn are doing a wonderful job with coordination of refreshments from the kitchen.

June's husband, Brian, helped to move our quilt stands and other infrastructure in the truck that Europcar provided "at a good price".

Our Art Quilt Group have another impressive display this year including examples from their "Portrait Challenge".

Our Community Quilting Group that makes quilts for donation to those in need in our community are demonstrating their work during the week and have a number of completed quilts on display.

Angela L and some "community quilts"

And, a big "thank you and congratulations" to Sheila K, our 2013 Exhibition Convenor, shown here relaxing with her husband  at the point when we were ready to say "Let the Show Begin"!

Sheila and Ken

Time for Tea & Quilts

TOOWOOMBA QUILTERS CLUB EXHIBITION 2013
The theme around the exhibition this year will be:

“Time for Tea & Quilts”.  The hall will be decorated along this theme and there will be a display of tea related quiltlets made by members. Members will also contribute to a floral display as we hold our quilt show to coincide with the Toowoomba Carnival of Flowers. 
Come to Toowoomba and enjoy the festivities!!!
Our quilt exhibition is starting next Saturday 21 September – Doors opening at 9.00 am.
There will be refreshments available and lots to see and do.
Tickets will be on sale for our beautiful raffle quilt and also for our spectacular basket of ‘goodies’.
The following quilt was on show at our last Tuesday gathering and was made by Carol B and is a Sylvia Pippen design.
Carol has done the most exquisite needleturn applique of Australiana flora combined with fine sashiko stitching.  Congratulations on a beautiful quilt, Carol.  The aboriginal design fabrics blend so well and give the overall design a lot of rhythm. 

A Special Invitation to our Exhibition *** 21–27 September 2013

  

Spring heralds the arrival of our annual Quilt Show.

Starting on Saturday 21 September and going through til Friday 27th September.

The Toowoomba Quilters Club Quilt Show is held at the St Ursula’s College Salo Centre (Rome St. Toowoomba) and is open from

9.00 am to  5.00pm  each day.

Entry is only $5 and raffle tickets will be available for the splendid quilt you see there on the right hand side of our blog.

Here is a taste of some of the beautiful work you may see.

Dear Jane quilt by Lyn B – Hand pieced blocks.

Small wall quilt by Judy J (done in an online class with Gloria Loughman)

Angela Langdon’s Australia Quilt

Please come and visit us, you will be most welcome.

Have some coffee and cake, enjoy some demonstrations, buy some beautiful handmade goodies from our Sales Table.

Some supplies  will be available to purchase from our wonderful merchants and see our guest quilt artist, Wendy  Wellham   from South Australia whose specialty is applique.

Until next time………Happy Patchworking & Quilting.

Quilt Show 2013 News

With only 5 weeks to go, members of Toowoomba Quilters Club are busy promoting our week long exhibition  encouraging people to come along in September (dates in the sidebar)

We have purchased 2 magnetic car door signs and members are sharing these to spread the word in different parts of town.

Over the past weeks we have had quilts on display at the Toowoomba Tourist Information Centre encouraging travellers to come back to Toowoomba in September (Carnival of Flowers week)

Thank you to Sue H and Marleen K for supporting this initiative.

Marleen’s Quilts

Quilt by Sue H.

At the end of the month you will see advertising signs appearing in prominent front gardens around the town.  All members are encouraged to share fliers with friends, family and businesses they regularly visit.

Quilts 1700-1945

Last Tuesday many of us (a total of 60) enjoyed a wonderful coach trip to Brisbane and the Queensland Art Gallery.

This exhibition is truly amazing and we were all excited and impressed to see the quilts from British museums including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Especially wonderful to see - possibly because most of us had some knowledge of it as part of Australia's history - was The Rajah Quilt (1841) from the National Gallery Australia in Canberra. This quilt was sewn by women on board the convict ship HMS Rajah, during their transportation to Tasmania (Van Diemens Land) in 1841.

Many of us also took advantage of the opportunity to view another interesting exhibition at the Art Gallery: A Stitch in Time, contemporary quilts made by the late leading Brisbane quilt-maker Ruth Stonely (1940-2007).

What a wonderful day excursion. Our final stop for afternoon tea was the Roma Street Parklands.

Thanks to Ineke for organising the day and to Lyn L for coordinating the refreshments we shared en route.

Sampler Quilt Course

Over the past three months fifteen enthusiastic Club members have participated in a Sampler Quilt Course taught by Angela Langdon.  Here are some of the students with their quilt tops.

Agnes

Trish P

Susan

Sharon

Trish M

Kim

There are more to come and maybe some of the quilts will be completed for display at our Exhibition in September?  Lyn L has progressed hers and is shown here using the Mulberry Millie Upright Quilt Basting frame that the Club has recently purchased to help save our backs!

Lyn L

Earlier this year we purchased a Horn Craft Plus table - another piece of back-saving equipment - that can be used during our workshops and social sewing meetings.

"Deck the Walls. . ."

This month's potluck lunch was a Christmas in July function. (We have a shared lunch on the second Tuesday of each month to acknowledge and celebrate members' birthdays.)  The walls of our main meeting room were decorated with Christmas-themed quilts and other home-made Christmas items. There was a prize this year for the best-decorated Christmas hat. As usual it was a hard decision for the judge but eventually Lyn V (third from left) was awarded the prize.

Christmas in July hat parade

There were lots of other prizes so there were lots of winners: a multi-draw raffle and a door prize plus a fantastic auction of donated items. Ineke, our Events Coordinator, is a wonderful, efficient, authoritative and entertaining auctioner!

Ineke

Proceeds from the day will be donated to the Toowoomba branch of Anglicare.  Many thanks to those members who contributed to a very successful and fun day.

Art Union Quilt and visitors from the Gold Coast

The recipients of the proceeds from our 2013 Art Union Quilt will be The Royal Bull's Head Inn, Toowoomba Branch of the Queensland National Trust.  Yesterday Stephanie, a member of the Toowoomba Branch, spoke to our sewing group to explain how they will use the funds.

 

The theme of our Exhibition this year is Time for Tea and Quilts and a few of the mini-quilts that members are making to decorate the venue in keeping with this theme are visible in the background of the above photo.

The Royal Bull's Head Inn  is open on the first Sunday of each month.  Our 2013 Art Union Quilt  will be on display until September and tickets will be available at the Inn.

2013 Art Union Quilt

Last Thursday a group from the Gold Coast Quilters Club visited  a very chilly Toowoomba as part of a three-day coach trip visiting place of quilting interest in SE Queensland.  As our meeting rooms are not available to us on Thursdays,  Marilyn K kindly offered the use of her premises for a "meet and greet" over a light lunch. It was a fun and very sociable few hours. The Gold Coast visitors were delighted to share their "Show & Tell" while Lyle and Fay displayed same of the Community Quilts that have recently been completed by our Community Quilting Interest Group. 

Fay and Lyle with Community Quilts

Fabric bags and Exhibition preparation

These bags that Joan and Cheryl have brought to sewing days on a number of occasions generated a lot of interest. So much so that they agreed to cooordinate a group sewing project where other members had the opportunity to create a coiled fabric bag with their guidance.

Joan and Cheryl's bags

Sally (L) being assisted by Joan

A busy group enjoyed themselves and made good progress on their bags, some of which will be on display at our exhibition in September, along with other items commenced on group sewing project days.

Our 2013 Art Union quilt is finished with photos on display at the side of this blog. Tickets will be available at the Exhibition.

Marlene's Flowers of the Outback (Design by Sylvia Pippen)

Meanwhile, Sheila is encouraging us all to finish incomplete quilts for display in September. Here's a sneek preview of one of Marlene's quilts (she's bound to have a few) that will be part of our exhibition.

Rowena's Japanese Baby Quilt

Rowena showed us the quilt that she hand-pieced and hand-quilted for her niece's first baby.

Busy Quilting Days

The activities on club days are in full swing.

This Tuesday we had all rooms filled to capacity with 50 members in total attending.  This is a record!

In one space we had Angela Langdon steering our beginners down the road of their quilting journey.

The beginners – hard at it.

Mel and Kathy R.

Carol happily ironing.  I wonder if she would be so happy if it was a basket full of business shirts??

  (samples)

The ladies are enjoying the beginner’s sampler course very much and are producing some very pretty blocks.

In another area we had our embroiderer extraordinaire, Shirley, showing some ladies how to extend their basic stitches into creative embroidery.   The ladies were very intent on what they were doing and these embroideries are sure to be admired by all.

L-R – Sally, Charlotte, Shirley, Ruth and Valdarie

In the main room the members were busy on their winter projects, feverishly getting things done for the upcoming exhibition in September.  Once again, some beautiful finished quilts adorned the walls of the main area. 

This stunning lone star quilt is made by Ineke and is called Dylan’s Choice.  Her grandson Dylan loves red and black and chose this pattern for his quilt. 

This quilt was made at the Jelly Roll Race Day by a newer member, Kathy R.  Well done Kathy.

This wonderful blue and white Irish Chain quilt is beautifully made by a long time member, Lynn R-S.

Heather showing us her drop dead gorgeous child’s quilt.

Lynn R – S tried to slash her stash in this fabulous strippy star quilt, but she reports that her stash doesn’t seem to be reducing much.

These strips are mostly 1/1/2 inch.

A very new person to quilting, Josephine, was enjoying learning how to put her first ever blocks together – the 9 patch.  Various members have been encouraging her and guiding her.  You will be hooked now, Josephine.

It is fabulous to see new members coming along and getting involved in the various activities.  Many of these new members were introduced to our club by way of visiting the exhibition and/or attending our open day.  We warmly welcome each and every one of you.