april 09 meeting

show and tell
Flora In need of business advice, Flora showed us her first commercial project. After 20 hours into fixing, quilting, binding and hemming, she was wondering how much to charge for a beautifully finished queen quilt. Not under $250, directed Shannon. We'll see how Flora does with this money challenge.

Miriam Showing us a quilt she made for her great grand-daughter in 2002, Miriam reminded us of the power of hand prints. Miriam has patterns she made over 40 years ago of her family member's hands so she can make another quilt in the future for another generation.

Miriam also revealed to us the beginning of a mauve-themed quilt inspired by a trip to the Lavender Festival where she bought a set of fat quarters. With squares sewn on point, the final quilt is unassigned right now.

Patricia I brought a baby quilt that is my favorite piece to date. It is a scissor-cut composition with a motley collection of mismatched fabrics. My other project was a hand-stitched table topper for a family friend on the East Coast who is being a second mom to my Victoria.

Diane Always a busy gal, Diane brought three projects in progress. The first was two squares of a handkerchief-applique quilt. The second was a square of squares made with a secret quasi-repeat pattern. The third was a bright quilt top that Diane finished for a friend who started the center portion years ago.

Pris A spirited hand-stitcher, Pris produced a remarkable quilt entitled Stars and Stripes for a member of the graduating YF class. Made with an assortment of plaids, Pris got from the fabric from the giveaway at Diane's. There are no stars in the layout but that is because the quilt is not yet finished!

Bertha A nearby neighbor, Bertha came to Piece Makers tonight to meet Emmanuel. She took up quilting a while back and brought one of her creations—an artistic and beautifully crafted quilt. Retired from quilting for now, we hope she will be inspired to return to the fold.

Shannon Although Shannon let us know that her Bernina bag was empty , she was kind enough to join us for the evening. And she generously brought fabric for our special creativity project.

Sarah Sarah brought one square of the quilt that was not meant to be. She shared an unusual story that involved the auction of goodies from a seized OR quilt store. After waiting for hours for bolts of fabric to go up for bid, they were all bought by one woman for $7,000. Sarah and other quilting pros were not pleased with the deal. So Sarah a bought another sewing machine at the auction.

Janet With a splitting headache (yuck, yuck), Janet showed us progress on her quilt-as-you-go project with freestyle stitching. The going is slow but the results are looking good.

Janet also reported that N Sid Sen is opening a new lodge and the camp wants a banner from each participating church. There are parameters such as size and the background fabric. It is hoped that the new banner will travel to Idaho with our church folks in July. Any banner makers out there who want to work on this project? Janet has the paperwork, so please contact her at jsaulsbury@path.org.

Emmanuel A 28-year old Liberian, Emmanuel is a Fellow from the iLeap organization and a refugee leader working with women in Ghana. To help these women--who have lost their loved ones, homes and country re-build their lives, Emmanuel is involved with a quilting cooperative. He brought pictures of the people and one of their remarkable quilts.

march 09 meeting

show and tell
Linda: Our newest member, Linda, went home with some adopted plaid fabrics and came back with a finished YF quilt. The piecing is striking, with dark colors on the perimeter and a diamond of plaid triangles in the middle.

Harriet: Chinese Coins is now Harriet's middle name. She produced another wonderful quilt from scrap fabrics she was given. From a side comment, I think she is ready to delve into her stores of gorgeous fabrics for her next quilts.

Janet: Working on a star/galaxy theme, Janet is practicing her free-motion sewing skills on small squares of fabric. The final piece, with lots of blue, will be a quilt-as-you-go YF project.

Shannon: Our lovely hostess for the evening, Shannon, produced wickedly scrumptious chocolate bar/cookies that we all devoured. Her quilts from last month were still in the bag but she got them out to show us at the end of the evening. Shannon is dreaming about getting an updated Bernina. With a big Swedish (Swiss?) sale at the Bernina store where she works, anything is possible.

Miriam: Not only our oldest Piece Maker, Miriam is perhaps our most prolific. She arrived with another YF quilt—this colorful one bursting with a wide assortment of patterns. Miriam has begun making pet quilts, the first for a friend's chihuahua. Good ol' Miriam perked right up when someone mentioned we needed bags for kid's coloring book kits at Plymouth. "Lined or unlined?" was the most memorable line of the evening.

Flora: Once again Flora showed us a pile of impressive projects—her stunning blue/black quilt with plaid centers, two pieced tops using novelty "house" fabrics, and her new sewing machine cover made with African fish fabric and fun freestyle stitching. At home she is making a 1/12 scale log house with a hand-carved bed that matches her own and a miniature quilt! It sounds like Flora has some new crayons she can add to the coloring book kits.

Pris: Our hand-stitching queen, Pris, told us stories. Pris started by telling us about a Hawaiian quilting project. Then Pris described a "sincere project" she made for a friend--a tablecloth made with coffee-cup-printed fabric for a round table that was a big production and ultimately turned out to be a rectangular piece.

Patricia: I brought a lap quilt that I am making for my "collection." It is named African Night and Day with black patterned fabrics on the front and a white-based fabric on the back. I plan to take a fabric dyeing class later this month at a friend's art studio in Sodo. To see a most extraordinary baby quilt made by my 18-year daughter Vik, visit my blog.

Sarah: Wow. Sarah takes on ambitious 3-D projects. It must be because her husband is an architect. This month she made a designer satchel--with a designer pattern and designer fabrics. Plus she showed us some wallets she made. Sarah was kind enough us some squares of fancy fabric. The piece I took home is the perfect final fabric for a baby quilt I am creating.

Diane: Diane worked all evening hemming a fun quilt sample that Shannon pieced. Recently Diane was in Oregon for a quilt run, visiting many quaint stores along the coast. In the past month she had peridontal surgery which, remarkably, was not too painful.

february 09 meeting

show and tell
It was wonderful to have Maurine up here for a visit. She is working on a senior quilt and she described an amazing quilt that she is creating from some antique blocks.

Linda showed the beautiful red and black quilt which she was hand quilting while we visited.

Flora brought out a quilt that her aunt made for her which Flora lovingly laid out on many Hawaiian beaches (doesn't that sound nice?)

Miriam brought a beautiful crocheted patchwork afghan which she donated to the Rainier House apartment furnishing project.

Harriet has been very busy and showed us a rail fence quilt which I think is going to be a senior quilt, a gorgeous 16 patch with uneven strips, a sweet baby quilt made using the quilt as you go method and another senior quilt made from plaids. (Whew!)

Janet brought a very nice "super simple strip" quilt (59" x 74")

Pat brought a cute baby quilt made for her grandchild and a green quilt which is to be from the choir for the apartment project.

Shannon brought two quilts. Wow! The crazy blue one will be a senior quilt after she makes it a bit bigger and the green/gold one is for her sister.

Flora has been very busy cutting out quilts for anyone who wants to put them together. She showed a couple of “house” quilts that will go to the Plymouth House of Healing. She also wowed us with the beautiful quilt that she has made for her nephew to use in his truck sleeper.

january 09 meeting

show and tell
Flora says that she got slowed down during the holidays due to a houseguest, but her huge bags of projects belied that comment. She brought a pristine table runner, a button robe she made for the Burke Museum, a quilt top made with little houses for YF (when finished), a quilt top made with lots of novelty fabrics for a young friend, and a plush quilt for a nephew with an ocean/sky motif and bold black stripes that she just finished on her longarm. Phewww.

Pat showed us a quilt top made with green squares that she made for her group’s Adopt-An-Apartment. Then she got out her crazy quilt samples—a vest, Christmas stockings, and a tea cozy. Her level of stitching and ribbon embroidery is remarkable and crazy.

Shannon joined us—which was lovely! She's been busy making cards and knitting. She gets her sewing fix making samples at work—the Bernina NW store.

Patricia displayed the fabrics she bought in Tokyo over the holidays and a baby boy quilt with primary colors and an asymmetric pattern.

Diana joined us for the first time. Never having attended a Piecemakers meeting before, she assumed it was a sewing session. With a bag full of memory clothes from her family, Pat gave Diana a demo for making a crazy quilt square on the set-up sewing machine.

Miriam is another busy bee. She showed us a yellow and red quilt she made for YF. Then she produced a table cloth, napkins and a gorgeous matching quilt that she made for another Adopt-An-Apartment. (As Miriam didn't have an apartment in mind, Diana was given the set as her Boy Scout troop is working to furnish an apartment with the $200 it raised.) Finally Miriam had a bag of plump ruby grapefruits to distribute to us. Yum.

november 08 meeting

show and tell
A small group of us gathered at Diane’s house. There were nine boxes of giveaway fabric on table tops in Diane’s dining room and living room.

During the meeting Diane had two major projects to show us—a blue quilt featuring Don Baker’s new collection and a remarkable quilt she has been making for her sister (see three photos) that will be finished by Christmas.

Harriet brought two impressive projects. One is for Plymouth--for either a youth or a Healing Communities companion, and one is for her home. The lavender quilt is actually a back!

Patricia brought a doll quilt in blue and white that she made for a three-year old friend.

Flora brought Maurine a home-made heating pad with straps. Diane gave the rice-filled tube a quick blast in the microwave so Maurine could try it out on her lower back.

The last photo is Flora with a large shopping bag. Flora, Harriet, myself and Janet all hauled bags and boxes of fabric home. Diane daintily picked out a few choice pieces. And Maurine, who donated most of the fabric, didn't need any of it back at her condo. When the evening was over, only three boxes of fabric were left.

dr. hilton’s quilt

To celebrate three years of leadership at Plymouth by Dr. Rev. Allen Hilton, the Piece Makers created a memory quilt. This is the presentation of the quilt in Hildebrand Hall on his last Sunday.