Wonderful Memory/Art Quilt and Workshop shenannigans

Janet took a mystery workshop today, everyone was so busy trying to guess what the article was, hints and guesses being thrown around the room and not too much listening being done, Janet found lots of calming jelly beans were needed, well that's what she told us......
Christine thought she had made a right muck up, but no, she hadn't been listening, Sue went crook at her..

...as you can see, she was dreadfully upset........not....

Sorry about the awful piccie, the photographer arrived late and was trying to catch up......oh those suffolk puffs!
And what was the Mystery I hear you ask, these lovely little rolls were, perfectly designed to hold a reel of thread, your thimble and plenty of space for different sized needles.

We all managed to finish our holders in time for Show and Tell.  Cool, a new and pretty 'essential' started and finished in the one afternoon......and you can have your Suffolk Puff facing in or out, Sue put a little star in the center of her Puff, some beads would be nice...no? and wouldn't it be cool to make a matching block roll from Linda's tutorial?  oooh I can see a project in the making here!  We will be putting up a tutorial for this thread roll in the near future.........will let you know when it happens.

 Betty has been playing with the Disappearing 9 Patch again this week, using 3 different 'feature' fabrics she has created yet again a different layout design.  Betty is going to turn this one into a tablecloth for her patio. 

Was heading for the arvo tea table when Barbara mentioned that she had finished her quilt, now she has been a bit shy about sharing, so I grabbed it while she wasn't looking, and with a bit of help from a friend, whisked it out the back to hang it. ......WOW!!!, I was blown away, I am so in awe of anyone who can create such a free flowing memory quilt........

There is a wealth of stories in this quilt, fabric from family members dresses, a blouse, a fave pair of slacks...Then there are the two blocks created from Lyn Ballinger past challenges, 'Pop Art' and 'Be In It'.  

I love the way the mauve frill emphasises the face but then becomes a 'bonnet' by the simple application of appliqued leaves and a little flip downwards.

The hands were an addition from one of the little folk in Barbara's family, I have to confess, was a bit  lot bad with this quilt, was so engrossed some of the story detail just didn't stick, would it have been a Grandie?, Grandaughter even?
The Cymbal player is to celebrate.......'Hooray, Strike up the Band, finally finished!' and Barbara has also included her 'Star of the Month' button that she earned for all the hard work she did, sorting and pricing the Goods for Sale in our recent Cottage Garage Sale.

The two bottom blocks (above) are blocks from a Diane Johnson workshop that we did sometime back, oh all right then, way way back!
And that's why arvo tea was half gone by the time it was snapped.............ah well......sorry 'bout that.

Gwen was then spied showing a group of nibbling ladies a couple of flimseys,

these lovely softly coloured stitcheries just cried out for fabrics from the same pallet,

Gwen had had a little scratch around in her stash and out fell a bag containing these scraps! Perfect!, Gwen was sure she couldn't have got a better match if she had gone shopping! however there was one tinsy little problem, not enough fabric to complete the borders!.....rats with a capital!, Gwen solved the problem by taking a row of pieced squares from the top and one side and Viola!, plenty of fabric.........well, enough anyway.
And what else did Gwen have to show?...........this beauty..........

Now Gwen has a new addition to her family, a brand new Great Grandson..........(saw the piccies and he is just the cutest!)...........sorry, off track there....... well, a friend was stitching this quilt top and Gwen just fell in love with it, perfect for the new Great Grandie, a deal was struck and Gwen will be finishing this off for her little cutie.
And so back to the arvo tea table, those little savouries were yummo, then stretched the allowance and had a square of caramel slice........not too shabby folks!

Lyn Ballinger, and how our Challenge came into being.

This post is proving difficult to write, as unlike the majority of our group members I did not actually know Lyn Ballinger, but I do know of the high regard and the affection with which members of our group and the community held her and the immense sadness when she lost her battle with Cancer.

Lyn was a very sharing and energetic lady, there is a wealth of stories from crafters whom she either encouraged or helped with practical advice, both here on the coast and previously in her home town of Toowoomba.

Back in 2001, Lyn was talking to members of our patchwork group about a quilt she was entering into a competition and suggested that a few of the others also enter an item.  The general comment was "my quilt is not good enough", Lyn believed that everyone's quilt was good enough to put on show, and as such, she suggested a group Challenge.

The challenge title was 'Rainforest' and each member was given a piece of dapple green fabric and a piece of sweet pea fabric.  Lyn knew that sweet pea fabric would proved a challenge, and to date I haven't heard one person say 'Hey, I liked the sweet peas', nope, it was uniformly found to be a bit difficult to incorporate into a rainforest theme, with the result that many of the group used as little of the fabric as possible, some using so little and in such a disguised way, that led Judge Rose to comment that the fabric just wasn't used at all!!

Marguerite was the winner of the Rainforest Challenge with her 3-D depiction of forest vines and life,she used the reddish pink of the sweet peas to create her butterflies...........a great disguise.

When Lyn asked Marguerite what her plans were for her winning wallhanging, and got the answer of 'oh, probably pop it into the back of a cupboard' (or words to that effect), Lyn just couldn't accept that as a life for this winning treasure, she promptly organised a swap, her 'Forest Frog' wall hanging for Marguerite's.

Lyn's Forest Frog' hung in Marguerite's home until recently when Marguerite decided to donate Lyn's wallhanging to join the Challenge winners on the walls at the cottage.

These are some of the other entries in the 'Forest' Challenge.

Ailsa wasn't one of the minimisers, using the sweet pea fabric as her border as well as the 3 appliqued flowers on the tree trunk in her wallhanging that is chock full of forest wild life.

Maureen used a large swath of both the dappled green (3rd stripe from left) and the sweet peas in her 'Snakes' wallhanging.

Barbara, who is also a member of the pottery group, decided on a definite 3-D effect with this fantastic rendition of the challenge, enhancing the 3-D effect even more with the addition of a gecko pin on the tree trunk and buttons used as mushrooms and other fungi, hiding the challenge fabric in plain view as triangles in the borders.

 A closer view of the 3-D caterpillars at the bottom of Barbara's wallhanging.

 Dorothy used a blended vertical collage of fabrics as her background and added embroidered forest life.

 Judge Rose commented that Dorothy's colour scheme was the closest of all to a rainforest.

Miriam really took the project to heart, traveling up to the Hinterland Rainforest park to suss out the trees, leaves and general wildlife, and as an Irish touch stitched 3 golden fairies dancing in the sunbeam to remind her of home.

 While we were gathered around, admiring Miriam's work, she mentioned the inspiration and enthusiasm that Lyn imparted with the 'Rainforest' challenge and that she had never before put so much thought and effort into creating any of her other work - it was a statement that all around the table agreed with, many telling their own stories of the extra effort made for the challenge.

Sheila was one of the many gals who did minimise the sweet pea fabric, Judge Rose was unable to locate the fabric at all........can you?

 yep, that's it, some of those itsy little bits inserted into the binding......Well it was the first challenge and no one had stated how much fabric you had to use...........of course now that has been rectified with a strictly enforced % rule, I've even seen Judges get out the ruler.........true!

In 2003 the Lyn Ballinger Challenge was created to honour Lyn and the wonderful work that she had done for our Patchwork Group, the unstinting encouragement of other members to be proud of their own work and for being a driving force behind establishing our ever so successful Biennial Quilt Show.

We have since added a perpetual trophy for the yearly winner of the Lyn Ballinger viewers choice award, a quilt display stand, and let me tell you, it is fiercely contested, everyone wants their name on one of those little plaques on that stand!