Oh my Giddy Aunt, the fun....

...the quilts, the catching up with old friends, making new friends, did I mention the fun? oooh yeah, and the prizes! and then the food.  It was an amazing day and all in the name of fundraising for Breast Cancer research. Yes we turned our Breast Cancer Biggest Morning Afternoon Tea into a day of Show and Tell with invited guests from other local quilting groups. 
Pat was on hand to take the admittance fee and give you your multi-draw raffle ticket.  There was a mountain of prizes to be won, all prettily wrapped in brown, fawn, beige caramel paper and tied with a pink ribbon (Thanks Wendy)

The Atrium looked a treat,

 with so many of the Charity Quilts decorating the walls

 and scattered around.

Val, never one to just sit and chat, was sitting, chatting to Barbara and working on her Shashiko.

As the Atrium began to fill, the excitement began to mount,

So did the temperature.
Sheila grabbed this enormously long stick and opened the top windows...not gonna tell you the jokes some gals made about witches and broomsticks and how we could all fit....nope, not sharing that one at all.

Finally the last smiling faces arrived, took their seats, and the day began.

Firstly there were some formalities to go on with.  Derrick and his Son-in-Law Dan were our special guests.  It is thanks to Derrick's most generous donation that has made it possible for our group to quickly create so many charity quilts.  Derrick's darling Pat was a quilter for 45 years and gave away many of the quilts that she created, so to have her fabrics used to create more quilts for giving is a lovely legacy.
Derrick was asked if he would like to have one of the quilts, either to give to his own charity or perhaps as a memento, he accepted, and chose Deanne's lovely vibrant twisted log cabin with fussy cut centers of puppies and kittens.

Derrick accepting his quilt from Pat and Sheila               Thank You and welcome from 
                                                                                                    Jan the Pres.

Deanne at the announcement of the chosen quilt             Derrick - doing the 'peekaboo thing'...
Congratulations Deanne, its a beautiful and thoughtful quilt. 

Derrick is giving the quilt to his neighbours, they have just had a little baby boy.  Perfect!.

Jan our Pres. (Buderim Craft Cottage President) was on hand to also thank Derrick and to share the story of just how this amazing story unfolded, it all began at a 90th Birthday Party.
There may not have been a cast of thousands in this story but there were quite a number, result was that Jan and Derrick got chatting about quilting and things moved on from there.  As Derrick and Dan said yesterday, it was all Kismet.

First cab off the rank for show and tell was Sheila's very first quilt, from about 3 decades ago, now back in those days there wasn't much patchwork fabric around in our neck of the woods, and Sheila, being a beginner quilter, didn't know too much about the 100% cotton rule, anyway, loving geometrics and loving blue, Sheila used polyester fabric to construct this beauty, it's been constantly in use on the Guest bed for all those years and hasn't faded one jot! perhaps there is a lesson there.

Sheila also bought along her latest quilt, all her own design and months in the creation, this beauty is for a special lady, one of her Grandaughters.  Aptly named 'Top Five' it has 5 of the young ladies favourite things, her guitar, reading books, cups of tea, ballet and most of all, hugs. Obviously, its a bit of a surprise pressy!

Ailsa shared her Jelly Roll quilt and cushion. Ailsa used some of the leftover Jelly Roll strips around the Sashiko panel to tie the cushion and quilt together. No, its not a Sashiko print, so neat it could be - but no, every stitch done by Ailsa

Jackie is a bit of a Kaffe Fassett fabric fan and had these two beauties to share with us. A beautiful bloom in each hexi and some intricate blocks interspersed in the green bordered quilt.

Sue W bought along her friendship quilt from some years back.  It now lives in the Guest bedroom, Sue used some of the leftover original fabric and needle turn applique to create this matching pillow sham.

Wendy had 2 lovely quilts to share with us, the first, a lovely vibrant strip pieced quilt, the black and white strip runs diagonally across the blocks which when assembled give the illusion of blocks set on point.

 

The second quilt has quite the story, a few years back Wendy went on one of those exciting quilting tours through the U.S.A. including a stop off at the Jinny Beyer Studio where she spotted this lovely.  However, Wendy wanted a different colourway and guess who helped her select the new colours? why Jinny Beyer herself! A special quilt with special memories.

 Lorraine L shared her recently completed beautiful pansy Dresden Plate quilt, it was her 'bring along' hand-piecing work for meeting days for more years that Lorraine wants to fess up to and used up some of those 'stash' fabrics we all love to collect.

Chris has almost finished her 'May Flowers' quilt, originally started as a single size, with a bit of input from the Darling it was decided to increase the size.  Chris then decided she didn't like the green border so she whipped it off and added another border using the background fabric.

This is another quilt from the past, also about 30 odd years old, Pat created it for her husbands office where it hung for many years. Pat was asked to show her wall hanging in a Quilt show at the Sydney Opera house where I think I heard it won a prize, (certainly looks like it should have won at least 1st prize anyway)
The fabrics were all cottons and Pat bought along some of the original scraps to show just how much the daily assault of  fluorescent lighting, dust and visitors cigarette smoke had caused the colours to fade.

The mauve-ish border fabric was originally a dark blue.  And no, that brown mark isn't on the quilt, it comes from using the 'shadows' slider on the picasa program, Why would I want to do that you ask, well if you bring in shadows you see the quilting lines, and sometimes, especially if the pic is taken from a distance, that grubby look is what you end up with, but this quilting needs to be seen, just ignore the brown, please.

Sue also had 2 pieces to share, both her own designs although the table runner was inspired by a picture in a New Zealand magazine.  The quilt was created in response to a challenge to use up your stash or scraps.  No straight pieces or squares and Q.A.Y.G.

 

Inge created this pair of really pretty charity quilts, using some lovely hydrangea print fabric for the backing, there was some reminiscing of that fabric, bought at a now defunct fabric store and bought by the kilo for a ridiculously low price, yep weighed fabric, off-cut squares, all about 10". - Memories!

 

Karen had some lovely stories to tell about her show and tell pieces, all about seeing a picture of a project, usually in a magazine and then the tenacious search to get the exact fabric, including in one instance making her very first foray into the world of internet shopping overseas!  It certainly paid off, all of her projects are beautiful.

Marie shared two quilts with us, the first using some wildly vibrant fabric, Marie had a lot of fun with this quilt, she layered, cut, turned under a seam, stitched, and then re-cut into another colour, turning and stitching the seams again and repeating until she had this terrific quilt.  Backing shows the vibrant colours used.

Now this quilt was just stunning, had to rush up front and get the girls to keep those arms in the air while we got a closer look (thanks Sue and Debby)

When asked what her plans were for the quilt Marie blithely said "Oh, I'm giving it away, its going in the mail tonight"
Well, I'd like to say you could have heard a pin drop, but really, the thunks of jaws dropping would have drowned out the pins!!!

Again, with the 'shadow' slider on picasa creating smudges on the pics - sorry, will have to work on my skills.

Bags were all the go, Mooloola Girls and Buderim girls all with the same pattern, well, it is a goodie, and it is at Kymz, it just takes one pretty bag to start an avalanche.

Judy has recently purchased a Caravan, now what do Caravans need most of all?? well quilts of course. these two flimseys will soon be decking beds and going on lovely holidays.

Not wanting things to be too 'samey' Judy relied on using some the same fabrics in each quilt to create continuity.

Interspersed with all the show and tell, lots of raffle tickets were drawn, there were some very happy people with some great prizes, Janice got fabric she loves and a little enameled case to keep her pins in. Perfect!

Then the part of the day everyone was looking forward to, a real thirst had been worked up by all the hard work of ooohing and aaahing and just generally soaking up the eye candy and expressing our appreciation of the work and talent displayed. 

Don't you wish you were there? we even had a separate table for those on a gluten free diet.

Sue and the Pres. were spotted happily partaking of the goodies.

On a totally personal note...Gotta say, the Pres. is retiring (sob), its a rule thing, (only a few years allowed in the position) but this lady has over seen the transformation of our Cottage into a streamlined and efficient entity and as much as I don't like the term 'moving forward' we are, and with pride! Ta Pres.

At the end of day, when everyone had been watered and fed, got a pic of Derrick and Dan holding the quilt to be given to the little lad next door, Derrick requested taking the pic in front of the library.  In light of all the wonderful quilts being created and donated, it's easy to loose sight of the fact that not only has he donated so much fabric, but also many books and magazines for our Library.

We truly are one lucky bunch of quilters.  Thank you so much Derrick, it was a pleasure meeting you and Dan.

After the Fair, it's all about relaxing and catching up

This weeks blog is very kindly bought to you by Lorraine, she took the pics, wrote the words and e-mailed them off so all I have had to do is pop them into a post for you all.  Thank You Lorraine, it is most appreciated.

Judy was starting a quilt full of clam shells. This is the first row. It will be a queen size quilt and she is already cutting a sizable hole in her stash of Japanese fabrics.

 Gwen is hand quilting. She saw this pattern not long ago and said that she just had to make it. Another good use for all her fabrics.

A view of Gwen's quilt, showing more of the lovely colours and layout.

Lyn is still busy making animal quilts for the grandkids. This has been on the go for most of the year. The animals change from week to week.

 

Deanne is working on lots of Southern Stars. Can’t wait to see them all put together.

 

 

Marguerite is candle wicking. Up to her usual standard she said she has put in 5 stiches today. Well, a girl does have to keep up with the goes and check out what everybody else is doing.

 

 

The show and tell table had some interesting things on it.

Lyn has made a litter of puppies. They will soon be off to a good home with each of 3 granddaughters.

 

(Someone, who's name shall stay a secret just for now) made this lovely bag to sell at the Easter Fair. She was a bit slow in finishing it so it will be a birthday present for her sister instead. Maybe I better not say that in case her sister reads the blog. 

Ailsa made time to make some string pieced squares for Val's charity quilt.

 

Lorraine made an 'I spy' quilt a little bit differently to her usual. This is for a friend’s newest family member, the eldest brother has already got one of Lainey’s regular I spy quilts so something a little different was called for.

 A good search around the fabric shop found this lovely range of circus prints from Benetex called 'Under the Big Top'.

The back is a cot panel from the range but was too small to use by itself so I put on some border fabric from the Big Top range.

 Thanks again Lainey for making this blog post possible - Andrea

A very special Big 'O' birthday and Charity Quilts

Won't be mentioning which one, but Betty recently celebrated a very special birthday, Marie W bought along a lovely bouquet of roses grown by her Darling, real roses, scented roses. Heavenly

We even had cake, with a candle and all.   Congratulations Betty

Double bed quilt using two jelly rolls and appliqué. Marie W was asked by a friend to make the quilt so she could give it as a birthday present for her friend, mind you there was a ridiculously short period of time involved, like - less than a week! non quilters, what can you do?, sew like crazy and get it done is what.  Great effort Marie and a beautiful quilt.
Marie named it Windmill and Roos

Marie also had another commission to share with us, these two quilts and Marie's story

The orange quilt is called Caravans abound. The fabric was chosen by the lady who wanted it made as they are her logo colours. It is going on her stand at a caravan convention in Melbourne later in the month. And the other one is for the same person and will be given away in a lucky draw for one of her customers. This one is called Camping and caravans. 

For those involved in the conversation a few weeks back, Blue Banded Bees or more accurately Amegilla, yes they do exist! Pic on left was my first encounter with a blue banded bee, photo taken in 2009

Pic on right, taken in 2012, is one of the many lost photos, but the Darling has it as a screen saver on his phone, not a good angle to capture the iridescence of the blue stripes, but you get the idea.

Marcia really started something big with her string quilt, everyone seems to have made one or is making one, such a great way to use up all your scraps.  Val in her new role as Patchwork Group charity quilt co-ordinator has us all organised to make a few for Najidah, hopefully for Christmas.
We all pitched in over the last couple of weeks with workshops at the cottage,
Beryl made a lap quilt  to inspire us..

Strips were cut, organised into colour groups and stitched by many hands

Nothing finished yet but coming together nicely and I'm sure there will be quilts for Christmas.

And in her spare time, Val ran up another two charity quilts, along with these cuties, a mug bag, tissue holder and coin purse, oh and of course, a lovely worded label for the quilts. 

Judy bought us some lovely goodies to show and tell, this Rosella wall-hanging was done in a workshop with talented local Textile Artist, Bernadine Hine.

 
In fact, pop over here to see Judy and the other ladies at Bernadine's class with their beautiful birds and of course to see some of Bernadine's wonderful work, including a new quilt made for her daughter, stunning!.
Judy also bought along a table runner done at the Angel using some lovely fabrics

Some time ago a friend of Judy's traveled to Alaska and bought home little collections of fabric featuring Alaskan wildflowers.  Judy knew she wanted to make something special, but what?.  Inspired by a pic in a magazine Judy just couldn't wait to get home and create this lovely table mat. Works brilliantly!

Using a printed panel, Louise is working on a Christmas Wall-hanging for the Fair,  Can't wait to see the finished hanging.