Oahu Modern Quilt Guild

2015 Hawaii Woman Expo!

This past weekend, OMQG had a booth at the annual Hawaii Woman Expo for the first time, and it was a fantastic experience!

A video posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Sep 12, 2015 at 6:32pm PDT

We met tons of interesting sewers… and doubled our membership! So exciting!!!

Two of our booth neighbors were Keiki Aloha Quilts and Kilauea Kreations, and both of them were incredibly friendly and generous. Throughout the expo, they kept sending potential new members to our booth for more information! 🙂

Our booth was nice and spacious, and we filled the walls with our members’ gorgeous quilts. Can you spot our bunting? 😀

A photo posted by Mai (@meezie) on Sep 12, 2015 at 6:46pm PDT

Expo attendees overwhelmingly loved our two wee animals quilts destined for Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children. Even non-sewers came to our booth to take a look and photograph them. We’re so grateful that Dani shared such a wonderful tutorial with the interwebs!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Sep 13, 2015 at 6:29pm PDT

Thank you to all of our wonderful volunteers who helped with our booth before, during, and after the expo, and also to everyone who let us display their quilts! We had so much fun experiencing the expo for the first time, sitting and chatting with current guildies, and meeting new guild members. We’ll definitely be back next year!

Expo bunting sew-in

In order to prepare for our booth at the 2015 Woman Expo, some wonderful guildies got together to sew OMQG bunting for decorations!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Sep 4, 2015 at 11:52pm PDT

Everyone contributed ideas for how the bunting should be made, so it was a happy group effort. The assembly line was quite impressive, as was the sharing of knowledge — some people tried out skills they weren’t familiar with, and some were super helpful with their tips and tricks.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Sep 5, 2015 at 1:02am PDT

The bunting ended up even more adorable than I had ever imagined it would be, and I can’t wait to see it at our expo booth!

A photo posted by Mai (@meezie) on Sep 5, 2015 at 12:02am PDT

August general meeting

Our August meeting started out with something fun: a sewing relay race! Amber and Alli brought their Juki TL-2000qi machines so that both teams would have identical machines, and relay racers had to sew as precisely and quickly as possible on paper printed with black lines. Then for every messily-sewn line, a person’s team was docked five seconds, and the fastest team after scoring won. muhahahaha!

Guild members then voted on and passed various amendments to the by-laws, including a new latter-half-of-the-year dues rate and additional membership levels.

Our patriotic charity quilt and completed guild quilt were revealed!

Both a September Cotton & Steel fat quarter swap and a new paper piecing challenge ending in November were announced. Then, once business was done, Nancy L. did an amazing demonstration and presentation of partial seams and Y-seams!

After the demonstration, one of our brand-new members won the door prize, yay! Then for show and tell, we oohed and aahed over everyone’s adorable wee animals blocks for our last charity quilts of the year. Some people made amazing original blocks!

July general meeting

At our July general meeting, we covered a lot of business:

New charity quilt for Kapiolani Hospital
Upcoming guild activities:
- July 18 sew-in
- August 19 general meeting
- September 11-13 Woman Expo!
- September 16 general meeting
- October 17 Weekender bag workshop
Our new guild library will be open soon!
2015 Woman Expo business: new guild banner, sitting the expo, helping with setup/takedown, submitting quilts for display

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:44am PDT

After the business was taken care of, Nancy F. gave a wonderful demonstration of how to attach quilt sleeves! She showed us a couple of different methods; plus, she told us about different hardware we could use to hang our quilts. It was a fantastically organized and informative demonstration!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:46am PDT

At show and tell, Nancy F. shared her adorable OMQG-themed pressing mat.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:48am PDT

She also showed us her first EPP project ever — a beautiful wheel block for which she drafted her own templates!

And her amazing mini quilt using English paper piecing. #oahumqg

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:50am PDT

Next, Megan and Alli modeled the tanks they made at our Eucalypt tank workshop. 😀

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:51am PDT

Nancy L. shared the sweet X and O quilt she made for her friend.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:53am PDT

Emily wowed us with her modern baby quilt!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:54am PDT

Then she showed us the biiiig quilt she made for her friend.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:55am PDT

Mai and Alli displayed the totes they made at our Poolside tote workshop.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:56am PDT

Finally, Alli shared the June medallion quilt she made from the Modern Medallion Workbook.

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Jul 16, 2015 at 1:58am PDT

Poolside Tote class at Hidden Yardage

We had a great time at Friday’s Poolside Tote class at Hidden Yardage!

Again, I forgot to take pictures during class! But everyone sewed industriously, taking full advantage of the two ironing boards and Hidden Yardage’s enormous cutting table.

Unfortunately, classtime was too short at just three hours… if we do this again, we should probably schedule at least five.

A photo posted by Trudy Hiyane (@hiya808) on Jul 20, 2015 at 11:08pm PDT

It was great meeting a few new faces — some non-guild sewers attended the class, too!

I hope we get to do this again — it was so much fun!

Eucalypt tank class at Hidden Yardage

This past Saturday’s Eucalypt tank class at Hidden Yardage was so fun! OMQG treasurer Megan taught us how to make Megan Nielsen’s Eucalypt tank top.

I forgot to take enough pictures, but we learned so many things. We learned about srs truing up of fabric — I’d previously only done the match-selvedges-and-eyeball-the-grain method. 😀 Laurie (one of Hidden Yardage’s owners) showed us how to snip into the selvedge so we could rip to find the crosswise grain. Then she folded it so that the newly ripped edge was on the top, and she held up the fabric to see if the selvedges were matching up while hanging. If they weren’t, she tugged on the bias to get them matching up!

On the sewing side of things, Megan showed us how to serge the first step of our French seams to save time. She also showed us how to serge the first step of our rolled hems to save time again. That saved me two steps out of five on my previous rolled hems, and that’s a lot considering I often do this on circle skirts!

We had such a blast in this class; thanks to Megan for teaching us and Hidden Yardage for hosting!

June general meeting

At our June general meeting, we:

talked about our favorite quilt blocks and the blocks we’d like to learn
brought up the possibility of Sarah teaching a cathedral windows class
announced upcoming events at Hidden Yardage:
- 6/20 @ 10 am – 2 pm: Eucalypt tank class
- 6/26 @ 5:30 pm – 8:30 pm: Poolside tote class
- 6/28 @ 10 am – 5 pm: sew-in!
Classes are $25 for members and $35 for non-members, and does not include the cost of the sewing patterns. The sew-in is $5 for members and $10 for non-members. For more information, email communications@oahumodernquiltguild.com.
Women’s Expo 9/11 – 9/13!!! We’re going to have a booth and two committees to help plan: quilt display selection committee, and a booth set up/break down committee.
membership committee is also open for new members
other upcoming events:
- July 15 general meeting @ 6:30 pm
- July 18 sew-in @ 10 am – 8 pm, Aliamanu Community Center activity room
- August 19 general meeting @ 6:30 pm
- September 16 general meeting @ 6:30 pm

After all the business, Megan did a wonderful demonstration of precision curves! She showed us the pinpinpin method and the wing-it-and-trim-it methods in drunkard’s path, clamshells, and orange peels.

Show and tell was inspiring, as usual! Val showed us her gorgeous quilt top (I wasn’t able to get a picture that really captures how pretty it was >_<).

Sue made a patriotic pillow in time for the fourth of July. 😀

Sarah made a memory quilt out of baby clothes for a happy mom.

She also finished up a ton of baby quilts to sell!

We especially loved this trip around the world quilt. 🙂

Operation Homefront Quilt

Sarah, our vice president of programming, organized an awesome and superfast charity quilt for an Operation Homefront baby shower!

She passed out block kits at the May 20th general meeting, and members sewed the blocks over the next few days. Then Sarah put together the quilt top, worked her longarm magic, and bound the quilt over the weekend so that she could deliver it in time for the baby shower the following week.

The Operation Homefront baby shower was a great success with many other donated presents!

And here’s the beautiful mama who received our quilt! 🙂

April general meeting

At our April general meeting:

Our freebie table continues, and was a big success! There were some really covetable scraps brought and adopted (sparkly Kokka skulls, hehehe)!
We collected blocks for our guild quilt, and they were amazing. The guild quilt blocks deadline has been extended to May 9th at 1pm, and can be dropped off at the sew-in that day.
We reminded everyone that blocks for our Wounded Warriors charity quilt are due at the May 20th general meeting.
Mai did an awesome Instagram 101 presentation.
Megan wowed us with her improv curves presentation.
We gave another QuiltCon goodies door prize away!

Our guild quilt is going to be gorgeous — just look at these wonderful blocks!

Mai’s Instagram 101 presentation was adorably low-tech. 😀 Everyone loved it and learned a lot!

A photo posted by Mai Flourry (@meezie) on Apr 16, 2015 at 2:49am PDT

Megan’s improv presentation was so inspiring that afterwards, some members were talking about using the technique for our next quilt block.

During show and tell, resident machine Jackie shared the photo quilt she was working on for her friend.

And finally, Sarah showed us the ADORABLE smocked baby dress her mom made. 🙂

March general meeting

At our March general meeting:

We had our first freebie table! We’ll have this at all future meetings, as well. People took home some excellent goodies!
We announced our upcoming events, including a May sew-in.
We also announced our first charity quilt for the year and formed a charity quilt committee. We’ll be making up 12.5″ unfinished red, white, and blue blocks (any pattern) into a quilt to donate to Wounded Warriors. In order to be able to present it in July, charity blocks will be collected at the May general meeting.
Sarah T. did a wonderful QuiltCon recap!
We gave away a bag of some QuiltCon goodies that Sarah brought back!

Show and tell was amazing, as usual! People kept grumbling about having to follow the last beautiful quilt, but theirs were always also wonderful!

Trinia brought her finished Hexie Framed quilt, which she pattern tested!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Mar 18, 2015 at 11:19pm PDT

Jackie (The Machine) showed her in-progress Fletcher quilt. You should have heard the collective gasp when we found out that she did all of that straight-line quilting without a walking foot! :D:D

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Mar 18, 2015 at 11:27pm PDT

Nancy F shared her adorable chocolate heart quilt — the bottom right bit is cross-stitched and the quilting is so clever!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Mar 18, 2015 at 11:29pm PDT

Megan brought her perfectly pieced Harry Potter-themed baby quilt top. What a lucky nephew!

A photo posted by Oahu MQG (@oahumqg) on Mar 18, 2015 at 11:36pm PDT