SewMeSTL 2018 Announcement

Please join your fellow St. Louis MQG members at the fifth annual Sew Me St. Louis weekend, where there will be lots of laughs, sewing, and opportunities to make memories. For the first time, SewMeSTL will take place across three fun-filled days!

Friday, Oct. 5 and Saturday, Oct. 6
8 am-midnight

Sunday, Oct. 7
9 am-5 pm

Drury Inn & Suites Brentwood

8700 Eager Road

Brentwood, MO 63144

:: All Day / All Night Open Sew ::

:: Swaps, Raffles, and More ::

This event is open to current St. Louis MQG members. Members must register, and space is limited to the first 60 registrants. We will also have a waiting list. The registration link will be sent out via email.

The cost is $60 for all three days or $40 for just Saturday and Sunday. This fee helps to cover the rental cost of the ballrooms, swag, and other incidentals. Information on payment options will be sent after registration.

As always, don’t forget to use #SewMeSTL and #STLMQG on social media. Interested to see how much fun we've had in the past? Check out #sewmestl on Instagram.

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Your registration secures a place for you in the All Day/All Night Open Sew Room. It’s a large ballroom fitted with standard-size tables, chairs, access to electricity, and way more fun than you can imagine. This communal room is where everyone will be hanging out, chatting, quilting, hand sewing, knitting, etc. until midnight on Friday and Saturday and then again until 5 pm on Sunday.

Food and drink are allowed in the large ballroom, so members are encouraged to bring something to share with the group -- a batch of brownies, veggies, fruit, chips, etc. For your main meal, consider ordering a pizza or checking out any of the fabulous restaurants in the surrounding area for lunch and/or dinner.

Door Prizes:: The SewMeSTL Committee has secured a number of exciting door prizes, which will be raffled over the course of the weekend. We'll be posting "sneak peeks" on Instagram in the coming weeks.

Scrap Swap:: Love scraps? Then this easy swap is for you. Just bring a quart- or gallon-size plastic bag filled with scraps and take home an equal share from the large pile of everyone's scraps. Just remember … we are a modern guild, so this is not a time to unload your upholstery and/or traditional fabrics.

Fat Quarter Swap:: The Members Swap and Challenge Committee has created a fun blind swap for us this year.  All SewMeSTL attendees can participate. Those who wish to participate should bring four fat quarters in shades of a color chosen from one spoke of the color wheel (see image). You can use the same shade in multiple FQs, but try to vary your grouping overall (for instance, two light green-blues, one medium green-blue, and one dark green-blue).

You may choose any combination of modern prints and solids. This will be a blind swap, so bring your FQs in a brown paper bag (we’ll have extras in case you forget). Be sure to include a piece of paper with your name inside the bag, so its recipient can thank you. The swap will take place on Saturday of SewMeSTL. Participants can drop off their bag when they arrive and choose another bag at their leisure during the course of the day on Saturday. This will be done via the honor system, and we ask that members Do Not Peek and/or swap out the bag they choose for another (unless of course you accidentally grab your own again ... they will all look the same).

We can't wait to see you all there!

Meeting #85 (August 11, 2018)

Hello modern quilters! Can you believe it's August already? Time to squeeze in one more meeting before the school craziness officially begins. We hope you can join us!

Date: August 11, 2018
Time: 10 am-12:30 pm
Location: The Heights
8001 Dale Ave., St. Louis, MO 63117
*Childcare available, please see info here* 

   =================================================================

Agenda:

-Welcome & Guild Business
     :: Membership Information
     :: Financial Information
     :: Quilting News / Around Town
     :: Reminders

- Collect Block Lotto #3 blocks (Marie)
- Explanation of SewMeSTL registration
- Activity: Ruler Demo/Discussion (Programming Committee). Experienced members will be demoing how to use a variety of specialty sewing rulers, from the Quick Curve to the Stripology.

---Break--- 

- Announce QuiltCon Charity Quilt plan/distribute blocks (QuiltCon Charity Quilt Committee)
- Announce SewMeSTL Swap (Member Swap and Challenge Committee)
- Raffle off Block Lotto #3 blocks and announce Block Lotto #4
- Announce next Rainbow BOM color
- Show & Tell
- Mix & Mingle

-------------------------- Reminders ------------------------------

:: Don't forget we're still accepting dues for 2018. Because we're halfway through the year, dues are now half price ($20) and can be paid by cash, check, or credit card. You can pay at the meeting or online through our Paypal link.
:: You must post your July (violet) Rainbow BOM blocks to Instagram with the #stlmqgrainbowbom before the start of the August meeting to get your points for the month (you can email them to stlmqg@gmail.com if you're not on IG). We'd love to see your blocks at Show & Tell as well!
:: You still have lots of time to participate in the Colors of the Year Challenge, as the deadline has been moved to November. See this blog post for all of the details.

Meeting Recap (July 14, 2018)

Thank you to everyone who came out to Saturday's meeting! It was great to see everyone and have some fun!

• Gayle, our Treasurer, gave us the updated financial info.
• Krista, our Secretary, announced our membership numbers and passed out our new MQG membership cards and pins.
• Marie, our VP, announced several pieces of quilting news and happenings (more about these will be sent via email).
• Jessica, our President, covered several items:
• The hand-sew happy hours and location for the entire year have been posted to the blog. This month's meet-up will be on Tuesday, July 24.
• SewMeSTL is going to be three days of fun this year (October 5-7)! Info on hotel rates and how to reserve has been sent via email.
• Updates on our upcoming workshops with Latifah Saafir and visit from Beth Snyder of 1 Canoe 2 were announced. Latifah will now be visiting in September, and Beth has been moved to November. More information will be sent via email. Updated information about Latifah's trunk show and workshops can be found in this new blog post.
• The Member Swap and Challenge Committee's 2018 Colors of the Year Challenge, celebrating Pantone Ultra Violet and Kona Tiger Lily, is still going on, due in November. You can find all of the details here.
• Our Nurses for Newborns charity project is still going strong as well. The final collection will be in November. You can find all of the details here.
• We discussed QuiltCon registration (it looks like we're going to have a big St. Louis representation in Nashville!), as well as quilt show details.
• Lilo and Emily announced the plan for our QuiltCon Charity Quilt Challenge, a fabulous design called Confluence. Blocks will be distributed in August.
• Jessica announced the next Rainbow Block of the Month (BOM) Challenge color -- violet. For our purposes, this includes every shade of purple, so you've got lots of options. You can find all of the details here.

• For this month's activity, we invited four of our most experienced members (Dottie Vaughn, Jan Ochterbeck, Rene Shoults, and Kristy Daum) to lead an "Ask the Experts" panel, ready to answer members' questions and offer advice. They covered a wide range of topics, and everyone learned something new. Thank you to our experts and everyone who participated!
• The Programming Committee announced that next month's activity will be a variety of demos on specialty rulers. More info on volunteering to come!
• Marie reminded us about our third Block Lotto round, which is a slightly more complicated star block. You can find all of the details here. These blocks will be due in August.

• We wrapped up the meeting with a great Show and Tell. Keep an eye on our Instagram page to see lots more pics of the meeting, show and tell, and our members' projects throughout the month.

We've got lots more fun planned for next month, so make sure to mark your calendars for August 11th!

The STLMQG welcomes Latifah Saafir to St. Louis in September

After a reschedule from June, the STLMQG is so excited to be bringing Latifah Saafir to St. Louis this September and is pleased to extend an invitation to her trunk show / lecture and workshops to the entire St. Louis-area quilting community.

   

Latifah Saafir is a pattern and fabric designer, teacher, and speaker who is known for her bold and innovative modern quilts. Combining her training as an engineer with her lifelong passion for sewing, Latifah creates designs that are graphic and contemporary, featuring challenging techniques with meticulous attention to detail. She is a co-founder of both the Los Angeles Modern Quilt Guild and the worldwide Modern Quilt Guild and has contributed to numerous modern quilting books in addition to creating her own extensive line of quilt patterns. Her popular Glam Clam quilt pattern epitomizes her fun, unique take on modern quilting.

To learn more about Latifah and her work, visit latifahsaafirstudios.com or follow her on Instagram @latifahsaafirstudios.

Latifah will be presenting a trunk show and lecture on her quilting journey and how she found her voice. The presentation will take place as part of our normal monthly meeting and is open to visitors. We hope you can join us! Details below.

When:

Saturday, September 8, 2018

10:00 am

Where:

The Center of Clayton
50 Gay Ave.

Clayton, MO 63105
Meeting Rooms B & C (First Floor)

Cost:
Free for members
$5 for non-members (payable at the door)

Latifah will be selling her patterns onsite.

If you are a local shop or quilt guild and would like to use this announcement,

 you can download a copy here.
 

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Latifah will also be teaching two full-day workshops to STLMQG members and the public on Saturday, September 8 from 2:00-6:00 pm (Glam Clam Quilt) and Sunday, September 9 (Molehills Quilt) from 9:00 am-4:00 pm with a one-hour lunch break starting at noon. The Glam Clam class is $35 for members and $60 for non-members. The Molehills class is $45 for members and $75 for non-members.

 You can read all about both workshops and the additional trunk show/lecture here.

Members can register here.

Non-members can register here.

    

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We hope to see you there!

Meeting #84 (July 14, 2018)

Hello modern quilters! We've missed seeing you all after our June hiatus and have lots in store for our July meeting, so we hope you can join us!

Date: July 14, 2018
Time: 10 am-12:30 pm
Location: The Heights
8001 Dale Ave, St. Louis, MO 63117
*Childcare available, please see info here* 

   =================================================================

Agenda:

-Welcome & Guild Business
     :: Membership Information
     :: Financial Information
     :: Quilting News / Around Town
     :: Reminders
     :: Information on changes to speaker schedule and new Latifah Saafir registration
-QuiltCon discussion: who's going? how was registration?
-Activity: "Ask the Experts" panel -- we've got four of our most experienced members on the panel, ready to answer all your questions and offer advice. No question's too small, so bring them all!

---Break--- 

- Announce QuiltCon Charity Quilt plan
- Announce our August meeting activity: looking for volunteers
- Announce next Rainbow BOM color
- Show & Tell
- Mix & Mingle

-------------------------- Reminders ------------------------------

:: Don't forget we're still accepting dues for 2018. Because we're halfway through the year, dues are now half price ($20) and can be paid by cash, check, or credit card. You can pay at the meeting or online through our Paypal link.
:: You must post your June (yellow-green) Rainbow BOM blocks to Instagram with the #stlmqgrainbowbom before the start of the July meeting to get your points for the month (you can email them to stlmqg@gmail.com if you're not on IG). We'd love to see your blocks at Show & Tell as well!
:: You still have lots of time to participate in the Colors of the Year Challenge, as the deadline has been moved to November. See this blog post for all of the details. 
:: We're having an STLMQG Summer Social at the Italian American Bocce Club on August 4 from 3-8 pm. More details to come, but mark your calendars!

NO MEETING this Saturday

Just a reminder that we will NOT have a meeting this Saturday, June 9. We had originally scheduled a visit from Latifah Saafir this weekend, but it has sadly been canceled due to a personal medical emergency for Latifah. We are so sorry to everyone who was looking forward to her visit. We are hoping to be able to reschedule with Latifah in the coming months and will keep you updated as soon as we have more information.

We look forward to seeing everyone at Hand-Sew Happy Hour on the 19th or at July's meeting!