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KINGSTON HEIRLOOM QUILTERS NEWSLETTER,
September, 2006

Contact the Kingston Heirloom Quilters at (khq at quiltskingston.org).
KHQ web: quiltskingston.org/khq /

Check list for September 5 th :
Show and Tell items
KHQ Library books
June Block of the Month
Tin Can Project
UFO Challenge info
Name Tag
Sewing kit & mug
Check list for September 21 st or sooner:
Broken Star appliqué blocks
"Fashion" appliqué blocks
Door of Kingston appliqué blocks
Name tag
Sewing kit & mug

Meeting Dates:  
Sept 5 and 21 (Gen Meeting) Nov 7 and 23
Oct 3 and 26 Dec 5 (Xmas Tea)

Greetings from the President
Donna Hamilton

I hope you enjoyed your summer and are ready to quilt up a storm. This promises to be another wonderful year of quilting. If you are willing, we can help you transform your UFOs into finished objects. The "Tin Can" should add a bit of mystery to the year. We will learn new or brush-up on techniques with the "Block of the Month". And won't it be wonderful if we can finish these tops: Ladies Fashion through the Years, Broken Star, and Doors of Kingston? Don't forget those baby quilts!

We'll add some workshops, trunk shows, and a visit from Marilyn Vance, who has a wonderful slide show of her trip to the artic with the Quilt of Belonging. As of this writing, your Executive has not started planning the extras of the program. We will be meeting on Aug 29 th to add the sugar and spice. We hope to have the details ready by the first meeting in September. In the meantime, be sure to review the "Program and Projects" lined up so far that you will find later in this newsletter. If your visits to shows or shops over the summer have exposed you to something interesting that you'd like to share or learn about, please let us know.

What you liked most and least last year

At the end of our Annual meeting in June, 21 of you told us what you liked most about last year: 12 noted they liked the energy level, sense of camaraderie, and meeting new people; 7 mentioned the variety of and seeing progress on our projects; others liked the workshops, baby quilts, trunk shows, hand quilting, and just about everything else we did. What you "liked least" was: 10 said "nothing"! And other comments were primarily about the hall acoustics. All of this has led me to conclude we should do more of the same. But I emphasize: our many activities are not meant to stress , but to bring fun and variety to the group .

Welcome back everyone! Happy quilting and see you at the Church Hall in September.

P rogram and Projects (some new)
Sylvia Currie

We have something for everyone, from 9:00 am to 3:00 pm and 7:00 - 9:00 pm .
. The Broken Star quilt will soon be ready for borders. Remember, please, the appliqué blocks are due by the September 21 st meeting.
. Ladies Fashions through the Years has 3 blocks yet to be made and several to be returned.
. The Doors of Kingston is awaiting 2 final doors, and then the blocks can be appliquéd to the background.
. Baby quilts remain a much valued project; always ready for sandwiching and tying hands. Last year we completed over 60 quilts; let's maintain or even better that record!
. Block of the Month Mary Ann McAndrews presents a new block at the second meeting of the month, and the draw for it is the first meeting of the following month. A reminder: we will be drawing for June's block (a 9 patch variation in blue) at our September 5 th meeting.
. Show and Tell Bring your current quilt projects, either finished, or seeking suggestions or assistance.
. Raffle Block Bea Walroth won the "Spinning Star" blocks and will be presenting us with a new block challenge this fall to be completed for our Dec 5 luncheon.
. Tin Can Project as discussed at our June meeting. Doreen Jeffers asks anyone wishing to participate to bring a fat quarter of fabric along with a slip of paper describing your "theme" in a covered tin can to the Sept. 5 th meeting (she has extra cans if anyone needs one). The cans will be exchanged, and returned the next month with a completed block using some of the supplied fabric.
. UFO Challenge Simone Lynch, Lorna Grice, and Marg Henshaw will help us pick teams, whose members will each have a personal goal, finish some UFO. Points will be assigned for the degree of difficulty. At year's end, the team with the most points is provided with a pot luck lunch by the other teams! And you will have a completed treasure for someone and maybe even our show!
. "Share the Wealth" and "Name Pin" Kitty Don't forget these two regular activities. The containers for each of them can be found on top of the library.

Membership
Rosalie Gray

Twenty-two members, having prepaid their 2006-7 fees, were entered in the June 22 "Early bird" draw which was won by Jose Roosenmaallen . Thanks for the early commitment - makes my task much easier! This year, to facilitate a soonest-possible printing/distribution of finalized Membership Lists, I'm hoping all others can be prepared to sign/pay up during the first two September meetings. If unable to attend either of these, perhaps you would give me a call at 613-546-1262 to make other arrangements?

We also welcome five NEW "Commercial Members": The Perfect Stitch ( Kingston ), Fun With Stitches ( Belleville ), Pine Ridge Knit and Sew ( Trenton ), Taylor Sewing Centre ( Brockville ), and Picton Fabric World ( Picton ). I'm sure our members will gladly support these and other shops who have opted to join and thereby support us. Thanks to the proprietors for signing on with our group - we'd be happy to have you attend any of our meetings!

VP Position Open
Donna Hamilton

We still have the Vice-President Position open. This is a wonderful opportunity to get to know the KHQ Executive and learn up close and personal how we operate. Believe me, the executive is active and will guide you. It is fun and can bring a new light to quilting. Please consider this and talk to any of the Executive if you have questions or concerns.

Best Wishes to Fran
Sylvia Currie

In a manner typical of her, Fran McArthur hosted her own "going away" luncheon at her home on August 22 nd . She and Daniel will be moving into their new home in Victoria , B.C. in a few months. We were fortunate to see her, during her whirlwind travels around North America this summer. Fran has been a most vital member of KHQ for many years, and often provided the inspiration and energy for many of our projects. We won't call it a farewell; Fran plans to maintain her membership and we hope she'll continue to visit us whenever she is in the area again. We wish her all the best and sent her on her way with some crazy patch blocks from her crazy-patched quilting friends!

A Visit to The Agnes
Sylvia Currie

On April 27, thirty KHQ members and friends were treated to a private showing of 12 quilts from the Heritage Quilt Collecton at The Agnes Etherington Art Centre. We thank Diane Berry for organizing the visit and Dorothy Farr, Associate Director and Curator, and Anabell Hansen, the Administrative Co- ordinator , for providing us this personalized showing.

We owe a debt of gratitude to Margaret Rhodes, Diane Berry and Fran Crandall for proposing the concept of a collection of heritage quilts, particularly from the eastern Ontario region, to the Agnes Etherington Art Centre in the early 1980's. Beyond this impetus, our three members collected, documented, and donated quilts, forming the foundation of the Heritage Collection, ranging from early 19 th century to contemporary pieces. The KHQ undertook the funding of the photographic book "The Heritage Quilt Collection", published in 1992 by the Arts Centre.

From the 12,000 hexagonal patches of the Diamond Block Mosaic, pieced in 1830 in England, and the 1860 elaborately appliquéd and quilted Whig's Defeat quilt (likely a wedding quilt), we enjoyed the variety of traditional log cabin, crazy patch, Star of Bethlehem quilts, and a pieced maple leaf quilt - all from the late 19 th century. Six contemporary quilts, most of which were produced in the greater Kingston area, featured two sampler quilts by KHQ (both first prize winners at the Kingston Exhibition), two original designs by Ada Torrance (County Fair and Apple Orchard), and the Bath Centennial quilt with village homes, churches and public buildings. Lastly, KHQ's own International Round Robin Quilt. We started our millennium project, most appropriately, with a centre square of maples leaves on a black background. England , Sweden , South Africa , Australia and New Zealand each added a border in turn. This well- travelled quilt circumnavigated the world once in its making and a second time for exhibitions in England and Japan . How nice to have it find its home with so many other wonderful quilts!

We are indeed fortunate to have this great resource and the wonderful collection of quilts so readily available to us.

Farewell to Field of Colour
Eleanor Clark

On June 8th we turned over the quilt, Field of Colour , to the Alzheimer Society of Kingston  at their Annual General Meeting held at the Trillium Centre.   Representing KHQ at the meeting were Donna Hamilton, Hilary Scanlan and Eleanor Clark.  We arrived in time to hang the quilt at the front of the room where it remained during the meeting (providing an interesting diversion to the dry stuff of annual reports).  Many people gathered around to see it and seemed most genuinely delighted by it, particularly the (outgoing) executive director, Karen Gill.  But none were more pleased with it than Vera Clarke who contributed the most paintings.  She is a very attractive, seventy- ish lady and despite failing memory readily recognized her own paintings. She just beamed.

The formal recognition of the quilt took place during the meeting and we were well and truly thanked for our efforts.  We learned the quilt will be a traveling one as it will be shown at other Alzheimer Society meetings.  Otherwise it will reside at the Alzheimer Society office at Rideaucrest .

 The guest speaker at the meeting was a Dr. Diamond from McMaster University and he presented some of the latest thinking and treatments for Alzheimer's.  It is a disease of aging and there are two forms - (a) familial or genetic, about 5 to 7% and (b) non-genetic or sporadic.  A vaccine is coming which right now is our best hope. And that's mostly what I remember of a very comprehensive talk.

Thank You, KHQ
Joan Bales

I wish to thank the members of Kingston Heirloom Quilters who made baby quilts during this past year: we completed seventy-five quilts for the Kingston General Hospital ! I hope that we will continue to donate baby quilts to the hospital. In the coming year, I would like us to set up and complete a few hand-quilted baby quilts for our next quilt show.

Thank you also to the Heirloom members who volunteered their time as monitors at the La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries for "The Quilt, A Breast Cancer Support Project" in August.

Library
Sylvia Currie

We have received the Cogeco video (DVD format) of the Seniors ' program featuring the KHQ. It is in the library and available for borrowing. Mary Ann McAndrews will be doing an inventory in September. Please be sure to return the books you enjoyed over the summer.

Quilts Kingston 2008
Sylvia Currie

Marg Henshaw has offered to once again co-chair the committee for our next quilt show in 2008 - many thanks, Marg . We will be consulting with the Limestone Quilters Guild to formalize plans for the show. We will be looking for volunteers soon. So please save some time to help with the planning of the show. In the meantime, we can be working on both quilts for display and items for the Boutique.

Quilting on the Web
Donna Hamilton

The KHQ web page has a link to The Quilt: A Breast Cancer Support Project at http://www.thequilt.com/ . Here you will find links to four galleries of Canadian quilts (over 400 in total) made to raise funds to provide emotional, informational and physical support for breast cancer survivors, their family and friends, nationally. You can bid on some of the quilts, while others you must attend the auctions being held in Toronto , Stratford , and Calgary . The East B show (60 quilts) came to Kingston from Aug 3-10 th . There are quilts made by members of our group in this year's collection, one which was in the East B show. If you didn't make it to La-Z-Boy, check out the quilts online.

Visit http://quilting.about.com/od/picturesofquilts/a/quilt_show.htm to see an "Online Quilt Show". There are many quilt photos in different categories including Art Quilts, Cancer Awareness Quilts, Christmas Quilts, It's all about Squares Quilts, Star Quilts, Quilts with a Circular Theme or Motion, Themed, Novelty and Pictorial Quilts, 2006 AQS Show & Contest in Paducah Kentucky , and more. You can even send your own pictures, if you'd like. Note also that this site is "About Home and Garden: Quilting". The far left column has many links to quilting information; some especially for beginners, others explain different techniques. Enjoy!

http://www.quilterscache.com/Inspirations.html , put together by Marcia Hohn , has many quilt photos to inspire you. The second page displays many quilts made by the Sunshine Quilter's Guild, including a kite designed with blocks that usually appear in quilts, not kites! Many of the quilt names are underlined, and if you click on these names you are led to instructions on how to make the block and quilt. The "Fractured Sunrise", an original block of Marcia Hohn , led to http://www.quilterscache.com/QuiltBlocksGalore30.html , a page with many more original blocks. There is a Terms/Conditions of Use link which you should read before using any of her patterns. Again, enjoy! It's fun to view online quilts.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jodilynn/sets/72157594164409892/ shows pictures of a hamster and its quilt! " Snarky Dork" tells the story this way: There's a tradition in my office to make a quilt for someone having their first baby. I made a comment one day that maybe people who aren't going to have babies should get quilts for new pets! ( as a joke) So, one of my co-workers made a quilt for me and my hamster, Ami!

Do you believe that? Kites using quilt blocks and hamster quilts! You never know what you will find on the web!

A Warning about Pets, Sewing Baskets and Tools
Donna Hamilton

While surfing the web, I came across the site http://www.catswhoquilt.com/special.html , called, "Cats Who Quilt; Where Quilters and Cats Meet on the Web" . It contains stories about special cats that quilt with us. Of course, cats love sewing baskets and love to play with the tools we use to sew. A spool of thread is a marvelous toy

to bat across the floor. However, the web page warns about the dangers of any kinds of thread to pets, especially cats. Many readers wrote in about what happened to their pet, and they weren't happy stories. There is a link to "Sewing Room Cat Safety Tips from Other Quilters" at http://www.catswhoquilt.com/special.html . The bottom line is: don't leave your pet in your sewing room unattended; as with young children, you never know what kind of trouble they can get into.

Visitors to our KHQ Web Page
Donna Hamilton

We have had many visitors to our web page, http://quiltskingston.org/khq/ , averaging almost 800 per month. The statistics program says over 70% each month are from .com or for-profit companies. Since February we have had many German visitors representing from 7 to 10% of the known visitors. Others come from Australia , Cyprus , Denmark , Finland , France , Japan , Malaysia , Netherlands , Poland , Russian Federation , South Africa , Switzerland , United Kingdom , and the USA . Very often the visitors from Canada are small! Visitors continue to come to our page through search engines, the Hamilton Quilters Guild web page, and recently, from the Kingston Literacy web page with our "Schoolhouse Sampler". Our Shop pages are visited most often, along with our Group Quilts and More Quilts pages from our Show.

Many have already found the changes to our site: new pictures of Margaret's Basket and Buds and Blossoms , links to our new commercial members' web pages, and more. If you want to have your quilt pictures on the web or add something else please talk to me. It would be nice to keep the pages changing and the visitors coming, especially with our upcoming show.

Interested in Designing Quilts With a Computer?
Donna Hamilton

I will be teaching a couple of classes on designing quilts with a computer this fall at "The Quilter's Choice". An overview and demonstration of Electric Quilt 5 will be given followed a few weeks later with a beginner's basic class, Electric Quilt 101. Anyone interested should watch for details in The Quilter's Choice fall newsletter or ask at the shop.


Why I Hand Quilt from 20 KHQers
compiled by Donna Hamilton

At the end of our Annual meeting on June 6, KHQers were asked why they quilted by hand. Here is a summary of what they said.

It is relaxing, meditative, brings peace (16)

. Hand quilting is an antidepressant, normalizes the blood pressure. Makes me think, contemplate, and meditate. A machine would be too noisy.

. The relaxed feeling I have when I work allows me to think about the next steps I'll take on the next quilt I'll create. I slow down enough to feel the stress leaving my whole body.

. It is very relaxing. It gives me time to think, meditate, or listen to music.

. I hand quilt large quilts (not wall hangings) because I like the rhythm of the action. Time to think and ponder, listen to music.

. For meditation! One's blood pressure goes down doing hand quilting or embroidery.

. It is a soothing activity. I can listen to music or TV while doing it and there is a beauty to hand quilting that isn't with machine work.

. To maintain a modicum of sanity in our crazed, high speed world!

. A relaxing activity

. I find it relaxing

. It's very therapeutic.

. I love the peaceful solitude and satisfaction of seeing fine even stitches, creating a beautiful design

. For the sense of peace it brings

. It's also a relaxing thing to do

. Peace or quiet of the process

. I find it very relaxing (almost meditative). If the project is on my large frame, I can work quietly for ½ hour or anytime I have (i.e. escape the busy, busy home life.) If I'm working on my small frame, I can take it with me - outdoors, relax, and still finish something.

It gives me pleasure and sense of accomplishment ( 12)

. It gives me immense pleasure to see what I create without using a machine.

. The softer hand of the quilt as opposed to machine work.

. I like the look & feel - doesn't flatten the quilt like machine quilting does.

. The finished project has a unique look. More satisfaction from the project.

. It looks good and I have time for it.

. To get the results I want.

. I admire the results. I want heirlooms for my family.

. For the sense of pleasure and accomplishment it provides me.

. For pleasure of enhancing the fabric through feel of the fabric between my fingers. Small incremental progress sometimes changing my mind as I work slowly - peace or quiet of the process.

. The pleasure of personal achievement (2 spoke of this)

. The effects of the finished piece are more satisfying.

Other

. When I am around a group quilt, I find the camaraderie and friendship hard to beat.

. Because I can. I find the sewing machine frustrating and I am not willing to put in the practice to be good at it.

. I want to keep the tradition alive.

. It has taught me patience.

. I want heirlooms for my family.

. I find machining quilting too tiring, especially very large items.

. Whenever making a quilt using "traditional" block patterns ( ie schoolhouse); it just seems more appropriate; it's a relaxing thing to do.

. It is "mine" - not a machine's or a computer's.

Upcoming Events

Sept. 7-9 - The 9 th Annual "Fruits of our Labour " Quilt Show and Competition in conjunction with the Owen Sound Fall Fair. Thurs. 4-9 pm , Fri. and Sat. 10 am-10 pm .

Sept. 30-Oct. 1 - 11 th Annual Fibrefest , Mississippi Valley Textile Museum and the Almonte Civitan . Sat. 10 am-5 pm , Sun. 10 am-4 pm . Featured Exhibition: "Shift" by Uta Riccius ; Cartographic threads weave from the historic machines to the contemporary. $5. Information available from the Mississippi Valley Textile Museum 613-256-3754.

Sept. 10 - Watson's Mill Quilters semi-annual Quilt Show, Watson's Mill, Manotick , 10am - 5pm. $5 adults, $2. 12 & under. A unique show of over 65 vintage, antique & modern quilts from South Ottawa area tracing the history of quilting; oldest quilt presently booked is dated 1836. Merchants mall. Demonstrations at 11 am , 12noon, 1 and 2pm.

Oct. 20-21 - "Quilts of Our Times", presented by the Brant Heritage Quilters Guild, Paris Fairground, 139 Silver St., Paris. Fri. 10 am-8 pm , Sat. 10 am-5 pm . $4 at the door; $3 in advance. For advance tickets: 519-759-7542.

Sept. 16-17 - "Festival of Quilts", presented by the North Hastings Quilt Club, Bancroft Curling Club, Sat. 9 am-5 pm, Sun. 10 am-4 pm. $5.00. For information contact: Marion Heasman 613-332-4364.

Nov. 2-4 - "From Our Hands", presented by The Kingston Handloom Weavers and Spinners, J.K. Tett Centre, 370 King St. West, Kingston. Thurs. 2-8pm , Fir. 10am-8pm , Sat. 10am-4pm . Clothing, household items, toys, baskets and more - all handwoven , handspun or felted. Free admission.

Sept. 19-23 - 2006 International Plowing Match and Rural Expo presents "Memories - Past, Present and Future" Quilt Competition and Show. Glen Isle Farm , County Road 2, Keene ( Peterborough County ). Featuring over 200 quilts, block challenge, antique quilts, raffle and more.

Oct 13-15 & Nov 17-19 - " Fibreworks Kingston" brings Penny Berens to give her "Layered Sheers" workshop; in November Elaine Quehl will share her "Beyond Stippling" Machine Quilting course. Each weekend workshop begins with a Friday evening talk. Watch for brochures at KHQ meetings.

Our Commercial Members: Be sure to tell friends and family to visit these shops.

Send questions and comments to: khq at quiltskingston.org
Last modified by dhh: August 24, 2006