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Our guild meeting on October 24th was attended by 63 guild members, and our guild now has 84 members. This was the first meeting where one of our newly formed member groups assumed responsibility for many aspects of our meeting. This included setting up the hall for the meeting, bringing the snacks, assisting during the meeting with the guest speaker presentation, and show and tell, and completing the clean up. It was a resounding success and thanks and kudos to everyone in the Flying Geese group, led by Vickie MacNabb for a job very well done! Members generously donated 20 new preemie quilts, when combined with the 12 collected at our September meeting, now bring our total for this season to 32. Thank you! Preemie Quilt Photos Guest Speaker Our meeting kicked off with very a interesting trunk and slide show by Bridget O'Flaherty, a local award winning fibre artist from Perth, known for her stunning large landscapes created with thread. With an environmental and sustainable focus, Bridget explores the use of local, organic and natural hand-dyed fabrics and materials in her works. Bridget’s fibre art is inspired by nature and biodiversity. She is passionate about our environment and creates intimate connections to the landscape. She conveys fragile aspects of eco-systems and advocates for awareness of species at risk, native and invasive species in nature and sustainable materials in textiles. Bridget was initially inspired by her mother, a seamstress, costume maker, and quilt shop owner. It was on an epic 2 week family driving trip to Banff and back that Bridget fell in love with landscapes. Her early quilts in the mid 1990's were leading edge modern quilts, and she had early success in getting her pieces into quilt shows. But it wasn't long until she pursued her interest in creating landscapes. She took courses by Joen Wolfrom and Ann Byrd and then she started creating her stunning large, typically 5 feet by 3 feet, landscapes. Using her sewing machine, Bridget builds up layers of multi-coloured thread 'drawing' to convey her landscape art. Bridget's Web Site     Bridget enjoys incorporating traditional quilting components into her landscape and nature art as evidenced in photos below.     Due to various family issues Bridget took a 10 year complete break from her quilting focus and passion. After sharing details of this journey with us Bridget offered us the great advice that it's OK to spend time on your crafts when you find yourself in challenging life situations, so you are better able to give to those who need you. Her passion and energy for her fibre art eventually returned and Bridget has since fully 9mmersed herself in her craft. With renewed energy she is further embracing natural fibres to the point of shearing sheep on her neighbour's farm, washing, carding and felting the wool herself. For practical (time and financial) reasons Bridget now focuses more on smaller pieces which she sews with a 6 inch hoop on a domestic sewing machine. Bridget has expanded her reach into the quilting community by teaching courses, she has her own YouTube channel, and she will be teaching courses at the upcoming Quilt Canada show in Ottawa in June 2019. Bridget will be returning to Arnprior on Saturday December 1st to lead a workshop on "easy peasy" thread painting.  
   PresentationResponse from our guild members to our invitation to provide financial support to our past president Brigid Whitnall and her husband Ken who lost their Dunrobin home in the September tornado was amazing. Mary deVries provided a very impressive money tree to which members secretly attached cash and gift cards in the far corner of the kitchen prior to the meeting. Brigid was surprised, pleased, and a bit overwhelmed when we presented it to her after she briefly spoke to us about their experience. Read Bridget's story in her own words in our October 2018 newsletter. Thank you to our guild members for your generosity.!  From left: Brigid Whitnall, Mary deVries, and president Donna Sheaves DrawsOur meeting wrapped up with our usual draws and some happy winners!
Block of the month - 30 blocks: Julie Carroll Guess the number of pages in the library book: Lori Bottriell 50-50 draw for $57: Chris Gordon Gift Basket - Suzanne deJoode Door Prizes - Brenda Greely, Mary DeVries, Sue Hodgins, Marilyn Erskine, Joanna Vlaming Comments are closed.
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