May Speaker - Stitchywoowoo

Our speaker for the May Meeting is Sally Hutson of Stitchywoowoo.  Her talk is entitled "How did I Get Here".

Sally Hutson is a textile artist who uses a variety of techniques to produce one off textiles.

Embroiderer, Quilter and Doll Maker, her range of work is exciting and innovative. She has a passion for antique and vintage textiles and uses many old pieces in her work. She also combines commercial printed fabrics with many of her hand dyed fabrics. Every work is a unique one off piece of art.

Sally has an MA in Textiles and Anthropology. She has lectured full time in the History of Textiles and Applied Textiles. As a Textile Historian Sally believes old and worn cloth have memory held within the weave and threads. She stitches these fading memories into a beautiful rich narrative of past times and lives.

Sally runs workshops and gives talks to groups. 

 

April Meeting

 "Lock Down and Love it" seems an unlikely title for our April meeting, in view of our personal memories of that time. 

However, it was chosen by our speaker: textile artist Moira Neal for her second visit to Cosby Quilters.  Her positive attitude to her own experiences was refreshing as well as a little reminder of what many of us did at that time.

The positive slant covered teaching her 17 year old grand-daughter to drive on  relatively quiet roads while delivering the items she had produced for the NHS and care homes.  Even her array of colourful and often numerous face masks led to an artistic arrangement, not to mention her personal ones hung on a useful rack made from recycled materials.

She was also energetic and imaginative in the kitchen producing a variety of preserves from surplus fruits.

Moira brought her colourful and attractive cards and led a successful workshop earlier in the day as well as large quilts.

Her entertaining style gave us a very enjoyable evening and a positive feast for the eyes.

Kathy Francis

April Meeting 5th April 2023 7.00pm

 

The April speaker is Moira Neal and her talk is entitled "Lock Down and Love It".

Moira Neal is a free machine artist and she loves to up cycle old cotton sheets to use in her work.  She enjoys dyeing, printing, stamping, marbling and appliqueing them to create her own unique cloth.  She no longer makes large bed quilts and now concentrates on making quirky work which she can use for her range of greetings cards. 

She has had mobility problems and as a consequence wrote her first book called 'Colourful Canvas Landscapes.  

Her workshop is at Ashby Magna Village Hall on Wednesday 5th April and is entitled "Pick and Mix Tuscan Landscape".

Practical Afternoon

Our March meeting is a practical afternoon.  Following requests in the survey we will be demonstrating some techniques.

Pam Morris will be demonstrating "Flip and Sew".

Sue Skelton sewing a continuous border with mitred corners and finishing.

Pat Screaton and Jo Turner will demonstrate the perfect circle technique.

Gina Cooke will be demonstrating water soluble backing.

They will be at individual tables so that you can move round to view all the techniques or as many as you are interested in.

 

The AGM was quickly dealt with at our February meeting and was followed by our speaker Linda Hill, a member of our quilting group. 

Linda gave us a potted history of her life.  She grew up in Yorkshire and at eighteen enrolled at Leicester School of Art and Design.  In Leicester she met her husband and has lived in Leicester since then, other than two short spells living abroad.  Her occupation was in textile art and design.

After she retired a friend, whose mother had died, and knew that she sewed asked her to finish a tumbling block quilt that her mother had half completed.  Her previous experience of sewing was making clothes.

In 2018 a friend, who lives in Australia, contacted her with a proposal to go on a textile and sewing tour of Japan.  This included four workshops for different Japanese techniques, sashiko embroidery, cogin embroidery, shibori dyeing and boro embroidery.  She showed us her workshop pieces and also various examples of these techniques either bought or given to her during the trip.  She also showed us a video of photos that had been taken during the trip.  When she returned she decided that she would make a quilt using sashiko embroidery samples that she had gathered during the trip.  This was displayed on the quilt stand at the back of the stage.  When she had finished that quilt, she started another quilt using boro techniques.  She prefers the boro techniques as they are less precise than sashiko which better suits her style of working.  She then showed us the quilt, which is a work in progress.

Sashiko Quilt

Boro Quilt

February Meeting

 The February meeting will start with the Annual General Meeting.  

Please note that a new page has been created on the blog   #cosbyquiltersblogspot.com

which contains all the relevant information for the AGM

             The Agenda, 

             2022 AGM Minutes

             Accounts and Treasurer’s Report for the year ended 31/12/22. 

             In due course we will add the minutes from the 2023 AGM for your information.

 

We are aware that some members are unable to attend an afternoon meeting, if you do have any questions or comments on the AGM 

business, then we'd like to hear from you - please email ginagcooke@gmail.com so your thoughts can be included in the AGM.

When the AGM has concluded Linda Hill, a Cosby Quilters member, will give a talk entitled ''3 Talks in 1' which covers her career in textiles, her trip to Japan and some japanese quilting techniques she learned whilst there.  She will be demonstrating these and showing some of her work.

    

As speaker’s costs and rent have increased, it was agreed that subscriptions for 2023 will be £30 for the year with visitors still paying £5. 

As our insurance requires that visitors can only attend up to 2 meetings a year before joining as members.  It was agreed to highlight this to attendees at the AGM 

ie visitors are required to join (ie pay the balance of membership subscription after attending two meetings), if they wish to come to future meetings. 

Workshops will be charged at £30 for members, and £35 for non-members.

However, more expensive speakers and those providing materials will be £35 for members, £40 for non-members.

Also, I note from the original email re Linda Hill that she would be happy to do a boro workshop.  This could take place later in the year.

Gina Cooke

P.S.  On a computer the pages show at the top right hand corner of the blog.  On a phone click on the home key and a list of pages will appear.

December Meeting

 An enjoyable practical afternoon was spent making Christmas decorations.

Projects

A few of the travelling books