crystal Coast QUilters' guild

CCQG Constitution is still in Draft form and has not been ratified. We need 2/3 of the membership to vote to be able to ratify the constitution and make any changes to the By-Laws. We have 72 members in our guild and since we do not get 48 members at a meeting the Executive Board amended our Policies and Procedures at our last meeting and added the following:

“Voting may be done by electronic means, paper ballot, show of hands or other means as determined by the Executive Board.”

The Executive Board will be sending by mail a paper ballot to all members to allow them to vote on two items:

1) Accept or Reject the Constitution as written. Draft dated September 16, 2010. The Constitution will be included in the voting packet.

2) Accept or Reject the one (1) change made to the By-Laws.

Please return your ballot by mail by October 10. Thank you all.

My first monthly Guild meeting was last week and thanks to all whom attended. We did have a lot of new information from the Committee chairs. Please see all the updates in the Newsletter.

The nominating committee is working on filling nominations, there are some exciting workshops coming this fall, and we all need to continue to sell Raffle tickets. Our Raffle Quilt will be shown at two events prior to our drawing a winner in October.

The Day of Sharing planning in March of 2024 is well underway and Mary Henris presented the “Bee Fun” Day of Sharing challenge. Let’s all get creative so we will have many wonderful entries - I understand there will be some good prizes.

Don’t forget the Vice President’s Christmas Challenge and place your 3 favorite Fat-Quarters in a sealed paper bag with your name inside and give them to Jeanne Biddle.

How many of you are planning to create a “Christmas Block”? Remember it is a 12-1/2” block in Red, Green and Cream. Let’s get lots of entries this year. I am planning to make a block this year.

Hope to see many of you at our next monthly meeting on Thursday, September 21st at 5:30.

Keep Stitching,

Joyce  

Dear Guild Members,

As you know, Laurie and her husband, Colin, have moved to their new home and from her Face Book posting they are enjoying living in the country. As the interim president, I am looking forward to the next 5 months with all the great meetings and events we have planned.

Our Guild Birthday Celebration was held at Riverside Grill and Sub in Morehead City with 35 members attending. We had a lovely room to ourselves, decorated with balloons and flowers. Everyone attending received a Gift Bag containing a Clear Pouch that has our new CCQG Logo printed on it. It’s a great place to store your sewing accessories. The Gift Bag also included a piece of fabric with the logo printed on it, (that you could use to create a new personalized name tag if you want), three fat quarters, a quilting book and a bookmark with a picture of Fran Lindley, whose estate sale provided the books and fat quarters for the luncheon gifts. Thank you, Jeanne Biddle and her committee, for all your work on the Birthday Party for our guild.

During the summer, “Drop-In” continues to have a fair number of members attending and the Hand Quilting group continues to meet monthly.

The Nominating Committee is working on nominees for our next President and Treasurer. If you have someone you would like to suggest, you can contact Jan Willis, Mary Henris, or Nancy Smith.

The BOM Mystery Quilt sign-up ends August 31st. The September block will be given out at the September monthly meeting or at drop-in the following week. Sign up online through the guild website or with Chris, Joyce or Karen.

Remember the “Make & Take Workshop” to be held September 23rd. Two of our members will be teaching us how to do sashiko and wool embroidery.

Laurie gave me a large bag of “scraps”. If there is anyone collecting these for animal shelter bedding or any other purpose, please let me know. I will bring it to our next monthly meeting which is August 17th.

Keep Stitching,

Joyce Dimock 

Dear Guild Members,

For those of you who were not at the June meeting, or have not heard through the grapevine, we have sold our house and will be moving at the end of next week (July 6th). We have found a house in Carthage, which is 25 minutes from where our daughter, Caitlin, lives. Our other daughter, Shannon, has also decided to move out in that area. Eileen teases me that we are going to turn into the Cartwright family from the Ponderosa! Joyce Dimock has agreed to assume the duties of president for the remainder of my term. She was installed at the June meeting. I’m sure she will do a great job until the next president begins her term. Thank you, Joyce!! 

The Nominating Committee has been selected and they are going to work on suggesting nominees for our next President and Treasurer. If you have someone you would like to suggest or you would like to volunteer yourself, you can contact Jan Willis, Mary Henris, or Nancy Smith. They will present their nominees at the October guild meeting.

At the last meeting, we tabled the discussion about whether or not to join the Quilts of Valor organization. Please take a few minutes to look at their website and familiarize yourselves with their program and procedures, so you can make an informed decision, when it comes up for discussion again.

Let me remind you that Jan Willis only volunteered to do the newsletter temporarily. I had planned to resume those duties after serving as President. Since I’m moving away, it doesn’t make sense to be responsible for a job such as that. The guild needs someone else to step forward and take over doing the newsletter after Jan steps down at the end of the year. It’s a good behind-the-scenes job that is an important one. Please consider helping us out in this area. Please contact Jan or Joyce, if you are interested in being the editor of the newsletter.

In closing, even though Colin and I are excited about being closer to our children and grandchildren, it’s hard to leave friends I’ve known for so long. The Crystal Coast Quilters’ Guild will always hold a special place in my heart. I’m not going to be so far away though that I won’t be able to make it back for some visits, or have some visitors! I’m sure we’ll cross paths again. Until then…keep stitching!

Fondly,

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

Unfortunately, we missed an opportunity to sell raffle tickets at the Carteret County Arts & Crafts Coalition’s Memorial Day Show in Beaufort. Thanks to Cathy C. and Lisa R. for volunteering to sell tickets. The rain had other plans though. Let’s keep our ears open for other possibilities to sell tickets at similar events. So far, ticket sales have been very good. Way to go, ladies!

Despite not having found a house to move to, we have recently accepted an offer on our house. Right now, our closing date is scheduled for early July. I do have a fill-in replacement lined up, and I announce who she is at the June meeting. It’s going to be difficult leaving so many friends. Quilting friends are the best!

Don’t forget to go through your “stash” to help make the Silent Auction at our next guild meeting a huge success! It should be fun to see what everyone brings!

Until then, I’ll be busy packing boxes and checking out the Zillow website!

Keep stitching,

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

A BIG Thank You to Jeanne for filling in for me at the last guild meeting, while I was away having fun at a quilt show in Greenville, South Carolina. It sounded like a lot of great information was shared about what goes on in the judging room. When interested in entering quilts in shows, it is helpful to know what the judges are looking for. I’m sorry I missed the meeting, but I did have a good time at the show. It’s only the second year Mancuso has hosted it there. It was smaller than their show in Hampton, but it was nice to attend a quilt show again after Covid messed with our lives.

I’m looking forward to the May meeting and hearing about the adventures that Jan, Mary, and Lisa had at the Academy of Appliqué. I’m sure they’ll have lots of tips to share with the rest of us!

Even though I’ve struggled with the Busy Bee Challenge the past two months, I’m looking forward to seeing who turns out to be the “Queen Bee”!!! There’s only one month left! Let’s all work hard to get our points counted!

Last month, Holly, Cindy, and I helped at the Children’s Advocacy Center’s Child Abuse Prevention Activity Day. We provided and supervised two sewing/quilting activities for the children. Thanks to Nan Miller and Sharon Ward for sharing supplies and ideas for the activities. The theme of the event was Super Heroes, and a few stopped by to visit with attendees. There were some ladies there who did express some interest in our guild. The children really enjoyed both activities!

Looking forward to seeing you at the next meeting.

Keep stitching!

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

We’ve had a great start with selling tickets for our Raffle Quilt, with three separate events this month and more opportunities in April. Don’t forget to give Nancy Smith a helping hand at Publick Day in Beaufort on April 14th, if you’re available. Jeanne Biddle is also going to take the quilt to a Women’s Club meeting. Since we are only asking members to sell 5 tickets, it should be much easier to sell your packet of tickets this year. Also, if you can think of a community event or group where we could sell tickets that would help with more tickets sales. We appreciate your efforts!

If you have not already heard, Ramona Pennington passed away early this week. She was a fun lady, who was involved in several areas of the guild, as well as the hand-quilting group. We will all miss her.

For those of you who were not at the last guild meeting, the Board has decided to keep the Scholarship program, but in keeping with the awards being named after previous members, Dorothy Nilsson and Kay Klein, we have changed it back to two awards and raised the amount to $300 each. Four alternates will be selected. This will take effect in 2024. Scholarship winners will still be expected to present a brief program at a meeting that summarizes what they learned. We will not be conducting a vote.

On Friday, April 14th, the guild will be helping at the Children’s Advocacy Center’s “Child Abuse Prevention Activity Day”. We have a couple intro to sewing activities planned for the children. It should be a fun day!

Thank you again to Nan Miller for helping to organize the Sacred Threads exhibit this past month. I hope that most of you were able to take the opportunity to see it!

Unfortunately, I will miss the April guild meeting. I will be out of town at the Greenville, SC Mancuso QuiltFest. Jeanne will be filling in for me. I will see you in May!

Keep stitching,

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

By the time you read this, I will have probably finished the quilting on the 2023 Raffle Quilt. Yea! And, just in time, because there are four events coming up where we will have the opportunity to sell tickets for the quilt. The first is Saturday, March 11th at the Emerald Isle St. Patrick’s Day Festival from 9:00-6:00. If you’re available to help sell tickets that day, please contact me in order to sign up for a time slot. The second event is the Artisans’ Affair in Havelock on Saturday, March 18th. This will be the first time we’ve done that event. Thank you to the ladies who volunteered to work the booth for that. The next event is the Quilters by the Sea Day of Sharing in Wilmington on Saturday, March 25th. If anyone is planning on attending and would be willing to sell tickets, please let me know. They are requesting RSVP’s by March 10th. The last event is Beaufort’s Publick Day on Saturday, April 15th. Please contact Nancy Smith, if you’re able to help at that event. It’s great to have several events that give us the opportunity to showcase our quilt! Thanks again, to Susan Foster for generously donating the quilt top!

For those of you who missed the last meeting, Jan Willis brought a quilt top that Paula Johnson had asked her to share, suggesting we use it for our 2025 Raffle Quilt. The top was made by Polly Scott and needs a little work on it in order to make it a queen-sized quilt. If you might be interested in working on that project, please let Jan or me know. Thank you!

As mentioned in my recent email, we will soon be conducting a vote to decide whether to keep the guild’s scholarship program. If you have any questions or comments, please contact me. Thank you.

Don’t forget to stop by the Sacred Threads Art Quilt Exhibit at the Core Sound Community Outreach Center at 806 Arendell Street in Morehead City. Thank you, Nan Miller, for helping to secure this exhibit for our enjoyment!

Keep Stitching everyone!

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

If you missed the January meeting, we discussed a lot of things of interest to our members. We started off by installing our new Secretary, Pat Bowes. I’m sure she will do a bang-up job! After a brief discussion, it was decided that we would preface our guild meetings with a social half-hour with some light refreshments being offered at 5:30. The regular meeting will still start at 6:00.

After discussions at the ENC Guild Presidents’ meeting and our Budget meeting, the Board has decided to charge $5 each for the Raffle tickets this year. We hope this change will help make ticket sales easier for our members. More on that in an article below. We have some raffle ticket selling opportunities right around the corner. The Emerald Isle St. Patrick’s Day Festival is on March 11th and Publick Day in Beaufort is on April 15th. If you are able to help sell tickets at either one of these festivals, it will be greatly appreciated!

I’m happy to announce that Debbie Goines has offered to take over managing the Membership for us. Thank you, Debbie! We will miss Kelly but wish her all the best on her next adventures!

If you think you’d be interested in helping out with the Raffle quilt for 2025, now would be a great time to start sharing ideas and get started with that project. hint, hint…

I just learned today that the Quilters by the Sea Quilt Guild will be hosting a Day of Sharing with special guest, Susan Brubaker Knapp, on March 25th. Information is included in this newsletter.

Hope everyone has a Happy Valentine’s Day!

Keep quilting.

Keep Stitching,

Laurie

Dear Guild Members,

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and wish you a Happy New Year! Where did 2022 go? A good time was had by all in attendance at the Guild Christmas gathering at No Name Pizza. A big thank you to Lisa Rechkemmer for planning the luncheon and everyone else who helped with decorating and setting up. It sure was fun to hear the stories from the ladies who shared their different Christmas quilts. Thank you! And, congratulations to all the Scholarship winners!

Looking ahead, the Workshop Committee has lined up workshops, lectures, and even a two-day retreat at the Ft. Benjamin Rec. Center that I’m sure will keep us busy throughout the year.

We are also drawing close to the end of this past year’s Busy Bee UFO Challenge. I wonder what Worker Bee Chris has planned for us??

I know that these Challenges have really helped me get some UFO’s completed! How about you? I have no news to share regarding the sale of our house. It’s been a slow month. We’ll see what the new year brings.

See you in 2023!

Keep Stitching,

Laurie

Dear Members,

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! It’s that time of year, when we all reflect on the things in our lives for which we are thankful. In addition to my family, I’m thankful for the friends I have made in the quilting community, and especially our guild, which makes it difficult to share that Colin and I have put our house on the market. Out of the blue, our daughter saw a listing for a house for sale. Long story short, we really liked it and have listed our house in the hopes that we can purchase this other house. We’ll see what happens. If we do move before my term is up, I will be appointing a replacement to fulfill the remainder of my term.

By the way, if you’re interested in a beach house with a great studio, call me!

The Greenville Day of Sharing is this coming weekend. I hope those members who are attending will have a good time. Next week, we will be having our annual Holiday Gathering. We will meet for lunch at No Name Pizza in Morehead City. I hope you’ll be able to attend. It’s not too late to make your Christmas block for the block exchange! (hint!)

I hope you all have a joyous Christmas holiday and have time to relax and enjoy yourselves!

Keep stitching,

Laurie