Visiting the Southern Branch

A big thank you to the Southern Branch who welcomed us to their November meeting for an amazing Show and Tell and an afternoon of sewing.  A good many of us carpooled to Cork and had a really fun day, meeting with friends and making new ones, sharing quilt making stories and tips and even got some stitching done on the day!  Here's a few photos of the Cork ladies show and tell and to see more visit the Southern Branch's blog here for a slideshow and recap of the day.  Thanks so much to you all and hope to return the favour and visit again soon!

Knitting & Stitching Show

The Mid-Western branch was well represented at the IPS galleries on display at the Knitting & Stitching in Dublin this past weekend.  For those of you that missed it here are some photos!

The 2016 IPS exhibit featured galleries with Traditional Quilts, Modern Quilts, Young Quilters, Art Quilts, Bags and a brach display by the South Eastern branch on the theme of Christmas.

Young Quilters Gallery

Ashling Murphy with her piece!

Quilts by Isobel and Ashling on display

Loretta O'Brien's Kandinksy inspired art Quilt on the bottom row.

Some of the quilts from Evolution were exhibited included Gillian's beautiful shells piece.

More than 30 bags were on display!

The modern section with Imelda's Star Light, Star Bright baby quilt!

Paula's Share Jane - over 100 quilt makers contributed to this Irish version!

Christmas comes early to the Knitting & Stitching - South Eastern branch.

Louise and Isobel invigilating!

October meeting recap

We were delighted to have Ester Kiely from the Western Branch as our guest speaker for our October meeting. Ester spoke to us about why you would want to keep a sketchbook. It was lovely to see Ester's work and how she uses sketchbooks and journals to prompt ideas and working out the design for a quilt. We all had a good look through the journals and were encouraged to start one of our own.

Thanks also to Rags for Linda who were our shop on the night and to Ruth and Suzanne for demonstrating the one hour basket (our Christmas challenge) and how to make Morsbags.  Suzanne went to a lot of work making bag kits for everyone and it was brilliant!

We handed out our pin cushions swapped with the South Midlands branch at the AGM and they were much admired!  Thank you to all in Kilkenny who made for us! 

The following day some of our members attended a workshop with Ester on starting a sketchbook and thanks to Suzanne again for the photos!

As always Show and Tell was plentiful and here are some of the quilts and quilt tops shared at our meeting! See you on November 4th for our next meeting (not the 11th as the Rugby is on!)

March meeting & workshop photos!

Last month we welcomed Arlene Shawcross to our branch for a talk and a workshop.  We were treated to delicate works of free machine embroidery.  Using a soluble base Arlene is able to make very intricate pieces that she quite often turns into clothing.  Thank you Arlene for sharing your work with us!

 Thank you also to our volunteers and shop on the night!

Our extensive library looked after by Kate and Imelda

Frances and Kate for helping with teas and coffees!

Sew Crafty Fabrics our shop on the night!

Our workshop involved a piece of art created using organza and blending thread and fabrics to reflect a line or image from a piece of poetry or a story.  We all had fun reading things into the shapes and colours.   Arlene's piece that she used to demonstrate her method was based on the image of a woman in a red dress lying on the green grass on a bright sunny day!

This was our show and tell table at the end of the day and it was filled with beautiful colour and texture!

I loved this detail in Louise's piece.  We were all very generous with each other and swapped organza bits.  Louise used some of the selvedge of a piece of yellow I had to make Daffodils and then added some bling!  A lovely touch to her art piece.

These are some of the examples of Arlene's work shared with us on the day!

And the other things I found really pretty were the baskets of thread that Arlene had brought to sell.  I am totally drawn to the warm colours and did have a case of thread envy when I saw Tracey's collection shown on the bottom right.  One day, maybe!
More photos on our Flickr page here! 

National Exhibition in Limerick!

Irish Patchwork Society

The Midwest Branch of the Irish Patchwork Society invites all IPS members to submit quilts for the National Exhibition on the theme of “Evolution”.

Limerick School of Art and Design (LSAD), Limerick City, 12 ^-22^nd July 2016.

Rules of the exhibition:

1.                   The quilt must consist of a minimum of two layers, although any technique may be used.

2.                   Size: quilts can be made to a maximum of 1.25 meter (approx. 50”) on any one side.

3.                   The quilt has a free choice of edging treatments.

4.                   No glass fronted, framed, mounted quilts or quilts made from kits will be allowed.

5.                   The work should have been completed in the last two years.

6.                   The quilt must have a 10 cm (4 inch) hanging sleeve, (with sufficient fullness to accommodate the hanging rod).

7.                   Please ensure that your quilt has a stitched fabric label on the back at the bottom edge with the following information:      

• Name of the Quilt, Name of Quilter, Postal Address, Telephone number.

8.                   The quilt should not have been exhibited prior to submission to this exhibition.

9.                   Quilts made by more than one person at any stage of construction should identify all of those involved.

10.               Quilts are not for sale during the exhibition.

11.               All IPS members are eligible to enter and there is a €10 entry fee per quilt to defray the costs of holding the exhibition.

12.               This is a juried exhibiition. The judging panel’s decision will be final.

13.               The quilts are covered by the IPS insurance once the quilt is received by the hosting branch.

14.               By entering your quilt you agree to have it photographed for publicity purposes and the catalogue of the exhibition.

15.               Each quilt must have its own bag labelled with both the name of the quilt, the name of the maker and your branch.

16.               Quilts will be released at the end of the exhibition period and not before that time.

17.               Deadline for quilts to be received is the 31^st May 2016. No late entries will be accepted due to cataloguing and photographing of quilts. 

Entry form can be downloaded here.

We look forward to receiving your entry and seeing you all for our National exhibition in July!