Sewing Room Tour and Potluck

Enjoying a delicious dessert after our meeting

About four years ago the Sewphisticuts started a tradition of holding their June meeting at a member's house for a dinner meeting and tour of the sewing room.  Each person volunteers to bring something for the dinner, from appetizers to desserts.  We have all had a great time sharing our creative spaces, showing off home-dec projects that could only be shared in photos, and enjoying our culinary efforts.  Yesterday's meeting was held at Maura's; after a brief business meeting, we sat down to a tasty dinner with home-made strawberry ice-cream and cheesecake for dessert.  Delicious!

We discussed Make-A-Difference-Day plans for this October 27th.  Maura will contact Kim at the Poughkeepsie Plaza to see if we can get a space reserved for our group to sew there as we did last year.  The plan is to make hats, scarves and possibly mittens as well out of fleece to donate to the homeless shelters.

Our next meeting is in July, and although originally we had planned to participate in The Blanket Project, we realized there was not a strong local need for lap blankets.  We decided to sew pillowcases again, since we know of a local shelter that will always put them to good use.

Mary's quilt

Upcoming meetings: September will be a sort of Christmas gift exchange, with each person bringing a sample of an easy-to-sew gift along with copies of the directions to share with everyone.  So everyone will go home with directions for a number of new gift projects.  Our October meeting will be used to prepare for MADD, cutting fabric, perhaps partially sewing some items, etc.  November's meeting will be a tutorial on proper pressing techniques, and December will be our traditional holiday dinner meeting.

The points look offset but really do all meet in the center!

Spring is apparently not a productive time for many of us sewists - maybe gardening and just the nicer weather keeps us away from our machines.  However, a few people had brought along some show-and-tell items.  Judy had completed a number of home-dec projects and brought along pictures of the valances and chair seats she had worked on.  Mary brought a quilt that showcased an interesting technique for cutting and sewing triangles so that they look like offset centers, but aren't!   And Connie showed her completed quilt top from a block-of-the-month club that she started at the Quilted Bear Den - absolutely fabulous! I was so busy admiring it that I forgot to take a picture, darn it! 

Garment Gals Schedule

The Garment Gals Neighborhood Group plans to continue meeting thru the summer, but a  poll will be taken at the June and July meetings to determine attendance for the next meeting.  Please know that the projects identified below are tentative and could change according the membership discussions/wishes.  Please contact Judy Longacre for questions regarding topic or meeting changes.

June 19 - T-shirt challenge.  We will have a session on making a t-shirt.  We will discuss stabalizing shoulder seams, making a no-ripple hem, neckline finishes, and any other techniques used to make a good looking t-shirt.  The challenge will be decided upon that day, but most likely will be to have each of us make some form of t-shirt and present it at some specific Garment Gals meeting (to be decided upon by the group).

July 17 - "My biggest mistake and what I learned from it".  Hopefully you still own it and can show us how you overcame the problem, or didn't, but learned from it.

August 21 - Linings.  We will need to pin this down a bit.  Skirt, pants, jacket - all have a lot we can talk about, but we may want to focus on a limited amount.

September 18  - Placement of plaids.  Bonny once volunteered to talk on this subject and we hope she is still willing.

October 16 - Underpants.  Several people were interested in this topic, but we will have to have someone willing to show us some lingerie sewing techniques.

November 13 (2nd. Tuesday) - Belts and perhaps other accessories.

December 18 - Pot luck lunch.  Topic, if any, TBD, but fun and non-stressful.

Quilting Group & Charity Chics Group - June Meeting Schedule

7th - Quilting - Town Hall - 9am (bring your own project)

14th - Charity - Firehouse  9:30am (project tbd)

 21st - Quilting - Town Hall - 9am(bring your own project)

28th - Charity - Town Hall - 9am (project tbd)

Contact Andrea Diamond if you have any questions.