by LMQG Canada Member Kristyn
I love following the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild’s blog, and when a trip to Halifax found me in the city on their guild night- I was lucky enough to attend!
I contacted Adrienne the Guild’s President who was so kind and gave me directions to the meeting. Usually they meet in Halifax at their LQS but for scheduling reasons, this meeting was across the water in Dartmouth. Lucky for me this meant some additional sightseeing and a quick ferry ride!
I contacted Adrienne the Guild’s President who was so kind and gave me directions to the meeting. Usually they meet in Halifax at their LQS but for scheduling reasons, this meeting was across the water in Dartmouth. Lucky for me this meant some additional sightseeing and a quick ferry ride!
The Maritime Modern Quilt Guild is a very active guild that meets once a month for the usual Guild meeting, and once a month on a Saturday for an all day Sew-In, as well as every two months for a Skills Building workshop. They also meet all through the year, without a break for summer.
We had limited time in Halifax so left my husband cracking lobster for his dinner to grab the little ferry that runs between Halifax and Dartmouth. It takes around 10 minutes to go across, and gives the loveliest views of both harbours. It was only a short walk for a few blocks to the meeting location, which I learned was where they hold their Sew-Ins. The room had lovely light and a view of Halifax across the river. Not sure how any of the quilters would get work done with that view! I’d be staring at it all day long.
I was a bit early, and spent some time before the meeting talking to Adrienne. She has a blog that can be found at http://chezzetcookmodernquilts.blogspot.ca
We talked about each of our guilds and I learned that the MMQG has a bout 40 members with around 20 coming out regularly to the meetings. One interesting feature with the MMQG is they offer 2 levels of Membership. One if you live in the Halifax area and another if you live somewhere else in the Maritimes. Given that the East Coast is pretty large, those that live further away, and can’t attend the monthly meetings, are able to be a member of the Guild and not feel pressured to drive for hours and hours each month. These members are still able to participate in all the Guild activities like swaps and charity quilts, via mail. Adrienne also said that an Ottawa MQG Member just moved to PEI and that she would be organizing a PEI chapter of the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild. How cool is that!
The MMQG members started arriving and the meeting was buzzing with excitement. This guild is a very friendly and social guild- much like everyone we met from the East Coast! The Maritime Community is such a friendly one- where people offer you directions when they can see you are clearly lost in downtown Halifax, stop their cars EVERY time a pedestrian is crossing the street, cars don’t honk, the drivers are cautious, just an all around niceness!
The first few minutes of the guild meeting, the members were chatting and catching up on things since the last meeting. The first order of business was the nametag draw. The members have made their own nametags and for each person that remembered to wear their nametag, they get a draw ticket. This Guild must do a lot of draws and everyone was excited to win a prize. Karen won the nametag prize of some fat ¼’s.
Adrienne went though the guild business talking about the MQG updates, charity quilts, swaps and challenges. For their charity quilts, they make 8” HST blocks each Quarter. They have a predetermined colour palette and then the members make the blocks and hand them in at the meetings. For each block made, the member gets a draw ticket. Linda made 104 blocks in Q-1 and she was also the winner of the draw- a great book- Patchwork City by Elisabeth Hartman. The Guild as a whole made 230 blocks. With the blocks that the members make, one of the members takes the blocks home and sews them into a quilt top in whatever pattern they choose. Then someone else takes it to quilt and bind.
We had limited time in Halifax so left my husband cracking lobster for his dinner to grab the little ferry that runs between Halifax and Dartmouth. It takes around 10 minutes to go across, and gives the loveliest views of both harbours. It was only a short walk for a few blocks to the meeting location, which I learned was where they hold their Sew-Ins. The room had lovely light and a view of Halifax across the river. Not sure how any of the quilters would get work done with that view! I’d be staring at it all day long.
I was a bit early, and spent some time before the meeting talking to Adrienne. She has a blog that can be found at http://chezzetcookmodernquilts.blogspot.ca
We talked about each of our guilds and I learned that the MMQG has a bout 40 members with around 20 coming out regularly to the meetings. One interesting feature with the MMQG is they offer 2 levels of Membership. One if you live in the Halifax area and another if you live somewhere else in the Maritimes. Given that the East Coast is pretty large, those that live further away, and can’t attend the monthly meetings, are able to be a member of the Guild and not feel pressured to drive for hours and hours each month. These members are still able to participate in all the Guild activities like swaps and charity quilts, via mail. Adrienne also said that an Ottawa MQG Member just moved to PEI and that she would be organizing a PEI chapter of the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild. How cool is that!
The MMQG members started arriving and the meeting was buzzing with excitement. This guild is a very friendly and social guild- much like everyone we met from the East Coast! The Maritime Community is such a friendly one- where people offer you directions when they can see you are clearly lost in downtown Halifax, stop their cars EVERY time a pedestrian is crossing the street, cars don’t honk, the drivers are cautious, just an all around niceness!
The first few minutes of the guild meeting, the members were chatting and catching up on things since the last meeting. The first order of business was the nametag draw. The members have made their own nametags and for each person that remembered to wear their nametag, they get a draw ticket. This Guild must do a lot of draws and everyone was excited to win a prize. Karen won the nametag prize of some fat ¼’s.
Adrienne went though the guild business talking about the MQG updates, charity quilts, swaps and challenges. For their charity quilts, they make 8” HST blocks each Quarter. They have a predetermined colour palette and then the members make the blocks and hand them in at the meetings. For each block made, the member gets a draw ticket. Linda made 104 blocks in Q-1 and she was also the winner of the draw- a great book- Patchwork City by Elisabeth Hartman. The Guild as a whole made 230 blocks. With the blocks that the members make, one of the members takes the blocks home and sews them into a quilt top in whatever pattern they choose. Then someone else takes it to quilt and bind.
The Guild also just finished a member’s blog hop organized by Jenn.
http://maritimemqg.blogspot.ca/2015/05/meet-maritime-modern-blog-hop.html This was a way to get to know the members of the MMQG. They have awesome bloggers in this guild, some of them I was already following.
Adrienne also talked about the various challenges and swaps coming up for their guild. The MQG Riley Blake fabric challenge is nearing the deadline and for the June meeting they wanted members to bring their finished quilts to participate in a Viewer’s Choice contest among the members. Linda had just finished her entry and brought it for Show and Share.
http://maritimemqg.blogspot.ca/2015/05/meet-maritime-modern-blog-hop.html This was a way to get to know the members of the MMQG. They have awesome bloggers in this guild, some of them I was already following.
Adrienne also talked about the various challenges and swaps coming up for their guild. The MQG Riley Blake fabric challenge is nearing the deadline and for the June meeting they wanted members to bring their finished quilts to participate in a Viewer’s Choice contest among the members. Linda had just finished her entry and brought it for Show and Share.
There is also the Michael Miller challenge that MQG members had just signed up for, and a Pillow Swap with the Edmonton MQG. They have done other swaps with Canadian MQGs and said if the London MQG was interest in a swap to let them know.
After the meeting portion was a slide show on Paper Piecing. Dena had a wonderful PowerPoint presentation on the step-by-step technique and had her block as an example as well as a few quilts she had made with the Paper Piecing technique. Dena is a very humorous presenter! The guild members were able to ask questions throughout the presentation if they needed more explanation, as PPing can be very tricky.
After Dena’s presentation we had a quick break for CAKE! It was Adrienne’s birthday so we sang to her and ate some yummy cake while Show and Share began. There were some awesome Show and Share quilts from these ladies, who look like they are quite busy quilting!
After the Show and Share, the meeting ended and many of the members stayed around a little while longer chatting. These ladies are just the nicest bunch of quilters! I hope if I get back to Halifax I will be able to attend another meeting!
As I was walking down the street, one of the MMQG members (so sorry I forgot her name) stopped and asked me if I needed a ride. I knew it was a short ferry ride to the other side, so I declined but thanked her. Should have taken her up on the ride, as Halifax is a very hilly city. I felt like I was climbing a mountain walking up those streets back to my hotel! I did enjoy seeing the city lights at night though both from the ferry and the roof top patio at our hotel.
Thanks again to everyone at the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild for making me feel so welcome! Hope to see you again.
As I was walking down the street, one of the MMQG members (so sorry I forgot her name) stopped and asked me if I needed a ride. I knew it was a short ferry ride to the other side, so I declined but thanked her. Should have taken her up on the ride, as Halifax is a very hilly city. I felt like I was climbing a mountain walking up those streets back to my hotel! I did enjoy seeing the city lights at night though both from the ferry and the roof top patio at our hotel.
Thanks again to everyone at the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild for making me feel so welcome! Hope to see you again.
*You can also check out the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild's recap of the same meeting here.
