In conjunction with the February General Meeting

The guild held its February meeting by zoom. After a short business meeting, President Nancy Sandreiter introduced our guest speaker, Ann Lauer. Ann is “an award-winning fiber artist who has been professionally designing and creating quilts, quilt patterns and kits, and quilt fabric for over twenty-five years.” (from her wwebsite).

Ann began her talk by describing her background and her work with Benartex in designing fabric lines. She showed us her new fabric line which will debut in the spring. She also showed us a quilt that she made from fat quarters from Africa along with her fabric taken from a pattern in a book sent to her by Nancy.

The program then centered on the Ride 4 Women group in Bwindi, Uganda. Ride 4 a Woman is an organization helping women, children and rural communities This link will take you to her website and a summary of her talk about these women and what they do.

She ended her program with information about donating to help the Ride 4 Women group. Donations can be made through her website at www.grizzlygulchgallery.com/african-quilters or directly to the Gofundme page at https://www.gofundme.com/f/ride-4-a-woman-in-uganda-africa.

To view the Ride for a Woman brochure click here.

The Hammersmith Quilters Guild January General Membership meeting occurred on a cold and blustery evening. Even with the frigid weather, members were eager to attend.

President Nancy Sandreuter did a trunk show with her collage quilts. She will be doing a workshop on making a collage quilt before the March general membership meeting.

The creative quilt works for the month was doing a Fibonacci quilt. These pictures do not show all the quilts presented. Many of the quilts will be shown at the fall guild quilt show and then donated for our charity endeavors.

Before the meeting, several members attended a workshop by member Gail Dwyer. Her workshop involved making a tote bag. Some of those attendees showed their finished work to us.

In the December 5, 2024, edition of the Saugus Advocate, there was a shout out to our guild for the annual charity quilt and pillowcase donations. If you want to read it online, here is the link. The shout out is near the middle of the page.

The Hammersmith Quilters Guild completed a successful year of sewing for others. Over the year 107 quilts, 106 snowman pillowcases and 103 novelty pillowcases were made! Many children will be very happy. We purchased goods for 100 children that we stuffed into the snowman pillowcases along with a quilt. These gifts are split between the Department of Children and Families and the Home for Little Wanderers. The extra items allowed us to extend to other charities as well. The extra quilts were be donated to the MassGeneral-Brigham’s pediatric cancer center, and pillowcases were be donated to Allison’s closet, a nonprofit started by Paula Fallon’s daughter, Michelle who live in AZ, and a friend of Ellen O’Sullivan who gives quilts and pillowcases to children of the Massachusetts National Guard who are being deployed. The deployed parent is given a star and when they Facetime they bond over the gifts they receive at the deployment ceremony.

The Guild is proud of its members who take to heart the mission of the guild. Here is our mission statement from our bylaws. “The mission of The Hammersmith Quilters Guild is to promote the appreciation, enjoyment, and knowledge of quilting as an art form and a craft to its membership and to the general public. The Guild encourages quilting for the benefit of charitable causes and provides opportunities to broaden quilting skills through educational programs, meetings, and workshops. The Guild hopes to foster camaraderie and inspiration among quilters throughout the greater North Shore of Massachusetts and offers support to the New England Quilt Museum in Lowell, Massachusetts.”

On a quilting Facebook group recently, a person asked for ideas for improving their guild. Boy, did they get a long list of things that can be done. Carol H. compiled that list into a PDF that we are sharing with our members. Click here to see it.

We are asking our members to tell us what they would like to see us do to improve our guild. The executive board will bring the ideas to the membership for discussion at one of our general meetings. E-mail your suggestions to [email protected].