Patchwords

Volume XLII Issue 4 www.nsqg.club Spring 2020

2019-2020 Calendar of Events Guild meetings are at Rolling Meadows Community Center. Doors open at 6:30PM, meeting begins

at 7PM. PLEASE CHECK OUR WEBSITE AT WWW.NSQG.CLUB FOR COVID 19 UPDATES. The situation is

rapidly changing, and we will keep our most up-to-date information there.

Thu May 21 Gudrun Erla: Quilts of Iceland Fri May 22 Workshop: Lupine and Aurora |

Location: Barrington Library Sat May 23 Workshop: Emma and Roxanne |

Location: Rolling Meadows Library

Thu June 18 Cheryl Lynch: Turning Travel into Treasures

Fri June 19 Workshop: Mini Mosaics | Arlington Heights Library

Sat June 20 Workshop: Travel Diary | Location: Rolling Meadows Library

To register for a workshop, contact Debbie Yates, programs@nsqg.club

Worshops are 9:30AM to 4:30PM unless otherwise specified. Locations are TBD unless otherwise specified. This includes an hour for lunch, unless otherwise indicated. Supply lists for workshops are available at nsqg.club.

Flexibility in This Time of Uncertainty

The corona virus public health emergency has affected all of us in different ways. One of my favorite times of year is the NCAA March Madness basketball tournament. And in the words of a basketball coaching legend John Wooden, “Flexibility is the key to stability.” Of course we would like to hold as many of our scheduled events as possible, but in this case public health prevails. We appreciate the flexibility of our membership in allowing us to do what’s best for everyone involved. Our board continues to follow the unfolding crisis closely, and will continue to cooperate with all of our location venues, to follow public health guidelines, and ensure that we do not contribute to the spread of this disease. For the latest information on the status of guild activities, please check our website at www.nsqg.club.

President’s Message

Dear NSQG, Quilters have a unique gift of giving and sharing. In the past month we’ve seen countless quilters across the country respond to our national COVID-19 pandemic emergency by sewing facemasks. Many of our members have also stepped up in response. I’m thankful to all of you that have taken up this cause and cared for yourself and

others. Article titles such as “Lucky to Know a Quilter” or “Quilting Cottons Make Great Facemasks” are all over the news and I can’t think of a better way to get our stashes a good workout by sewing up as many as we can for family, friends, neighbors, nursing homes and anyone who asks. At the end of all this--and I hope it will be soon--we’ll all be ready to re-build our fabric stash and sewing supplies. I ask all of you to keep tabs on our website for the most updated news regarding when our meetings, classes and events will resume. As of this writing events for April are cancelled and we’ll know soon if May’s events will also be as well. I wish we had better news in that regard. I can only hope that all of you remain healthy and out of danger from this virus. Since it’s the ending of a fiscal year, we’ll soon have our membership renewal on-line. Even in this time of uncertainty I’d ask that you think about renewing your membership. In May we’ll have an election for our new Board of Directors, providing we are able to hold a meeting safely or come up with some type of write-in ballot and voting system, or at least a nominating system since we would need to offer nominations from the floor according to our By-laws. I want to thank the 2019-2020 Board of Directors for all of their hard work, commitment and leadership this past year. It has been a joy to have served all of you these last two years as President. Thank you all! I’ll be looking forward to a life of quiet solitude at the sewing machine and design wall! Once again, please check in on the website for the latest news and I look forward to us all coming together soon! Be Safe! Cathy Steiner NSQG President

ELECTION 2020-2021

Our yearly board elections generally take place at our May meeting. Please read carefully. The COVID-19 pandemic may require alternate voting methods, outlined below. If the May meeting occurs, we will follow normal voting procedures.

Thank you to the nominating committee for their hard work in identifying the following slate of candidates:

President - Maria Ross 1st VP: Programs - Linda Nemec

2nd VP: Membership - Karen Snell, Valerie Kuster Contracts - Jonnie Staggs

Recording Secretary - Kathleen Haaker, Susan Leverenz Corresponding Secretary - Theresa Benson

Treasurer - Sue Nowakowski

Remote voting Should the May meeting be cancelled, we have set up the following remote voting procedure: Floor nominations: Email nominations for any of the above positions to nominations@nsqg.club no later than May 15. Please do NOT do this without discussing it with the person first. If alternate candidates are identified, our nominating committee will contact them about being added to the ballot, and the corresponding secretary will email the final ballot on or before May 21. It will come from newsletter@nsqg.club. Remote voting: Once you have received the final ballot, we will ask you to send an email to vote@nsqg.club using these procedures:

If the final slate is uncontested, you may vote “yea” or “nay” for the entire slate. That’s all you need, just one

word and you’re done.

If it ends up that we have more than one candidate for any of the positions, it becomes trickier, so please bear

with us. We would like you to copy the entire final ballot into an email, retaining only the names for which you

wish to vote “yea.” Delete the name of the person you are NOT voting for on the contested positions. We will

assume you vote “nay” for any names not listed in your final vote email. And we will remind you of this

procedure when we send out the final ballot.

Voting will be open until May 28. Emails received after that date will not be counted.

If we use remote voting, please note:

Multiple emails to either the “nominations” or “vote” email address will not be considered. Only the email with

the earliest date/time will be considered your “official” nomination or vote.

In a contested election, returning an email with an incomplete slate will not be accepted. You must return a vote

for all seven open positions in order to be a valid vote. Most of us are old enough to understand the reference to

“hanging chads”. Please remember the person counting the votes is a volunteer and doesn’t have time to try to

discern your intent. Help us do our best by following the rules.

Block of the Month

Starting in February, we began a block of the month. Each month we will have an activity to go along with that month’s chosen block. For example, our activity may be block raffles or donations for charity quilts (let me know if you have other ideas.)

Here are your options…

● Participate in the monthly guild activities with the BOM and/or

● Choose a color palette and make blocks for your own sampler quilt. Or just make a bunch

the same block to make a quilt!

● There is no long-term commitment. You can participate whenever you want or when your schedule permits.

February BOM-Ohio Star

March April Guild Activity: Make a Block for Charity- For the April meeting bring in as many 12½-inch unfinished Ohio Star blocks as you want in batiks and use a light background (background does not have to be a batik). Please use quilt shop quality fabric. Unfinished size of block should be 12½”.

Note: You can use one fabric for your Ohio Star or more. The only requirement is that the Ohio Star is made with a batik and the background is a light color.

We are all at different places in our quilting journey and may have different techniques in our toolboxes for constructing the block. We wanted to share some websites that provide measurements and directions:

Quilters Cache https://www.quilterscache.com/O/OhioStarBlock.html

The Spruce Crafts https://www.thesprucecrafts.com/ohio-star-quilt-block-pattern-2821198

Blue Print https://www.mybluprint.com/article/tackle-the-beginner-friendly-ohio-star-block

Resource for Sampler Quilt Makers:

I’ve decided to make a scrappy sampler quilt with different sized blocks. Here is a site that gives directions for 4½-inch, 6-inch, 7½-inch, 9-inch and 12-inch Ohio Star blocks:

Generations Quilt Patterns https://www.generations-quilt-patterns.com/ohio-star-quilt-block.html

Happy Star Gazing! Can’t wait to see the blocks at the next meeting! -Karen Snell

July Retreat Registration

We are postponing the registration date for the July 31-August 2 retreat at the Schaumburg Hilton Garden Inn in hopes that the Illinois stay at home order will be eased. Instead of registration beginning May 1, we are now planning to open it on June 1.

We will still be following an all online sign up rule. If you do not have access to a computer on June 1, please find a buddy who can do your registration for you. This process, instituted at our last event, streamlines the paperwork for our retreat coordinator and means she has less of our germs to touch on forms, envelopes, and checks.

If we are fortunate enough to be able to hold the event, please be sure that you follow public health guidelines. If you are sick, or have been around people who have been sick, please stay home.

For the latest updates, please check https://nsqg.club/special-events/retreats/.

thewoodenbear.com/shop/Patterns/Quilt-Signs.htm

Coming this Quarter For more information, check out nsqg.club/programs

For status of meetings during the COVID-19 pandemic, please check nsqg.club.

May 21 – Gudrun Erla Time: Doors open 6:30, meeting begins at 7PM

Place: Rolling Meadows Community Center (3705 Pheasant Dr.)

Gudrun Erla, the designer and owner of GE Designs, was born and raised in Iceland. She started quilting at the age of 23. After owning and running quilt shops and designing patterns in her home country, quilting brought her to Minnesota in 2003. Since then Gudrun has been designing full time, publishing patterns and books in Chanhassen, MN.

Gudrun will have two workshops. Check out https://nsqg.club/programs/may-2020-gudrun-erla/ for details.

June 18 – Cheryl Lynch Time: Doors open 6:30, meeting begins at 7PM

Place: Rolling Meadows Community Center (3705 Pheasant Dr.)

Cheryl Lynch will be with us sharing her lecture “Turning Travel into

Treasures’. Traveling overseas or to the town next door can lead to

inspirations for lots of quilts. Learn to look at your pictures with a quilter’s

eye.

Cheryl will share two workshops with us. Check out

https://nsqg.club/programs/june-2020-cheryl-lynch/ for details.

M

Northwest Suburban Quilters Guild P.O. Box 146 Arlington Heights, IL 60006-0146 First Class Mail