Christmas Meeting December 2015

Our members arrived at the Christmas Meeting laden down with food for the Jacob's Join, raffle prizes,embroidered Christmas decorations based around Dorset buttons and usual sewing kit!
A few of our members were missing because of ill health but luckily after the horrendous flooding everyones' homes were safe and most roads were now passable.
We had a quick business meeting and then there was a break of about 10 mins to vote for favourite decoration[ a few pictures below], buy raffle tickets and make a hot drink.

raffle prizes

We then all joined in with a game of "sewn consequences" which caused much hilarity and giggling and at one point it was taking so long that we thought we might not have time to eat!!!!!.

Luckily we finished the last fold at12:30 and the picture was passed to the left for the last time and the great reveal which you can see below!
I must point out these are not self portraits!!!!!!

 Our game of consequences had given us good appetites and we enjoyed our Jacob's Join.

At the end of our meal members wished each other a Happy Christmas and a Peaceful New Year.
The votes were counted and Sandra won the competition with her tree decoration. The raffle was then drawn and there were a lot of winners of our Christmas raffle.
After a fun meeting members made their way home. 
A big thank you to our members for their generosity.

Dorset Buttons November Meeting 2015

Our meeting this month was taken by one of our own members, Joanna Henson, who had made a beautiful array of samples to inspire us, some of which you can see below.
Joanna gave us a little of the history of buttons and particularly Dorset Buttons.

 Because the buttons are small, Joanna gave us a film demonstration on how to start the buttons, secure the central threads and possible ideas on how to work and decorate the buttons.

               

Buttonhole stitching the outside of the ring

 

Making the spokes

Back stitch weaving the spokes

 

Members were very pleased with their finished buttons and we are using the idea for our Christmas competition which is to make a decoration using Dorset Buttons.
A few of our members also had a go at making a Dorset "singleton" button which you can see in the pictures below.

Thank you very much Joanna for a very enjoyable day and I think we will be seeing more Dorset buttons in the future!

A.G.M. and Stitching October Meeting 2015

On Tuesday we held our A.G.M. which was well attended and Sandra welcomed the members to the meeting. The minutes of the last A.G.M. were read and adopted. Sandra reported that we had enjoyed a full and  busy year with a workshop every month except in December.At the beginning of September we  held a well attended exhibition in the Methodist Hall, Grange.
Sandra thanked everyone for their support and hard work over the past year especially the committee.She also thanked the members who shared their time, expertise and skills with the group.
The treasurer reported that the finances were tight but with careful management we managed to break even.
A new committee was formed  with one outgoing member and two new members. The outgoing member was thanked for her hard work on the committee over the years.

After the A.G.M. and the normal monthly meeting time was set aside for either Machine stitching with Mary Seaman or hand stitching with Dorothy Pearce and Sandra Kendall.

Mary had very kindly volunteered to run another machine stitching workshop for those who were unable to attend the last one or still needed some help. You can see the group receiving instruction and practising their skills in the picture below.

Other members were hand stitching  practising the basic stitch and then varying size, thread, orientation and then working the stitch irregularly to see what effects were achievable

Dorothy led the group on feather stitch and you can see their efforts in the pictures below.

Sandra led the group working herringbone and various ways of working the stitch can be seen below.

Members always enjoy practising their stitching and find it relaxing.
Thank you to Mary, Dorothy and Sandra for leading the groups.

Exhibition of Work, Methodist Hall, Grange 5th September 2015

We have just had a busy couple of days preparing for our exhibition in the Methodist hall in Grange. There were projects to finish, cakes and biscuits to be baked and sales itms to be priced!
We set up Friday night and as usual there were a couple of technical hitches which needed sorting out but by the morning apart from making the tea and coffee and setting out biscuits and cake everything was ready apart from visitors.

The weather was good and gradually people began to arrive and view our work and chatter over a drink.
We tried something a little different this time and had a few mini diplays of skills or topics for embroidery and you can see a few below. These were very handy for chatting to people about our work.

Lichens

Boxes

Gummy Silk Paper

Block Printing

Cords

Patchwork

Hardanger

Our sales table did very well and helped raise money for our funds.

 Thanks to the generosity of our members we had some good raffle prizes.

 We served tea, coffee and home made biscuits from 10 until 3.
There was a steady stream of people throughout the day and they were very appreciative of our group's talents and skills and made very positive comments.
A couple of people might come and join our group and they will be made welcome.
Our Regional Chairperson Val Coleshaw also visited and it was much appreciated by our members that she had travelled all the way from Bolton.
It was a successful, if tiring day, and thanks go to all our members for their hard work and generosity.