Want a West Sider’s Neighborhood Group?

Denise is convening an organization meeting for a possible west side Neighborhood Group on Friday at 1:00 pm, in the Sedgwick Room at the Extension Center.  If you’d like to be a part of such a group, you are invited to come give your suggestions for when to meet and what to do.  If you can’t make it on Friday, call or email Denise and give her your ideas!

June Meeting

The gals from Country Cousins up in Concordia gave us a marvelous session on panels this month! There were three parts to the presentation…

First, Peggi Barrett talked about using panels in garments. She showed several kinds of garments, mostly jackets, with some innovative ideas for showcasing panels or even interesting sections of regular yardage. Here, she and Marsha are showing off the Dragonfly top from Diane Erickson:

Next, Marsha Doyenne discussed panels in quilting. Even if the designer thought the panel would be used intact as a quilt, Marsha showed us that it may look even better cut up and combined with additional fabrics:

Finally, they pulled out a big tub of fabric and let us play! Each table got a set of panels, complementary fabric swatches and some trims (like ric rac) and were encouraged to plan a project — garment, quilt or home dec. It was lots of fun to see what each group came up with.

Many thanks to Marsha and Peggi for driving all the way down from Concordia to meet with us!

New Fabric Store in Wichita

A new home decorating fabric store has opened up downtown.  It’s called Water Street Fabrics, and is at 255 N Water, on the SW corner of 2nd and Water St.  262-4200.  It’s closed on Sundays and Mondays.

Has anybody checked it out yet?

July Sewing Retreat

The next sewing retreat will be Friday, July 6 and Saturday, July 7 at the extension center. (Remember, there is no July general meeting.) Friday, we’ll be sewing from 9 am to 9 pm, Saturday, from 8 am to 4 pm. We’ll provide lunch and dinner on Friday, and lunch on Saturday. The cost is $15 for one day (either Friday or Saturday) or $25 for both days. There’s a registration form in the most recent newsletter, or you can pick one up at the June meeting.

As is usual with our retreats, you are encouraged to bring any project you’re interested in working on. We’ll have tables for your sewing machines, extension cords, irons and boards, and the extra tall and wide cutting tables.

We have a couple of special projects which you may or may not wish to participate in.

First, Becky and Betty will be bringing the felting supplies and patterns they picked up at Regionals last month, so everyone will have a chance to try needle felting.

Second, we’ll be making cute little drawstring bags out of fat quarters. Betty will bring the instructions. If you’d like to make one, you’ll need to bring a rotary cutter with large mat and large ruler, 2 fat quarters, about 1 1/2 yard cording or ribbon, a bodkin or safety pin for threading cording, a marking tool, and basic sewing supplies.