Club Notes - February 25, 2026

We finally had our winter potluck party today. There were 19 of us enjoying the food, friends, and games.  I gave everyone a sewing multiple choice quiz, and I think everyone learned a little something.

Show and Tell:

Mary Ellen Boutin started us off.  She made some zipper pouches,

 a tote with a matching zipper bag, 

and a small quilt top using one of our orphan blocks.

Ceal Pedersen showed some more stuffed toys that she painted the faces on to finish them for us.

Louise Stem made 4 more pillowcases for the Youth Ranch graduates.

Bev Minnerly showed some of the doll clothes she made.

Nelda Keltner has dived into our efforts and made some stuffed animals.

Lisa Strahs-Lorenc made some doll medical gowns,  and was proud to show the first walker bag she made.

Next we ate some more and played Sewing Bingo

Thanks to everyone for helping the clean-up..

The next events that I am aware of are the following:

March 7^th  - Quilter’s Closet & Notions Sale at La Hacienda. 8:30am-12:30pm.   Caroline Grasso, Roxann Wales and Isabella O’Brien have volunteered to help.  If anyone else can spare an hour or 2 to help, let me know.

March 1-April30 All Florida Shop Hop.  Purchase the magazine at one of our local shops to get free patterns and the official passport needed to register for prizes. There are prizes given at the shops plus regional and all Florida prizes. This is a fun way to get to know the shops.

Last week we gave 39 more toys to the UF Villages Hospital Auxiliary and 11 walker bags to Freedom Point Assisted Living.   

Next week we will get back to our regular sewing fun.   It is the last week before the Quilters Closet sale, so if you have any tools, books or other items you want to get rid of, bring them and we will add them to our sale.  Proceeds go to our charity fund.

Hope to see you next week.

Lois

Club Notes - February 18, 2026

There were 17 of us at today’s meeting including 2 new members.  We put out the 2 bins of fabric pieces, the 5” squares, and the 6.5” squares.  I also had several walker bag kits available for anyone who wanted to make one.  Last week I mentioned that we have a 2^nd place to regularly donate toys, so I am hoping to increase the number that we make.  There were quite a few ready for stuffing today, so much that we used up our stuffing.  We will get more before the next meeting.

Normally we would have had a winter potluck party in January, but I couldn’t get it together until now.  We will have our winter potluck party next week! Bring a dish to share if you can, but don’t worry if you can’t.  There is always lots of food.  I will bring the plates, plasticware, etc., as usual.  Bring your own drink and 25 pennies, buttons or other items to mark your bingo cards.  As usual, we will eat, then have show and tell, then a multiple-choice quiz, and finally bingo.

The next events that I am aware of are the following:

March 7^th  - Quilter’s Closet & Notions Sale at La Hacienda. 8:30am-12:30pm. I will be looking for a few volunteers to help for an hour or two.  Caroline Grasso and Isabella O’Brien have volunteered to help.  If anyone else can spare an hour or 2 to help, let me know.

March 1-April30 All Florida Shop Hop.  Purchase the magazine at one of our local shops to get free patterns and the official passport needed to register for prizes. There are prizes given at the shops plus regional and all Florida prizes. This is a fun way to get to know the shops.

Show and Tell: (https://sewingn-more.blogspot.com/)new

B.J. Herter brought in 7 dinos to be stuffed.

Ceal Pedersen showed some more stuffed toys that she painted the faces on to finish them for us.

Louise Stem made 4 more pillowcases for the Youth Ranch graduates.

Lisa Strahs-Lorenc showed a doll for Dolls from the Heart and some doll medical gowns.

Pat Pipa brought animals to be stuffed

Eileen DiSanto made a bunch of animals to be stuffed.

Cats

Dinos

Pigs

and another dino.

Ellen Hein showed all the quilts that were handed to her to complete the binding.  

This one came in as a quilt top in a donation.  Ceal did some minor repairs and found it had been paper-pieced on newspaper from the 1920's.  We plan to donate this one to the Friends of the Sheriffs Youth Ranches for their Spring auction,

In the same donation, we found a stack of fan blocks.  Lorraine Manz took these and turned them into several quilt tops.

There is one more of these that I am still working on quilting.

The donation also included some star blocks,  Lorraine turned these into quilt tops too.

We don't remember who handed this one in.  It has been in my pile of to-be-done for at least 2 months.  If you created this, let me know and I will update this blog.

Ellen also handed in several Cornerstone Hospice quilts.

This one is complete and ready to go.

The rest of these are tops and backs that I need to add batting to and quilt.

We convinced Ann Knoff to show this quilt that Khaki Quilters sent.

Lorraine Manz also made this one.

We talked about saving these for the Youth Ranch graduates, either this year or next.  We'll decide in a few weeks.

Since the beginning of the year, we have donated 24 toys to The Villages hospital, 42 toys to Project Hope, 11 walker bags to Freedom Pointe, 38 quilts and 13 pillowcases to the Christian  Care Center, and 13 quilts and 20 pillowcases to Advent Health Waterman.  You all make this possible!!

Hope to see you next week for food and games.

Lois

Club Notes - Feb 11, 2026

There were 14 of us at today’s meeting.  I told everyone a little about our experience at thr Giving Showcase last Saturday.  This is a unique opportunity to network with other charitable groups within the Villages. Thanks to Lisa, Carolyn and Brenda for helping.   We may have picked up a new group to donate to – Isaiah 117.  They can use small quilts and drawstring backpacks for children transitioning into foster care.

I did a quick explanation of how to sew a zipper into a small zipper bag, Thanks to everyone who contributed to the discussion.  I’m afraid I was not on my A game today. As I have mentioned in the past, I do not function well early in the morning, and I had to wake up at 4AM this morning to take my husband to the hospital for an outpatient procedure.  All went well and I had him back home by 11AM.

I brought the squares back in and Mic brought in a bunch of zippers and other notions.  The stuffing and fabric scraps were available in the closet.

The next events that I am aware of are the following:

March 7^th  - Quilter’s Closet & Notions Sale at La Hacienda. 8:30am-12:30pm. I will be looking for a few volunteers to help for an hour or two.

March 1-April 30 – All Florida Shop Hop.  Purchase the magazine at one of our local shops to get free patterns and the official passport needed to register for prizes. There are prizes given at the shops plus regional and all Florida prizes. This is a fun way to get to know the shops.

Show and Tell: 

Louise Stem made 4 more pillowcases for the Youth Ranch graduates.

Ceal Pedersen showed some more stuffed toys that she painted the faces on to finish them for us.

(Linda Greenbaum made these bears)

Nancy Miller has been busy making 30 drawstring backpacks.

Linda Greenbaum is making port pillows for mastectomy patients.

Mary Ellen Boutin has been very busy making tote bags

 and several quilt tops.

Eileen DiSanto made another dino.

Diane Placek made a couple of zipper bags.

Bev Minnerly made a backpack, 

doll clothes and a bunch of doll bodies.

A few weeks ago, I showed 2 quilt tops. Today I showed the finished quilts,

As always, everyone spent the rest of the afternoon selecting fabric, sewing stuffing toys and socializing.  

It has been a while since we had a party, so I am working on that.  It won’t be next week, but sometime soon.  I will let you know.

Hope to see you all next week.