Onebyone

I was asked to be program chair for guild. We have a good budget for programs but I can't find anyone to schedule. All seem to want to do zoom . That's fine with me I like the zoom presentations and classes but the majority of the members say no to zoom. It's getting hard to find local talent that we haven't used before or come up with new topics and presentations we haven't done before. It's getting to be stressful. The local quilt shops have all agreed to do a program but after the first of the year. I have the rest of the year to fill. We have had extended show and share, meet your members until we are running out of shares and members. LOL We have had round robin project demos, roundtable discussions, and quilting bingo. Anyone have any ideas?

Tartan

Is your guild into machine quilting with rulers? Someone coming with rulers and demonstrations for home machines may be nice. If they could also bring Machinger gloves or similar and the sticky tape that goes on the bottom to keep rulers from slipping, I would like that.
How about a hand appliqué block work shop night with someone putting the blocks together and quilting for donation quilt. We really enjoyed the program where we divided into tables and played for squares or strips of fabric that we brought and rolled dice to see who won them.

Onebyone

We have played strip poker (fabric strips) many times. One of the quilt shops will present a machine quilting program. One will do an Accuquilt program and one will do a modern art quilting program. That's only three months scheduled. LOL We have community service sewing during day of the meeting, we meet late evening. I'll come up with something but it sure isn't easy.

cashs_mom

Our guild is going to have their first F2F meeting in August. They wanted to do it sooner, but had the same problem with no one wanting to travel, they just want to do zoom meetings. Since we usually have a workshop the day after the meeting, its been very disappointing. I would have been very interested in a workshop with a couple of the zoom presenters.

At one of our Christmas parties, we played quilters bingo for the door prizes. We've also played some other games which were really fun like one on quilting internet abbreviations like FMQ.

Our guild is looking for a program chair. I don't think anyone wants to do it right now because of all of the difficulties

ElaineCovid

You could get someone local (physiotherapist or kinesiologist) to present about ergonomics of sewing, how to adapt to prevent injuries, and if you pair that with a local sewing machine repair person doing/showing basic maintenance that the home based person can do preventatively, that would do a meeting (or two, depending on how long each person presented)

Tartan

How about a sewing /quilting garage sale? Have everyone bring what they want to sell with the price on and a number and have people pay at a table and the money go into a envelope with the number on it. The member could then collect their numbered envelope and anything that didn’t sell to go home.

cashs_mom

Ooooh, I like that idea!

LAF2019

similar to the garage sale idea, our guild has a yearly "Auffle" that is very popular. it's a combination of an auction and a raffle. Members bring in new or used items to contribute (items are donated and members do not receive compensation). They are randomly or strategically placed in marked off sections or tables. members buy raffle tickets at $1 each, write their name on the back, then drop off tickets into a cup or container that is placed in each "raffle" section. you can buy however many tickets you want. for example, buy 20 tickets and place one ticket in 20 different sections or all 20 in one section that you really want, or anything in between. once all tickets placed, a winner is drawn for each of the sections.

Do you have any senior members of the guild that can do a trunk show or have skill in a certain technique (paper piecing, art theory, quilt design, etc)

Gemm

I'm pretty inexperienced and not part of a guild so I'm honestly not sure what would work in your setup, but have you considered connecting with a local school's home economics or art teacher, a girl guide or scout leader, or a community center that runs programs for kids? Years ago, I introduced a group of my students to quilting by bringing in some precut squares and helping them to make simple 4- or 9-patch blocks. We were really limited for time, but a few of the kids managed to complete small projects. I could imagine that at a meeting it might be fun for groups of quilters to come up with simple projects and create little kits or instructions that could be shared with these types of groups. It could even go over a couple of meetings if you have a planning session and then another meeting to put the kits together and/or arrange for distribution. Just a kernel of an idea, but I hope there might be something useful in there for you. :-)

Bonnie K

Our guild has a night of mini classes each year. Members from the guild volunteer to teach a technique in the span of 15 minutes, like making your own spray starch, binding a quilt, no waste flying geese, how to mark a quilt for quilting, etc. They all have their own table. We walk around and watch them demonstrate their technique. A bell will ring after 10-15 minutes and we go to the next table to see the their demo. It's a very fun night and we learn a lot.