Scissor Queen

Here we are at the beginning of a new year and it's time to start new challenges. What has been your favorite challenge? What challenge did the most members of your guild participate in? I know we won't be buying any ugly fabrics for that type of challenge this time.

Some challenges I've seen or participated in have been ugly fabric, M&Ms, crayons, favorite book, panels, about your state, candy wrappers, and packaging labels.

I heard about one having to do with paint chips but I didn't see the details for that one.

Phyldar

One year our guild-challenge-chairman handed each member a different magazine that had absolutely nothing to do with fabric or quilting (farm magazines, hunting, gardening, news related, etc.) and then had each one draw a number out of a "hat". The member then turned to the page in their magazine which matched the number they had drawn. The challenge was to make a quilted project that related to something on that page - it could be color related, based on a word or phrase on the page, based on a picture on the page, etc. When they submitted the challenge project, they also had to include the page from the magazine and a short writeup of how it related. I had a page with an ad for an artist which showed one of his paintings of a field in winter with an abandoned barn, guernsey cows, pine trees, and snow. I made a stuffed cow out of muslin and made small quilt blocks whose names corresponded to different things in the picture for the spots (trying to keep the fabrics "guernsey-spot" colored) such as "Hole in the Barn Door", "Pine Tree", "Snowflake", etc. It was really fun and we had some really unique interpretations. This year we each drew a letter of the alphabet (with the harder ones removed) and are challenged to make a small quilt that has three things beginning with our letter. One of the members has "M" and is making a baby quilt with cute monster material, sock monkey material, and melon material. Last year our challenge was "memories" - our interpretation. The year before it was "black and white and one bright". Hope this gives you some ideas - sorry it's so long!

Scissor Queen

The magazine challenge sounds like it would really kick start people's creativity!! I'm definitely putting that one on the list of possibilities!

Peckish

I don't normally participate in challenges, but the one we're doing this year sounded really fun so I joined.

It's a very relaxed and mellow challenge. We put some money in a pot and bought a couple of bolts of one print of fabric. Each member gets at least 1 yard, although some of us requested 2 or 3 yards.

The rules:
The item we make must be a quilt. No bags, jackets, etc.
The fabric MUST be recognizable in the quilt. It can't be cut so small that no one can pick it out.
The perimeter of the quilt cannot be more than 200" around. (Quilts are to be lap/crib/wallhanging size.)
Each participating member will put $5 into a kitty. Quilts will be revealed and voting of "Best of Show" quilt will commence at the Christmas gift exchange/meeting next December. Winning quilt gets the kitty.

Since we all have different tastes, I'm pretty excited to see what each of us comes up with!

DogHouseMom

Letters ... using your three initials ... one initial should represent the main color, another initial should represent the pattern or block, and the third initial should represent the quilting motif - any initial can be any item. Creative license allowed with colors and quilting motifs (ie blue can be aqua, stipple can be meander, etc.)

Example: Annette Delores Baker could be Drunkards Path blocks in Aqua and quilted with Baptist Fan.


The next one will really get the creative juices flowing ....

Clue!! Each person chooses three cards from a standard "Clue" game. They then have to represent those three 'clues' somehow in their quilt. The people (Professor Plum, Ms. Scarlet etc) could be easy as they can represent the color (but they don't have to), the rooms and weapons will be the tricky part.
The Rope ... could be a rope quilting motif, or a couched thread as an embellishment
Lead Pipe ... something grey, something long and thin
Conservatory ... use floral fabric, applique flowers and vines

Example: Mrs Peacock in the Dining Room with the Revolver could be Peacock feathers forming a Dresden Plate (dining room), quilted in concentric circles (revolver).

There are lots of possibilities, but folks will definitely need their thinking caps for this one.

CorgiNole

Standing in line at the New Year's sale, I overheard a very doable UFO challenge - member's showing UFO's were entered into a drawing sponsored by the guild president each month.

Cheers, K