October Meeting part one

After our business meeting, if we are not stitching together our newsletter, we have Galleria. Several times a year it is an assigned theme and the other months it is something that has been generated out of a previous program, homework, if you will.

The Galleria for October was to have finished your book made in June with Louise and filled it with something. Here is the collection of completed books set out for viewing.


Margot leads us through the Galleria each time.

I am not sure who this belongs to, it looks like a great travel journal!

Rita showing her finished book.......great flowers by our artist!


See! the pictures loaded first try in this entry but flatly refused to load for the next entry, which originally was the first........

Finally! with so much on this past week, I am finally down to the blog on my list of "to do"! Thank you very much to Kathleen for sending the pics right away after the meeting!! For whatever reason today, I am having a bit of trouble adding photos to the blog. There are still four more that refuse to load. I thought I had this all figured out and then it throws me something I don't know how to fix!! It might just be that I have to do the other four in another blog entry. They, of course, are the first four I wanted to show you! isn't that always the way?!

This was part of the Galleria, ably led my Margot. The books were made in June with Louise and they were part of the homework for the summer..... fill those books with something, suggested it might be a good travel journal. Here is Violet showing her book and on her right is Janice Woodland who was leading the October program for us.


Nan's book.....lots of letters!


Fay explaining how she has been using expired calendar pages in her work.

another page of Fay's


Can you believe how much Marilyn's grandsons have grown?! wasn't it just a bit ago that Rhonda brought a tiny baby to the meeting?


Let the fun begin!! the program, led by Janice Woodland, "tag book". Here are Joyce and Janice with Margot in the background.

I had to leave before the program began to attend a funeral.
It looks like the packets of materials exploded and took over everyone's workspace!
Kathleen with Rita to her right......

Jean, concentrating! Fay distracting Eileen, Val and Anita busy.

Fay will always share her grandchildren and or travel pictures! Eileen, Val and Anita.

and finally, a photo I have tagged as "The Bridesmaids". I think you had to be there!!

Thank you very much to Janice for teaching this book structure! looks like everyone had a great time. I haven't even had a chance to peak in the bag but I really must do that before the November meeting.

November - Copperplate with Joyce!
if you do not have an oblique nib holder, let me know, I have several and could share.

September Meeting

The September meeting was jam packed with things to accomplish after having the summer off.
The business portion of the meeting always takes about an hour it seems. We are a chatty lot! and then the Fall newsletter was hot off the presses and needing to be sewn together and then put into the envelopes. We had decided at the Executive meeting in the summer that we would try a year without having Galleria on the dates when we sew the newsletter. At least we had that bit of extra time! While everyone ate their lunch, it was time to have our draw to share Diana Haines' studio contents. Her daughter Melanie had said that their Dad asked her to please make sure that I was given her calligraphy things and I immediately said I would share with her friends at Alphabeas. It is hard to believe that Diana has been gone 5 years now and now her husband Don has passed too. There were enough things that we drew all the numbers at least a half dozen times. Everyone present seemed very pleased with their treasures.

And then, it was on to the Program. Remember, we were supposed to have had a two day workshop instead of the meeting so some last minute planning happened when the workshop did not fill. With our focus on calligraphy, it would have been easy to present another lettering style but there is more to it than that! Why not an exercise in design and layout.....

We were each given the same instructions and we got 14 different posters to be used with the upcoming exhibitions.

1. Pop outside and find something to either write with (twig, rock, etc.) or something to make a
mark with (leaf print, flower, berries, etc.).

2. At least 1" tall, write the word "EXHIBITION" it could be diagonal, horizontal, at the top of
the page, at the bottom of the page, across the middle, no rules!

3. Decide where to make that mark with whatever you found outside. Think about adding
some colour.

4. Write the information 'where' and 'when' in a triangular shape.

5. Write the information 'who' and 'why' in a rectangular shape.

6. Add our contact information.

All of this was done quickly without too much planning, it was to be spontaneous and quick. We
were done in about one hour!! These are the posters, and as we didn't put our names on the work or some of the names were lightened when I attempted to remove all the scan shadows, they are anonymous!!





















It is amazing what you can do just putting pen to paper and crossing your fingers!!

What did you do last week?

I helped Erin with her friend Joyanna's baby shower. I made her baby book and iced her cake. The theme of the baby shower was "Classic Pooh Bear" and so the cake was made to resemble a beehive. Erin made 60+ cupcakes and dyed coconut green to make them look like a lawn around the beehive.

Jo chose the fabric for her bookcloth and was lucky enough to find some with bees! I am easily amused at the overheard comments made by some of the guests...... "oh, she *made* the book?" "she wrote everything by hand?"

It must be baby week! don't we have two new grandbaby's expected amongst our members?

September

The start back looms! We have postponed our workshop with Lorraine Douglas which means that we are as usual for September 12th - a meeting with sewing the Broad Edge together and a program. Please bring your regular lettering gear, including some paper at least 8½ X 11 and at least one largish pen.....5 mm should do the trick, along with other smaller sizes. The Zig marker pack would work well for some of the work planned. See you all there!

Beat the heat?

If you are spending a bit of time at your computer trying the beat the heatwave, here are some interesting websites to spend a bit of time looking through.

http://members.shaw.ca/warmlandcalligraphers/ .......nice to see what others are doing

http://www.btinternet.com/~candeo/index.htm .......eye candy

http://thecalligraphypen.com/ .......lots of interesting articles here

What are you doing to beat the heat?! comments welcome!

Summer Luncheon at Fay's

At one point in the week, I saw a forecast of cloudy for Saturday. That would be ok, cloudy and warm, we could go with that. Then I saw it was going to rain the whole weekend - my husband's dream but not great for an outdoor luncheon! the weather network must have gotten us mixed up with back east somewhere, maybe Hamilton ;o) Finally, all the weather reports aligned and we were given a cloudless, hot, sunny day!

Thank you to Fay and Eileen for these photos. They are in no particular order as that would make me have to think and plan this!! Thank you to Jo for bringing the gazebo/shade which was well used. Too bad the thing didn't fold up as easily as it went up! Did you find out how to do it in the end Jo?

Thank you very much to Fay for sharing her home and garden with us for our summer get together! and Thanks to everyone who brought delicious things to share at lunch. Calligraphers do know how to eat well!

Eileen and Val

The sun shade protecting some from the incredible sunshine!

This might look very bright under the "gazebo" but I had to brighten it up before posting as you couldn't really see Joyce, Margot, Wilma and Frank very well!

Muriel looking fit and ready to travel!

Violet and Bev

Val sharing some birthday cards with Dorothy and Diana

Jo, fresh back from her trip which included a visit with Kay in Regina!

It has oft been said, "When I grow up, I want to be just like Joyce", great attitude! sharp dresser! but hmmmm, I think this was Diana's yellow purse, not Joyce's! even though it looks lovely with her summery outfit!!

Wilma and Frank enjoying some Cuban Rum Cake. You had to be there, if I do say so myself, it was pretty tasty!!

Violet, Bev and Jo enjoying some rays.

Dorothy, Fay and Muriel enjoying a giggle!

Dorothy and Nan in deep conversation :o)

Diana and Joyce looking very summery!

Val, Diana, Dorothy and Muriel

Jo, Rita, Fay, Nan, Joyce and Margot

Yes, we should have thought to take a photo of the table ladened with food! maybe next time. It was all very good, of course! did you doubt it?!
We hope Terry is feeling better and over the illness that kept him away from the lunch. We send our good thoughts to Jean and her son and hope that his condition improves daily. And, everyone else who missed it because of travel, we hope you are home safely and that you had a wonderful time whatever you were doing on Saturday afternoon. Hope you enjoy seeing our afternoon John. We haven't heard from you for awhile and wonder if you are recuperating ok.

Next up is our workshop with Lorraine Douglas in September. If you haven't registered, please do so in the next short while as I must open it up to non members very soon. We want this one to go!! Lorraine makes fabulous cards and will be sharing two days worth with us.

Remember the Broad Edge deadline approaches! better get those articles written and in the hands of the newsletter committee!

Happy Summer!