Small guild? Big idea!

Written by Diane Harris on February 15, 2022. Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Inspiration, Open Classes for Everyone, Quilt Lifestyle, Trunk Shows

There are hundreds of small quilt guilds all over the world.

And I know firsthand that their programming is limited by their budgets. So I’ve come up with a plan to make it easier for smaller groups to book a program with Stash Bandit (that’s me!).

Here’s how it will work.

The live presentation will be virtual through Zoom.

Available to groups with 50 or fewer members on their paid roster (honor system).*

The fee for a one-hour trunk show of your choice is $10/person on the roster. For example, if you have 35 members, $10 x 35 = $350. (The standard fee is $525.)

You will be guaranteed a seat for every person who registers for the meeting on Zoom.

I will make the remaining seats available to others.

The deadline for your members to register for the meeting is 10 days before. This gives me time to fill the rest of the seats.

For very small groups, I may request a date other than your normal meeting time.

I will limit the number of these programs I do each year.

The Jingle Bells Trunk Show is great from July to December.

Cope & Hope is part of “Make Extraordinary Scrap Quilts.”

I have six trunk shows from which to choose. Today I’ll highlight three.

Windy Wonders: A Quilt Block Grows Up

is one of my favorites because it’s all about creativity. I’ve taken one simple block and made dozens of quilts by tweaking it in different ways.

Framework by Diane Harris of Stash Bandit

I love watching the light bulbs come on for quilters when they catch the excitement of this program. There’s no end to the variations.

Here’s an EQ rendering of just one idea.

I won’t live long enough to make all of the quilts in my idea folder, but I’m going to try.

Tilting Windmills by Diane Harris. Photo by Mellisa Karlin Mahoney. Used with permission.

Taste Test: Unexpected Sampler Quilts

is a newer program, and I had so much fun making these quilts. No longer just blocks in rows, samplers are dynamite for building your skills and using your stash.

Petit Patchwork, original sampler by Diane Harris of Stash Bandit

Many of these quilts are my own designs but there are fabulous pieces designed by others, too.

Christmas Figs, designed by Fig Tree Quilts and made from stash by
Diane Harris of Stash Bandit

I share many ideas for making sampler quilts of your own, and show you enough examples to get your blood pumping!

My Wild Garden by Diane Harris of Stash Bandit

Whatever your quilt style, you’ll find something to love in the Taste Test trunk show.

Let’s Play Drezzup

is a trunk show that just keeps growing! Dresden Plate has enjoyed a comeback in the past few years and there’s a lot to see.

All Drezzed Up by Diane Harris of Stash Bandit

My Dresden Plate love affair began with 20 vintage blocks. From them I made the quilt above called All Drezzed Up.

Diane presenting Let’s Play Drezzup program for a guild

In this trunk show, you’ll see many examples of what works and what doesn’t. The styles abound. I share the most common problems seen in Dresden quilts and ways to solve them. It’s easy to get lost in Dresden Plate but it’s the best kind of lost, believe me.