Got Caught Playing Hooky

Last Friday I took a half day off work so that Hubby and I could attend the opening session of the 2011 MD20 Lions Club Convention.  As many have read before, both of us are active in Lions and hold or have held various volunteer positions at the club, local and state level.

At the opening session on Friday afternoon I was being honored with the Past District Governor's Association leadership award for my district.  We headed to downtown Rochester after working part of the day, and enjoyed the opening ceremonies, where I was also surprised and humbled by a gift of appreciation from the current Council of Governors for my work with the MD20 Lions Leadership Institute over the past 6 years.  It was wonderful when they asked all the Leadership Institute graduates in the room to stand, and that included a large number of the people on the stage, and many many in the audience.  Quite a touching moment for me, especially as I have stepped down as coordinator of the Institute... I needed a break.

After the PDG awards were presented, Hubby and I were very hungry and decided to slip out of the opening session and get some dinner (and celebrate) - we had a  long evening of socializing ahead and I know my limits of going without food... so we slipped out before the opening session was entirely finished and went to Dinosaur BBQ just down the street for some dinner, also figuring we would get in and through before it got crowded.

That's when the trouble began... see neither of us knew that I was to receive another award at that opening session - the International President's Leadership Award ( I think I got the title of that right)... no one who knew had tipped us off to stay put, and most other people did not know either.. and when they called my name... we weren't there....  to make it worse it was a very good friend and mentor who was making the presentation (and who was picked up by the mic saying "I'm gonna kill her!" or something like that!).  We actually got back from dinner when the session was just finishing up - and I got "caught."  Boy did I feel like a schoolgirl caught skipping class!

Luckily my peers have a great sense of humor - and although I took ribbing for it all weekend, I did return to the formal session on Sunday morning where the medal was presented to me with lots of pomp and circumstance.

Humbling, humorous, honored.

It was another great weekend to be a Lion!

The Whole Lan-Yards...

Last month I participated in my 7th MD20 Lions Leadership Institute. 1 of those was as a participant, and 6 have been as a staff member - 4 as Coordinator of the program.

Each year I served as coordinator, I ended up making something for the participants, the faculty/staff, or both.

This year it was lanyards for all - thanks to a pattern from Two Peas in a Pod Designs that I came across one day. I did not go as patchworky as her instructions, other than the star insert on each lanyard. Our theme was "reach for the stars" but I had a very limited amount of this fabric, so I just inserted a bit in to each lanyard.

I also modified the finishing a bit - I don't have pictures of it but will go back and do a little tutorial on that if people are interested - it encloses both raw ends but only uses one ring in the bottom, unlike the double ring in the original tutorial. Both work equally well - it just depends on what the lanyard is being used for. These were name tag holders -I printed the nametags out on card stock - ran them through my Xyron laminator -and punched a hole at the top for the lanyard clip.

I will say that this project really drove home the concept of different fabric quality though - the black pin dot and star fabrics were a bit softer to the hand than the solids (although they were the same price!) - and after sewing on them all for a while - and having to change out my needle THREE TIMES when sewing through the solids - I would best compare the rougher fabrics to sewing through sandpaper! I could "hear" the difference in the machine as I passed from the solid to the stars on each lanyard!

It is just a good reminder that I should remember to shop with my hands as much as my eyes when buying fabrics!!! I DO buy online - but usually manufacturers I am familiar with and fabric lines I have "pre-browsed" in stores.

I will be making more lanyards - I wear an ID badge/swipe card at work and now think I need more to change up my outfits - but I think I will choose my fabrics a little more selectively!

Scraps Gone Wild

OK - so I had 12 Aeropacs and 2 rather large quilts ready to take to Leadership Institute, and was still faced with a pile of scraps.

This is when my brain gets dangerous - when I get on a creative roll like this - because then I started thinking about quilting, specifically scrappy quilting, being kind of like leadership sometimes - you get lots of different fabrics/people with different looks/strengths and have to put them together into something functional - like a quilt or an organization. And many times you may have a pattern in mind, but the pattern changes depending on what you have to work with. I even asked my participants which came first - the pattern or the fabric -and which of the quilts was made first. It made for an interesting discussion.

And then you have leftovers - people who can't/don't work with the big plan, but still are useful in their own way, or that mixed in with the whole they overpower, but on their own they do better. In my metaphor filled brain -these are the 'scraps'...

So I decided to illustrate this - and make all those scraps useful. I started sewing "Perfect Pouches" and when I ran out of pieces big enough to make those, I started sewing the little scraps back together and making more pouches. Big pouches, little pouches - pouches with Handy Tabs, pouches with handles. My goal was to use up all the scraps.

(if you look closely at the pouch on the right of the top photo, the top portion is made up of a bunch of 3 1/2 x 1 1/2 scraps of the same fabric - stitched back together into a bigger panel.)

I even made 2 journal covers with Perfect Pouches on them - one for my assistant coordinator, and one for me.

I pouched until I ran out of zippers and found that I had one for every participant to take home with them.

And I still have some leftover scraps!!!

Next year our theme is sports...
Stadium blankets anyone!??!

A Tale of Two Quilts

So yesterday I started to tell you about my overabundance of travel fabric. Well, as I worked on my dozen AeroPacs, my mind got into that "dangerous" zone where I was figuring out ideas for the Leadership Institute and how the whole theme and event were going to come together.

I decided in keeping with the travel theme I would issue the participants "passports" -and as a bit of incentive we would "stamp" those passports and then raffle "something" away at the closing banquet.

Hmm - after looking at what I bought and finishing up the AeroPacs, I thought I probably had enough leftover fabrics to make a quilt to give away.

So I made a Yellow Brick Road. Not my favorite rendition of this particular quilt - but it worked for the purposes of the program - and was easy and quick to assemble and tie.

But - I STILL had lots of leftover fabric.

Hmm - perhaps enough for a second quilt??

Yup - this one was a "make it up as I go along" pattern - trying to use up blocks already put together. I was able to make them exactly the same size. I actually like the 2nd one better, although with more time I might have done things differently.

I decided to raffle off one quilt among all the participants, with their number of chances based on the number of passport stamps they received, and to let them choose which one they wanted. The second one would be drawn from the names of the faculty, staff and participants, with each person getting one chance.

But - I STILL had lots of leftover fabric.

So tomorrow I will tell you what happened next...

A Funny Thing Happened in Preparing for Leadership Institute

So last week I was AWOL from the blog because I was at our Lions Leadership Institute. This is an intensive 3 day leadership training retreat for Lions Club members in New York state. I was a participant in this retreat in 2003, and for the past 4 years have been on the coordinating staff, holding the position of Chair this year and last.

This year we had 17 participants, 4 mentors, 5 faculty members, 2 staff members and an additional 7 guests at the closing banquet. Coordinating this event means my assistant and I publicized it, recruited participants, processed applications and payments, made hotel arrangements, planned the meals, recruited faculty, built the schedule, purchased and prepared all the materials AND hosted a hospitality room. Oh, and we were present for every workshop and I was master of ceremonies for the banquet.

But that's the "work" part of this - the fun part is coming up with the annual theme and all the little things to go with that. Last year it was a Lion Safari, and this year we went on a Trip Around the World.

So the crafty side of me decided that buying things for props just was not good enough - last year I made Lazy Girl Wonder Wallets in safari fabric for all my faculty (instead of framed certificates) and carried around a Runaround Bag with the same fabric. This year I decided to make them Studio Kat AeroPacs.

My quest for the perfect fabric began last November, as we came up with the theme on our way home from last year's Institute. Map fabrics were usually pirate themed, and I was just having a hard time finding the right fabric...

Until February - when a trip to JoAnn fabrics showed me the debut of new fabric lines by M'Liss Rae Hawley - including a great travel fabric line.

So I bought a little. I kept forgetting to bring the pattern with me -nor did I know exactly how many I needed to make - so next time I was in the store I hedged my bets and bought a little more. And the next time I was in the store, knowing this was a JoAnn's exclusive fabric and might also be time limited - I hedged AGAIN and bought a little more, each time buying a bit of one of the other fabrics in the line. This happened more than a few times.

By the time I sat down to start making the AeroPacs, I realized I had WAAAYYY more fabric than I needed.

What's a girl/quilter to do with too much fabric for an intended project???

Expand the scope -that's what.

And that's exactly what I will tell you about - tomorrow - when I can load in the photos to go with the rest of the story.

We Serve -and have fun, too

In addition to work and home and crafting, I am also a very active Lions Club member, as is my husband. He was a Lion in Pendleton, SC before our move to NY, and I joined shortly after we moved here, primarily to meet people in our new community and do something good with my time.

Little did I realize that many members of my Lions Club were active within the organization at the regional, state and international levels, and soon drew my husband and I into volunteering in larger capacities, capitalizing on our skills and interests in writing and web design, as well as leadership training and communications, to enhance the organization and our service to our communities.

This weekend is our annual convention for all the Lions Clubs of New York State and Bermuda. We will be converging on Niagara Falls, NY for 3 days of fun and fellowship, sharing ideas as well as touching base with old friends and probably making some new ones. I am leading a workshop to promote our Lions Leadership Institute, a 4 day intensive leadership training seminar that I help coordinate each year, as well as having a booth with hand printed greeting cards to sell as a fund raiser for the institute (hence my hours with the Print Gocco recently). This photo is of me at our booth with my good friend Ken, previous coordinator for the institute, and incoming Council Chair for the Lions Clubs of New York State and Bermuda.

Hubby is helping with a seminar on building a website for your Lions Club, as well as helping me out. And the Munchkin is spending a fun filled weekend with Gramma, Grandpa, and their new dog, Lilly.

If you have an urge to serve your community, check out your local Lions Club. It's a great organization with lots of opportunities to do good, and usually fun, things. Even if you don't want to join, you can support the club's activities and fund raisers, and don't forget to give them your used eyeglasses or hearing aids.