As our President, Marilou Moschetti, was ill, Vice-president, Bruce Fihe, welcomed the group of members and guests. A visitor from the Central Coast Weavers and 3 new members, Loren, Patrice and Maggie introduced themselves to the 30 members present for our first meeting of the new guild year.

New officers/board members: President, Marilou Moschetti, Vice-president, Bruce Fihe, Secretary, Kris Nardello, Treasurer, Susan Penney

Appointed leaders: CNCH liaison, Shar Brunston, Librarian, Marsha Hein, Historian, Laura Rider, Programs, LeAnn Bjelle & Jen Dyer, Hospitality, Mibs Sommerville & Karen Golding, Greeter, Diane Wardell-Tuel; Enchantment Committee: Maggie Clark, Peg McCullough, Michelle Simon, LeAnn Bjelle, Kris Nardello; New Member Liaison: Maggie Clark & Sandy Geise; Web Master: Marsha Hein (retiring) Bruce Fihe & Jennifer Palm (beginning); Name tags, Karen Golding

Treasurer’s report

-Membership renewal-Susan stressed the importance of hurrying to renew membership by Oct. 1 in order to maintain access to our Members Only section of the website as well as meeting the guild deadline for our annual dues payment to CNCH (Conference of Northern California Handweavers). The password will change within the next 7-10 days.

-Estate Donations-Under their umbrella, the guild is insured and also has the use of the group’s tax ID number for income tax deductions from estate donations. The treasurer is authorized to provide a letter describing such donations along with the other required information.

-Security-Members may request removal of some/all of their contact information listed in the roster if they are concerned about security issues by contacting the treasurer, Susan Penney 4redpenney@gmail.com

Fair Report

Cathy Walls, chair for the Santa Cruz County Fair Handspun/handwoven Dept. reported that we had more total items this year than last, but that Anne’s Web and Carmel Crafts Guild members made up the majority of the entries. She urged all of our guild members to consider participating next year to change that.

CNCH

Shar will be attending the fall liaison meeting although the date has not been set yet.

Historian

Nothing to report

Workshop update

Mibs announced that the Barbara Shapiro hexagon basket workshop would have 6 participants over the next 1 1/2 days and they would begin at 1:00.

The next workshop will be given by Brenda Collins on May 10th. The theme is designing art yarns from a photo, movie title, person, etc.

Old Business

-Library update- Marsha reported that it was lovely to have another helper, especially one with professional experience in a library as is the case with Amy Chirman, but she would like another 2 more helpers to review book purchase requests and other small tasks involved with managing our wonderful guild library. Amy has found that easily 20% of our books are not available anywhere else! Marsha brought the latest new books for perusal and there are good descriptions of them on our website in the Members Only section.

New Business

-Roberta Valdez, curator of the on-going Many Threads…One Cloth show at the Pajaro Valley Arts gallery, 37 Sudden St, Watsonville, invited guild members and friends to a fashion show of the wonderful Coats With Stories created by Rachel Clark on Oct. 1, 1:00-3:30 in the back patio area of the gallery. Not only is she a creative and imaginative artist, but her presentations are filled with humor and great stories accompany each coat. Don’t miss it!

-Karen Golding said the visually impaired weavers need more help. Over many years, several of our members have been helping these women continue to weave on floor looms and they have been frequent blue ribbon winners at the county fair, but more help is requested. You don’t have to be an experienced weaver to assist them and this is a great opportunity to learn how to warp a loom or other weaving skill.

-Elizabeth Shilling proposed an interest group for sewing with handwoven fabric. She asked everyone to think about it.

–Change of venue Oct.12th meeting

Meeting location will be at Valencia Hall, 2555 Valencia Rd, Aptos. Further directions are on the website, Calendar section.

Interest groups

Embroidery- had 2 meetings in members’ homes where they try to learn a stitch a month by teaching each other. The next meeting is Oct. 4th at Bruce Fihe’s mobile home park off of Felt St, Santa Cruz. Contact Elizabeth Shilling for further information.

Spinning-Bruce said that the Wooly Wonders group was small, but welcoming to any members that would like to hone their skills or get help with spinning problems. They meet monthly on the 4th Thursday at the community room at Bruce’s mobile home park. Contact Marilou Moschetti for more info.

Tapestry-Maggie Clark explained that there are currently two groups of tapestry weavers. The Twisted Tapestry beginners are 3 enthusiastic weavers that frequently get together at Quail Hollow Park to ask questions and get help. The Eccentrics are a larger group of more experienced tapestry weavers that have been meeting for the past 2 1/2 years weekly (mainly on Zoom) to share information, design looms and offer help to each other. Contact Maggie Clark for info.

Natural Dyes-Peg McCullough described the most recent Dye Day held on Aug. 23 where the Dyeversities group dyed yarns with garden flowers plus indigo. Their October gathering will focus on dyes extracted from colored woods. Contact Peg for info.

Baskets-LeAnn Bjelle described the activities of the Basketeers which meet at members’ homes. They are using the book Basketry Basics to guide their learning. The next time the focus will be on using all materials gathered from nature. Contact LeAnn for info.

Weaving-Joan Vierra reported that the Be Weave It Or Not beginning weavers have all completed their first projects. They meet at Joan’s home every Tuesday to weave on floor looms and they are joined once a month by a more experienced group of weavers for show and tell, a short lesson, questions answered and yarn suggestions. Contact Joan for more info.

Show and Tell

An amazing variety of beautiful creations were shown by members. They included nalbinding hats, several pieces of handwoven yardage, a rya rug, an itajime shibori scarf, a wedge-woven tapestry, woven cotton placemats, a tapestry woven with handspun paper, a mokome stitched shibori towel and t-shirt dyed with indigo, a throw woven of thrums, woven fabric with naturally dyed yarn for a vest, several baskets and a tapestry woven of naturally dyed yarn.

Thank you’s to retirees

Susan Penney expressed the gratitude of the guild to both our current webmaster, Marsha Hein, and former treasurer, Rachelle Weiss. They were each presented with a gift card and written Thank You’s from the guild members for jobs well-done.

The meeting was adjourned at 11:05.

Respectfully submitted, Kris Nardello, Secretary