STEAMfest 2018

March 3-4 the Boulder MQG had a booth at STEAMfest at the Boulder County Fairgrounds in Longmont, CO. STEAMfest is a yearly festival “celebrating all things creative, imaginative, and exploratory.” STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Entrepreneurship, Arts and Making.

This is the third year the Boulder MQG has had a booth at the festival and has introduced children of all ages to sewing. Children choose fabrics for their blocks, sew them together, and then choose either to take them home or leave them behind to be sewn into a quilt we will donate.

Over the two days the children sewed over 200 blocks, 89 of which were donated to our guild. We helped children of all skill levels, some who had never before used a sewing machine and some more experienced with sewing. Some visitors to the booth had been there in past years and were excited to make another block. Often, kids who chose to bring their blocks home use them for fun projects. One girl told me that her older sister has a sewing machine and made her block from last year into a pillow, another younger visitor was telling me how she loves sewing bags and was going to make one from her block.

Thank you to all the volunteers who set up and manned the booth.  Your patience in guiding these children may spark additional interest in some to pursue sewing as a hobby. A special thanks goes to Common Threads who helped with the booth both Saturday and Sunday. A big thank you to Cynthia for lending us two Bernina sewing machines and to all the guild members who donated fabric for the event. And last, but not least, thank you to Monique and Barb for all the planning and work that went into organizing the Boulder MQG booth.

If you are looking for somewhere for your child to learn sewing, Common Threads is located in Boulder and has a Creative Lab with different classes and workshops for kids 7 and up. You can find information about those here.