Tag Archives: Sewing

Camp Blankets

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Recently, the 49th Guiders decided to use some of the girls’ hard earned cookie money to get camp blankets for each girl as a year end gift. This was just on time for the girls to bring their new blankets to camp.59533105_362280671160807_7263286084086267904_n.jpg

Camp blankets are a fun Girl Guide tradition that allows girls to sew their various crests onto the blanket as a momento. These blankets are great to stay warm around a campfire or as an extra bit of warmth while sleeping at camp. Many girls have blankets they’ve been working on for years filled with memories of their different Guiding camps, challenges, and adventures.

The 49th Guides got crests with the first letter of each girl’s name and sewed them on for them. This means there’s no way for them to get confused with who’s blanket is who’s! Together, they practiced sewing on some badges! Practicing their hand sewing skills fit into the “how to” badge, which is a cool way to incorporate program.

What a great idea! These girls all now have a camp blanket that they can keep working on for the rest of their time in Guiding — many adult Guiders even keep up the camp blanket tradition!

Guide Quilt to be Auctioned

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The 22nd Burnaby Mountain Guides are thrilled to finally unveil a project that they’ve been working on for a long time: an original Girl Guide quilt!

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Over a year ago the unit found out about a collection of old Girl Guides of Canada uniform pieces that had been stored at Provincial Guide house but that no longer had any use. After confirming that the uniforms were not of interest to other committees, including the museum and archives, they decided they had to come up with a worthy project for this textile piece of Guiding history.

The idea was born to make the uniforms into a quilt. It seemed like a great idea… except for the fact that neither the girls nor their Guiders actually knew how to make a quilt.  The unit brainstormed some design ideas and sought out some expert advise from family and community members.

As an ongoing service project, units in Burnaby Mountain District take turns going to LJ Christmas Manor, a local senior’s residence, for monthly visits. When the 22nd Guides had their turn, they decided to appeal to the seniors for help. In September 2016 with the help of the residents of the manor, they dismantled the uniforms, removed the buttons, and cut the fabric into usable squares. It was a great hands-on project to engage the seniors and it was great to see the girls working with them on a task.

Then, the group reached out to some local West Coast Area Trefoil members to help with the next steps. In January 2017, with the guidance of these experienced quilters the girls helped lay out the quilt and did some of the sewing at their unit meeting. A huge thank you goes out to Guider Nancy who took the quilt home to help with putting the last bits together on her sewing machine.

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Almost done, the quilt came back to a Guide meeting in March 2017 for the girls to put on the finishing touches, which included sewing on buttons for decoration. In addition to the old Guiding uniforms and scarves, the quilt also features commemorative crests from Lady BP’s 100 club, 100 years of Girl Guides in Canada, Thinking Day,  the four original world centres, and West Coast Area.

The quilt is going to be auctioned off at the Trefoil Guild Rendezvous, happening April 28-30 2017 in Richmond, BC. Proceeds from the sale will be donated to the Canadian World Friendship Fund.