Category Archives: Kindness & Community

Quilter’s Call to Action

Hi Everyone –

As I have written, California has been under siege with fires up and down the state. One of the really awful ones, the Butte Fire, is burning in Amador County. At this point, we are thankful that it is 75% contained. However, it’s damage has been horrible. Over 75,000 acres have burned with a current loss of 535 residences. (Information obtained at Yubanet.com.) Everyone’s worst nightmare, right? The loss of your home and all of your precious belongings and then having to rebuild. It must be an overwhelming situation for these people.

In comes Kerri of “Kerri’s Quilting” in Lakeport, CA. She is putting together a few quilts for some of the quilter’s that lost not only their homes, but their quilting supplies and fabric. I think this is such a sweet thing to do. Providing something handmade as an expression of love and concern will hopefully bring comfort to some of our fellow quilters.

Would you like to help? Here is what Kerri wants:

“If you would like to help turn ashes to beauty please make a quilt block – applique a heart in the center of a CUT 10” square using pastel colors, sign your name and town and mail to Kerrie’s Quilting 1853 N. High St. Lakeport, CA 95453.
The blocks will be set together to make quilts for at least 5 ladies that I know of who lost all their sewing/quilting things in the fire.
The deadline for mailing is October 8th.”

Here are two blocks that I made the other day. Just a simple heart appliqued in the middle of a ten inch block.

I hope you will create a block, sign it and mail it to Kerri. How wonderful for people from across the country to show their concern for these Amador County quilters! Let me know if you have any questions. Also, for a quick tutorial on making an appiqued heart block, see this post at Quilting Jetgirl.

For those of you who saw my messy, messy sewing room the other day, here is an updated picture. As I was told by Deb at Frugal Little Bungalow, it was time to ‘Redd Up’ that room, which is apparently Pittsgburgh-speak for cleaning up a mess. 😉 Success!

Much easier to work in!

Of course it didn’t last long because I was sewing this weekend. But it is still, it’s much better than it was.

Remember the post about the elephant baby quilt I made for my friends that are having a baby via surrogate mom in Mumbai, India? Their daughter, Emerson, arrived today via planned C-section!! I can’t even imagine how exciting this is for TJ and Margot after so many years spent working, hoping and praying to become parents. I am so happy for them and hope their transition from India back home is safe and uneventful.

Finally, this is why I love giving a quilt. Look at this text that I received out of the blue the other day. Lil is my niece and I made her a t-shirt quilt about a year ago. (Story is here.) Warms my heart!

Linking to Connie over at Freemotion by the River.

Charitable Donation Winner

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Hi Everyone! Happy Tuesday. Wow, as always, summer came quick. Never fails that the temp jumps from mild to crazy hot in a matter of days around here. We were floating along with lovely 78 degree temps and it is in the high 90’s this week. I am not a fan of hot weather. Makes me ever so grateful for the A/C unit. The older I get, the more I dislike hot weather (thank you menopause.)

One positive side to the heat is that my husband’s berry patch is going crazy. We have blueberries and boysenberries that are ripening and they are so yummy. Right now we are picking about 5 pints daily of the two combined (more boysen’s than blue’s). Ray is all about making jam so I suspect that he will take over the kitchen on Sunday and put up jam. When he does this, I happily become chief bottle washer and he does the rest.

Thanks to everyone who entered my blogiversary celebration giveaway by leaving me a comment about their favorite non-profit. I truly enjoyed reading through each comment and found it interesting to see what everyone holds near and dear to their heart. If you haven’t read the post, I offered to donate $25 to the winner’s favorite charity. My sister, Patti, then piped up with an offer to match my donation, bringing it up to $50. Because, you know, she’s awesome like that. 🙂

And the winner is……….. Number 9, Sarah Goer!! Sarah was one of the first virtual quilty friends I made when I began this blog last summer. A talented quilter and writer, Sarah is also a stay at home mom to two little ones. I enjoy her blog and especially love reading about the projects she does with (and for) her kiddos. Her son (about 5-ish years old) is on his second quilting project already! Do yourself a favor and take a peek at her blog, Things I Make. Sarah left a wonderful comment as an entry to my giveaway. See what you think:

“Happy blogiversary! What a special and unique giveaway. And thank you Patti for contributing as well! The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation has a special place in my heart as my friend’s 18-year-old daughter (who I’ve known since she was 2 or 3) is living with CF. She just graduated from high school and is on her way to college. I admire how hard she has worked while also having daily treatments and regular hospital stays to deal with her CF.”

In honor of Sarah’s friend, $50 has been donated to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation!

Finally, here is a peak at the quilting I am doing on the batik Honeymoon quilt. It is a traditional nine patch pattern with each block being made up of nine 5″ charm squares. The center of each nine patch is a blue square which I quilted with a large flower of one sort or another.

I have all twelve of the flowers done and just started the filler pattern to go around the flowers. I am doing a leafy vine.

It is kind of difficult to see the pattern against this particular batik because is it so busy and leafy. This is the only square I have done so far though. I think I should be able to get this finished up fairly soon. Seems like it is going quickly.

That’s it for now. Wishing each of you a wonderful summery week! The season for iced coffee, iced tea, iced water… get the idea? Stay cool and enjoy.

Linking to Freemotion Mavericks, Sew Cute Tuesday and Freemotion by the River. Links to all of these sites are available at the top of this page, under Link Ups.

Happy Blogiversary to Me!

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I can hardly believe it, but today marks one year since I first published my first post on this lovely little blog of mine. This post is my 97th. Who knew I would think of something to say 97 times!! I have had such a fun time this year writing posts, tracking my projects, and best of all, meeting so many friends in this on-line quilting community.

I read a lot of blogs. From food, vintage collecting and thrifting, finance information and investing, to humor and parenting (which should go hand in hand, in my opinion!) there are blogs about anything and everything. However, the quilting community of bloggers is unique. This community is caring, respectful, and supportive. Honestly, this is a great group of people. There are all levels of quilters in the blog world – some are experts with endless talent, many are beginners and everyone has a common love of cutting fabric into bits and creating something from it. The philanthropic and caring nature of this group impresses me no end. I have seen so many situations where another quilter is experiencing a hardship and is immediately supported by quilters as a group. Conversely, when there is reason to celebrate, this community is right there cheering you on.

I am grateful for all that I learned this year. It was nervewracking to publish my first post. I was not at all sure anyone would want to read what I had written. I remember thinking, well, I would have at least six readers (my five sisters and my parents!) Here it is one year later and I have nearly 100 followers. Thank you.

Gratitude also goes to my son, Andrew. He set up this self-hosted blog, does the updates and other miscellaneous tasks needed to keep it running. When I come with questions, can I do this, how do I do that, he is so patient with his explanations. Better yet, he often just makes the changes I want. Take a look at those gorgeous social media buttons on the upper right side of the page. Yep, thank you Andrew!

I am truly grateful for this community. Getting involved with other bloggers has enabled me to improve my quilting skills. The tutorials that are so generously provided and painstakingly written are such a great source of learning material (hah – pun intended!) Just this year, using tutorials, I learned to use a Hera marker for quilting, found cleaner methods for binding my quilts, learned to look at color values when deciding which fabrics to use in a project, and free motion quilting – oh, how thankful I am for the endless posts on FMQ! The many link parties that are hosted each week have provided me with exposure so that readers could find my little blog as well as allowed me to find other blogs that I may never have stumbled across.

It has been a blast and I look forward to my second year! In celebration of this milestone, I wanted to do something special. I considered a giveaway of some sort of fabric but it didn’t seem right. Really, don’t we have enough fabric? Aren’t our shelves bursting with it? Be honest now. 🙂 Instead, let’s celebrate in the giving way that our community is known for. I would like to make a donation to your favorite non-profit. Leave me a comment with a link to your favorite charity. Maybe add one or two lines about the charity. (Who knows, maybe others reading the comments will be intrigued by your charity and get involved.) I will pick one lucky winner and donate $25.00 (USD) to your charity. I am looking forward to reading about the organizations that are near and dear to your heart. This type of giveaway also allows me to include international readers. Previously, I have always included only USA readers in my giveaways because the shipping costs are so expensive. But this giveaway is open to anyone! Just give me the link to contact your non-profit. This giveaway is open until Monday, June 8, 2015. I will announce the winner on Tuesday the 9th. I hope everyone will enter so that your charity has a chance for a donation.

UPDATE: The donation to your favorite charity has just been matched by my sister Patti! She is celebrating my one year blogaversary with me and wants to double the donation. Yay!! This means that $50.00 will be donated to the charity of one lucky winner. Isn’t she the best? See her comment offering to make this match. Thank you Patti!!!

I hope you all know that I am thankful for your readership and even more thankful for your friendship.

Linking to Thankful Thursday at Quilting Jetgirl and Lorna at Let’s Bee Social.