June Meeting

We met again last week, and boy did Darleen give us some updates!  She had been gathering data to include in the submission to Council for a grant, and here are the statistics.

In the last 12 months we have distributed the following:

Minamurra Presbyterian Nursing Home, Drummoyne                 84

St Mary's Nursing Home, Burwood (top up)                                 12

MS Society, Lidcombe (8 singles & 10 comforts)                         18

Drummoyne Meals on Wheels                                                     44

Westmead Hospital Babies with Cancer                                      30
                                                                        
                                                                                Total:           188

Not bad for a small band of 10 or so, don't you think?
             
Besides these, we also donated quilts to the following organisations for raffles/auctions as fund raisers:

St Patrick's Church, Mortlake, Parish Dinner
Concord Community Hostel, Rhodes
Barnwell Park Golf Club (charity day for Lucas Gardens Special School)

Now to show you some lovelies, but first I have to tell you this story.  In January there was a devastating fire in the Blue Mountains and over 120 homes were destroyed.  One of these belonged to Ellen's daughter, whose family lost everything except what they were standing up in.  Their eldest was to sit the Higher School Certificate (final exams in High School) the following week.  Ellen was at one of our meeting when she heard the news. 

We decided to make the family some quilts.  We chose this one which has sat in the cupboard waiting for a home for some months, for Ellen's daughter & her husband:

 

It is absolutely stunning, with fabulous workmanship.  I feel terrible that I can't credit the maker, but it has been in the cupboard for ages, and we may never have know who it was anyway.  So good to see it go to someone who needs it. 

 

This lovely little Twinkler Star inside a Twisted Star is fabulous, and just look at those points!  Every single one meets perfectly.

 

I should know the name of this star, but I don't.  So if you do, please tell me.

Evelyn made this one for Ellen's grand son.  See the street art faces?

 

And Robyn made this one for Ellen's grand daughter:

 

All three need to be quilted before they go to their new home.

 

The next two quilts were blocks donated to our group by one of Evelyn's friends, Ann Tosich.  Evelyn sewed the blocks into tops.

 

 

 

Cheryl made this bright & cheerful quilt featuring balloons.

 

 

Evelyn and Robyn do a lot for Aussie Heroes.  The last sewing day, Jan-Maree gave our group a bunch of blocks which had been made as block of the month blocks, but were not suitable.  They are all too "girly" and you can't send girly quilts to big boofy blokes, now can you?  So we scored.  Evelyn constructed this pretty top from some of the blocks:

 

And these are the left overs.

 

At least 3 quilts in that pile.  During the day, we stacked them into groups, and several ladies took them home to be made up into tops.  You will see that next time.

 

Lastly, Evelyn brought a doona cover she has made for herself for show and tell.

 

Darleen showed us two very special things.  First up was this gorgeous Thank You from one of the students of Chalmers Road Special School.   Here he is in his wheelchair with his quilt (face and name fuzzed for privacy).

And second, back here I told you about Betty, a tireless fund raiser, to whom we gave one of our quilts.  Well, Betty received an OAM during the Queens Birthday Awards in June.  Here is a clip from the local paper:

Congratulations Betty from all of us.

That's it for now.           

May Meeting

I have done it again.  Here is a post I wrote a month ago and does not appear to be incomplete, which I have found in the "drafts" box.  Apologies.  This time I will actually post it!  Enjoy.....

 

We met mid May, but life has been so busy for me this last couple of weeks that here it is the end of May before I have had time to write this.

 

These lovely cheerful quilt tops were made by Cheryl

 

 

This one was made by Jill a few weeks back, and Maria quilted it.

 

Made by Jackie, quilted by Maria.

 

Another one made by Cheryl

 

Jan made the next three quilt tops.

 

This one started out with an appliqued basket on a piece of plain cream fabric.  Jan took this home, added some lovely flowers to the basket, and lots and lots of half square triangles for borders, to make it a gorgeous quilt.

 

We decided to donate this quilt to Jeanette O'Hara who is organising the upcoming Senior Citizens' lunch at the club as a door prize.

 

Lovely scrappy "man" quilt.

 

And one with flowers appliqued to the centre of the 4 patches.

 

Made by Jill, quilted by Dasha

 

 

The next two were made by Jan a few weeks ago, but this week they came in quilted by Robin.

 

The next two photos are of baby wraps made by Jill.  They will end up at Westmead Hospital for the nursery there.

 

And lastly, these two were made by Jill.  They are not part of Stitching Hearts, but she brought them in to show us.  One is for Community Cat Care, the other is for Animal Liberation and both will be used as raffle quilts by the organisations.

 

We selected 5 single bed quilts to be donated to a new residential centre being built by the Greek Orthodox diocese for disabled adults at Gladesville. 

 

I am getting better at recording who made what.  I come armed with both writing pad and camera, but I still have to shriek "Stop, wait!  Who made that?" at least 5 times a day.   The others are getting used to me running around like a mad thing taking photos of everything!   They have even been known to turn around and say "Have you got that Dash?"

 

Its a 5 week month so the next meeting is not until the first week in June.

 

PS.  Have you noticed our logo I put up on the right side bar?  The logo goes onto the label sewn onto each and every quilt which is made by our group.

A Bunch of Co-Incidences

About a week ago, I got a text from my daughter which went something like this:

"I am at Vinnies at Kincumber and found this.  Isn't it one of your group's quilts?"

The text was accompanied by these photos.

 

It is definitely one of our labels and I certainly remembered that quilt!  So the following morning I went up to the St Vincent de Paul op shop to find the quilt.  It was there alright.  And it was one of the quilts I had made!  It was obviously unused, and obviously had never been washed.  (No.  Not dirty - just that a quilter can tell fabric which has not been washed.)

The blocks had been donated by someone and had languished in the cupboard in Cabarita for ages, so one day I picked them up and brought them home.  There was one block short to make up the quilt so I drafted out the pattern and made the extra block.  Then I sashed it, pieced the top, and quilted it too.  I even have a small piece of the binding I used on this quilt, still in my box of binding off cuts.

Here is the quilt....

So I bought it.  It went back to Cabarita on Thursday and it will be reallocated and donated somewhere else.

After a bit of deliberation, we decided that it must have been one of the quilts we gave to St Mary's Nursing home in one of our "top up" batches in 2011.  Why?  Because that design of the label was created in 2011; Jan doesn't remember the quilt and she started with us in 2012; St Mary's is a Catholic establishment, and St Vincent de Paul is a Catholic charity.  We think that the quilt went to someone who died fairly soon after receiving it, and either the family gave the quilt to the charity, or there was no family and the nursing home passed the quilt to the charity.

But what a bizarre co-incidence!  The quilt was made by me; it went to Cabarita, where it was distributed; it found it's way to St Vincent de Paul, and would have gone to the central distribution area in Sydney;  it was sorted there and sent to the shop in Kincumber, the next village to the one I live in (how many other op shops does this charity run??); and lastly, my daughter happened to be in the shop and spied it!

So that is the story of co-incidences.

Rotary Meeting - 21 May

Last Wednesday, 21 May, I was honoured to have been invited to be the Guest Speaker at the Rotary Club of Drummoyne's meeting.

 

Rotary meets every Wednesday night for dinner at the Drummoyne Sailing Club, so that is where I headed for the talk.  The Rotary Club has supported Stitching Hearts for a number of years, and had decided to make another donation this year.  

 

 

I had set up a few quilts draped over a convenient table, and used them during the talk as exhibits, to show the different types and styles of quilt.

 

I had also put together a slide show of some of the quilts made during the last year or so, and had that running in the background on a large screen television while I spoke.

 

Good action shot (giggle).  At least I wasn't waving my arms about!

 

When discussing what might interest the members, my contact at the club, Ilia Hristoforidis, asked that I speak about my back ground, how I came to quilting, and my involvement with Stitching Hearts.  So that is what I did. 

 

After dinner, I was presented with the cheque by Ilia. 

 

 

We are so grateful for the support given us by Rotary members, and their enthusiasm for what we do at Stitching Hearts.  Although we get lots of donations of fabrics, it is mostly scraps, and we never have wadding donated, the single most expensive component of a quilt.  So the donations we receive from our supporters generally go towards the purchase of wadding and sometimes yardage for the backs of the quilts.  Without these donations we would not be able to support the organisations for which we make quilts, and many people would not benefit from a colourful quilt at the foot of their bed or over their knees.

 

Thank You Rotary!

We Are Back

Last Thursday was our first meeting since March.  It was great to see everyone after such a long break.  We only ever meet twice a month, but we didn't meet in April as there was new air conditioning going in and the hall was not available for us to use.

The long break meant that we had a lot of business to catch up with. 

We have been asked for donation of a quilt for a raffle for the annual lunch at the Senior Citizens Centre where we meet.  We also discussed the possibility of donating to the Concord Cancer Centre for fund raising.  And there is to be a trivia night to be held at the Golf Club to raise funds for Lifeline.

The Senior Citizen's Centre has also asked us to set up a display of our baby wraps, at their lunch.  Any money from their sale will be donated to Westmead Children's Hospital.

Aussie Hero Quilts (see here for more details) sent a letter of thanks to us.  Several of our members make quilts & laundry bags for the personnel deployed overseas, and the letter was formally acknowledging their input.

And now for some of the lovely quilts which came in that day.

First up was an enormous pile of about 40 baby wraps made by Jill and Cheryl.  They aren't big as they are meant as a wrap for new born babies, and they are all lined with lovely soft flannel.  They will be donated to Westmead Children's Hospital for the Nursery.  Here are some:

Evelyn was busy, and as always came in with a pile:

Such a striking quilt!  Orange is not a colour that is used very often.

 

 

These two sarongs were donated by a friend of Evelyn's.  They are beautiful, and the photos don't do them justice.

The next three quilts were donated to our group by Jane Picksley a friend of Robin's.  The two of them met at a Monica Poole quilting class.

Love this design.  Great quilt for a man.

 

These next two are made from the old favourite, the Disappearing 9 Patch pattern.  How different it looks when you use just 3 colours (instead of our usual scrappy look), and look at how the different fabrics change the overall appearance of the quilt.

 

Robin made and quilted this one.  She wasn't happy because of the "dull" colours, but I love it, brown being a favourite colour of mine.  I am sure the person who receives this will love it too.

 

Three tops made by Dasha. 

 

 

 

This quilt was made from blocks donated by Julia Peake and put together by Dasha. 

 

A few more came in after having binding and/or labels put on, but I have already shown you those in previous posts.

March Donations & the Latest News

Last time we met, Darleen, our Fearless Leader, shared some fantastic news - the Rotary Club of Drummoyne has decided to take on our little group and is planning to make a donation.  This financial year's donation will be presented on 21 May at their dinner.  We will be providing a guest speaker on that date.
They are planning to make a donation next financial year as well.  Oh Happy Dance!

Canada Bay Council is our major sponsor; they provide us with the meeting room and a grant each year as well, which varies from year to year.  Our major expenditure is for wadding, and to some extent, our output is governed by our ability to purchase wadding.  The majority of the fabrics we use are donations, so that is not a significant cost to us.  We also sometimes pay for a quilt to be quilted on a long arm machine.  But we limit these to really special quilts which are destined to be raffled. 

So the Rotary Club donation will be a huge relief. We will be able to purchase a couple of rolls of wadding and continue being productive for the rest of this year.

Several quilts were selected as special donations at the last meeting.  They have all been shown before, but here is where they are going.

This red quilt is for Bernice, a very active lady in the community who has given us lots of lovely materials over time.

 

 

We selected this quilt for Betty, another very active lady in community.  Betty has now taken over the running of the raffle of our quilts for Concord Hostel, Rhodes and in the past year raised $950 for the charity.

 

Both ladies have selflessly given so much of themselves to people in need for years on end, that we felt they should have a comfort quilt each.

 

And last of all, this quilt will be auctioned as a charity fundraiser at the Parish Dinner to be organised by the St Patricks Catholic Church, Mortlake. 

We have been providing quilts for the St Pat's dinners for a number of years, and the auction is usually very successful.  I will report back when I hear how this year's auction went.

The meeting last week was cancelled as the hall where we meet is having some new air conditioning installed.  That is great news, as it does get terribly hot and stuffy in that hall!  Instead, several of us met for lunch.  Nice day.  Thank you to everyone who managed to come.