On Saturday our guild met . . . with only 19 ladies spread out in a huge room. But, as always, it was so good to be part of that community of quilters.
One member, Janice showed us some blocks she was working on made from a layer cake. One 10" square in the center, one square cut into 5 x 5" quarters, and two squares cut into 5 x 10" halves. Such a simple idea. Janice was using a beautiful autumn layer cake, and of course I immediately went home to see what I had for layer cakes in my stash.
This child sized quilt top took less than 2 hours to make. And I only used about a dozen of the 10" squares from the layer cake. I made the 4 simple blocks that Janice showed us, and then added an extra row of squares to the top and bottom to make it a bit longer. I had the fun of making it, but didn't really have a plan for where it was going to end up.
And this brings me to "lightening the load". On Monday morning I was prepping a couple of packages for shipping - a secret Santa swap, and a Quilt of Valor. And I got to thinking about donating a quilt or two. I found an Oregon shop that is accepting quilts and tops for victims of the fall wild fires, and decided that a box needed to go that way too. A little Google searching provided several options.
The red package has my secret Santa goodies going to a state I won't name until it has arrived. Don't want to spoil the surprise!! The middle box has a Quilt of Valor going to one of my relatives in Florida. I'm shipping that to his daughter and she will do the presentation since I can't go in person.
The bottom box contains the layer cake baby quilt top shown above, the panel quilt top (below) that has been hanging in my closet for a couple of years, and a finished baby quilt that needed a home too. Those quilt tops will be finished by the shop's volunteers and given to someone in the area who lost everything in the fires. And the baby quilt is ready for them to give.
It felt so good to mail those boxes to lighten my own load, and hopefully bring some pleasure to others out there. I have the luxury of being able to sew and I need to share the wealth more often.
7 comments:
Great idea with the layer-cake squares. And I agree, it feels good to give quilts away.
Thanks for the inspiration, Sara. There are so many people suffering right now. A quilt hug is a good thing!
Thanks for the specifics on the layer cake block. I have some scrap 10” squares that I could use that way.
Wonderful idea to lighten the load! I love making quilts, but have way too many.
Someone will appreciate your quilting efforts! Such a sweet thing too do!:)
The baby quilt is very fun and colorful (and fast too!). I've been meaning to lighten the load a bit too and send some finished quilts that haven't found homes with my family to a family that could use them. I should put that on my to do list for tomorrow. Thanks for the push in the right direction.
Super idea, to send quilts to wildfire victims. Feels good to share this way. I love the bicycle panel one. Not sure what a layer cake is, but now I'm hungry . .
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