Gudrun is collecting quilting supplies and fabric to help those affected by the terrible flooding in Iowa. Many residents have lost everything and still have not been able to get back into their homes. Gudrun is hoping to have all donations in by August 15.

Find out more from these posts: Quilters in Need and Quilting Care Packages for Flood Victims.

Submitted by: Ami Simms – Blog

The Alzheimer’s Art Quilt Initiative (AAQI) is an Internet-driven, grassroots, totally volunteer effort to raise awareness and fund research through art.

More than $157,000 was collected for various chapters of the Alzheimer’s Association during 2006 and 2007 by the AAQI. In January 2008, the AAQI became a Michigan nonprofit corporation and will be funding research directly.

The AAQI currently administers two major programs. The first is a nationwide quilt exhibit called "Alzheimer’s: Forgetting Piece by Piece". It contains 52 quilts each interpreting Alzheimer’s in some way. So far, an estimated 192,000 people have had the opportunity to see this exhibit. It will continue to crisscross the country until the end of 2010. A book and a CD of the exhibit are available for purchase.

The second is the "Priority: Alzheimer’s Quilt" project, so named for the urgent need for research dollars and the requirement that these quilts must fit into a flat cardboard USPS priority mailer without folding. They are small works of art no larger than 9 inches by 12 inches, offered in an online silent auction the first few days of each month or sold outright on the Internet or at selected venues across the United States.

More than 5 million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease, a progressive and degenerative brain disease that kills brain cells. People with Alzheimer’s lose their memories, life skills, the ability to reason, to learn, and eventually to take care of themselves. It is always fatal unless another disease takes one’s life first. Quilters across the United States are threading their needles in the hopes of bringing a cure for Alzheimer’s disease one stitch closer.

Did any one person or event inspire the creation of the charity quilt organization?

It was founded in January 2006 by quilter Ami Simms. Her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2001.

Geographic location of your organization.

US primarily although we have some foreign participants.

How many charity quilts have been donated?

Almost 3,000.

Are there any special yearly events, such as a quilt-a-thon?

We offer quilts for sale at the International Quilt Festival in Houston, TX each year. We hope to bring 1,000 quilts in 2008.

How many volunteers are involved?

A handful of core volunteers, and hundreds of quilters who make, donate, and purchase the quilts.

How can one volunteer, donate or get involved?

See our web page at www.AlzQuilts.org or go directly to the You Can Help! page. (Donate quilts, bid on monthly auctions, buy AAQI gear, subscribe to our AAQI update newsletter.)

Contact Information:
Web Site: www.AlzQuilts.org
Ami Simms (founder, curator, executive officer)
amisimms@aol.com or 810 637-5586

Reminder: I’m putting together a blog post of links to other quilter’s posts about their charity efforts. If you would like to write something this month, or already have a post, please send it to me for inclusion.

Submitted by: Caron Lage

Inspiration and description for my project:

Not long ago, I was perusing the Internet, when I came across some photos of a display at Reed College out in Portland Oregon. Flags had been placed in the lawn. A red flag for every American who has died in the war, and a white one for every six Iraqis. There were 3055 red flags, and 112,000 white flags. I was overwhelmed.

I don’t live in a hole, I consider myself moderately well informed about the world, but seeing the visual representation of the consequences of war was so much more powerful than hearing, or reading the numbers.

Thus began the haunting. That visual was thought provoking without telling one what to think. It was something to raise awareness about something that is far too easy to ignore on a daily basis. But it was also impermanent. It would most likely be picked up in a few weeks when the lawn needed to be mowed.

Haunt. Haunt. Haunt.

Wait! I’m an artist, what can I do to make something as a visual reminder? My chosen medium is quilting, so it would obviously have to be a quilt of some sort. The rest of that particular brainstorming happened so fast, I can’t describe it for you, except to say I was jumping up and down and dancing the dance of good ideas.

Here’s the idea – A small quilt for each American who has died and on that quilt small french knots to represent each Iraqi. Using the numbers from the Reed display, that’s 3055 little quilts with 212 french knots on each one. The quilts will be made and bound with solid color fabrics. Any color is fine, they represent the soldiers who represent us and we are of every color and ethnicity. The 212 french knots will be made with black thread. I’ve been using 2 strands of embroidery floss, and starting in the center, make a spiral of french knots. Each little quilt will be connected to the next with small brass safety pins. I am putting a purple bead on the safety pin between the quilts to represent the wounded. It’s no where near the actual number of wounded, but, they need to be represented as well.

The idea has evolved a bit – folks are helping me with beads and some decorative machine stitches are ok (Check with me first please with machine stitches) and you can out the knots or beads on the blocks in any non-representational design. I still want the main idea to be a visual reminder of the numbers, and not to dictate anyone’s specific meaning. So, no peace signs, crosses, or doves.

How folks can help:

My family and friends have been incredibly supportive and helpful! And the Internet has brought bits of help from all over the continent. I’m always being amazed with support.

I still need about 1500 more blocks to complete the first branch of this. My goal, for now, is to finish 3100 blocks, because that is how many American military deaths there were when I started the project. When these are done, we can probably start another project of similar size. Another 1000 plus military deaths have occurred and, there wasn’t talk of American contract workers dying when I started this. Last I heard there were at least 1200 who have perished.

So all of that was to explain that YES! I do need help! Go to my tutorial pages and make some blocks!! Drop me an e-mail and I will give you my address to send them in.

I am also looking for venues for the memorial to be seen. It can hang in sections as small as 30 blocks, or any combination really, as the design allows it to be fluid and flexible for any space.

As the project grows and is ready to be seen, I could use monetary help with shipping costs, and insurance while it travels.

Contact info:

Check out my blog for this project at: And Still Counting. Photos, tutorials contact info and updates will be there.

Comforting People with Cancer
Réconforter les personnes avec le cancer

Victoria’s Quilts Canada was established in 2000 by Betty Giffin. VQC is a non-profit charitable organization, committed to providing comfort, both spiritually and physically, to individuals diagnosed with cancer. It is staffed entirely by volunteers who make quilts and distribute them to people diagnosed with cancer in Canada.

Victoria’s Quilts Canada was modeled on an organization in the United States, Victoria’s Quilts, which was established by Deborah Rogers in honour of Victoria Ann Morrison, a wife, mother, grandmother, and Deborah’s best friend. Victoria was also a cancer patient who often commented about being cold during her chemotherapy. Victoria was also a quilter who took the fear out of quilting by reassuring others that “since people are not perfect – quilts don’t have to be either.” Out of this grew Victoria’s Quilts.

In August of 1998, Betty Giffin learned about this effort and brought the idea to Canada. She started slowly with a handful of friends. In the first year, 16 quilts were distributed to adult cancer patients in the Ottawa area.

Over the past eight years, the organization has seen immense growth, and now includes some 800 volunteers in 20 groups in Ottawa and 18 communities across Canada. This growth enabled VQC to deliver its 10,000th quilt during January 2008, and it distributes an average of 250 quilts each month.

However, with the number of people stricken with cancer continually rising, VQC has also seen an increase in the demand for quilts. Although the organization has, to date, been able to meet all the requests, it is concerned that quilt production will soon not be able to keep up with the demand. Victoria’s Quilts Canada is actively looking for new people interested in sewing or quilting, or any of the non-sewing positions that need to be filled.

Victoria’s Quilts Canada also appreciates the support it has received from corporate sponsors, including many of the local quilt shops and Fabricland Distributors. But the major source of its funds is donations from private individuals, often the recipients of our quilts, and their families and friends. Victoria’s Quilts Canada also raises funds through raffles and direct solicitation, and through some innovative ideas, such as President Betty Giffin’s head-shaving in April 2008.

In addition, Victoria’s Quilts Canada holds an annual Quilt-a-Thon, in October, where about 100 quilters converge to make more than 100 quilts during the day. And besides the quilters, the volunteers include the administrative organizers, floor managers, food caterers, and clean up staff. A whole lot of people work towards making the day the successful endeavour that it is.

In addition, we hold an annual raffle of three major prizes. This year, the three prizes are two queen-size bed quilts and a lap quilt.

As well, anyone who wishes to get involved with Victoria’s Quilts Canada can contact us. No quilting experience is necessary, as there are many jobs that need to be filled, from administrative, to quilt delivery and counselling, to public relations. If a person is willing, we’ll find a job for them to do!

Here are some photos of the many quilts that have been sent to people over the last few months.

Contact Victoria Quilts:
http://victoriasquiltscanada.com/
By phone: (613) 843-9212
By fax: (613) 843-9131

Mishka’s Notes: I am a volunteer for Victoria Quilts meeting once a month to help baste quilts done by other members of my group. I would like to volunteer more, but don’t seem to have time right now. A friend and I participated in the Quilt-a-thon last year. It was a blast, I highly recommend others to get involved. I have raffle tickets, if anyone wants them, drop me an email and we’ll make arrangements.

Reminder: I’m putting together a blog post of links to other quilter’s posts about their charity efforts. If you would like to write something this month, or already have a post, please send it to me for inclusion.

… I’m really behind these days. A couple of days before Canada Day, I switched Internet providers and something went very wrong, resulting in me having no access for several days. While this might not be a big deal for many, for a web developer who works from home, this really caused me a lot of nuisance.

I had every intention of starting the Charity Quilting Month posts on July 2nd, but just haven’t had time to get them together. I hope to get caught on the Wednesday or by the weekend for sure. If you’re waiting for an email reply, please be patient, it’s coming too.

My mom and I had a great visit, we did some stitching (her knitting, me blanket stitching some applique) and shopping and eating out at restaurants. It was my birthday on the weekend, and I got some great gifts from my family (including home-made cookies that the cats ate already) and a lovely professional seam ripper from a friend of mine. My mom was here for breakfast that day, and she left right after so I spent a quiet afternoon and evening, relaxing, reading, watching some television and drinking some beer. It was perfect as I didn’t want anything elaborate and preferred to just forget about it altogether (yes, it was one of those big ones).

Anyway, I was back to work and getting client stuff done today, so I feel more in my groove than I have the past couple of weeks.

I was reading Judy L.’s Patchwork Times blog earlier today, and she was kind enough to post about my Charity Quilting Month in this great post of her Charity Quilting projects, which gave me a great idea to tie into the theme here. If others want to post a blog entry on their own site about their charity quilting efforts, then send me an email, I’ll gladly compile a list of the posts together in one spot on here. Depending on how many I get, I’ll do a couple of posts this month to highlight your submissions.

Have a great week,
Michele

July will be Charity Quilting Month here at the Quilting Gallery. This will be an opportunity to feature the many wonderful charities and organizations out there where quilts and quilters are involved. We are a very generous community. My hope is to have a charity to post about every other day during the month of July, but if I get more submissions, all the better.

Are you a charity organization and want to be featured here?

I’ve created a series of questions below that you can use as a template in preparing your submission. Send me your submission along with any photos or logos you would like used in the post. Please don’t just send me a URL, I don’t have time to do the research myself. Feel free to skip questions that are not appropriate and add ones that are more applicable to your particular group.

• Describe your organization or group.
• Did any one person or event inspire the creation of the charity quilt group/organization?
• Geographic location of your organization or group (i.e. world-wide, country-wide, or city/state/province only).
• If applicable, how many chapters are there world-wide or country-wide?
• If applicable, how many charity quilts have been donated?
• Are there any special yearly events, such as a quilt-a-thon?
• How many volunteers are involved?
• How can one volunteer, donate or get involved?
• Submit photos of finished quilts (maximum of 4).
• Submit logo or other branding for use in the blog post.
• Web site address?
• Other contact information.

Any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I reserve the right to edit any submissions; however, I’ll be sure contact you if I’ve changed anything significant.