closer oh so close

As you all know by now if you have been following along on the blog, we have had a pillowcase challenge going all year long.

The first goal was 250 by April 1rst, issued on Ground Hogs Day.

We met goal, and I got greedy and asked for another 250 for the center.

In the spirit of Christmas Jenny O. collected money from her nursing buddies at work and purchased fabric.  For the sole purpose of making these pillow cases for Iowa Comfort

Jenny did all of the cutting and sewing on these 15 bright and cheerful pillow cases.

Thank you Jenny for your generous spirit.

Officially these are pillow cases 454-468.

IF my math is correct that means we need 32 more pillow cases to hit the goal.

In this week of Thanksgiving I want to thank all of you who have supported Iowa Comfort in any way.  Special shout out to Jacque J.  who volunteered to deliver them to the center straight from her shop for me.

Beanie Babies and a cozy quilt

Nancy H. has been cleaning out her collection of Beanie Babies....lucky us!  We recieved a sack of them to go with our Hope quilts.

Here are the newest arrivals.  You know over the last three years I have seen a lot of Beanie Babies....but there were a few that I had never seen before.  I thought kangaroo, spider and octopus were all so cute.  Maybe because it was the first time I had seen them.

This flannel quilt top was donated by Jan M.  She originally was going to give it to a loved one, and decided that it wasn't quite the right colors.  

Lucky for us she decided to donate this one to us.  I need to check my fabric.  I am hoping that I have enough flannel to use as backing.  

This quilt is a generous lap quilt, and so bright and cheerful.  My initial thought is that I am hoping I can find a cancer treatment center that will take it and make it available during treatments.

Thank you Nancy and Jan for your generosity of time, talents and Beanie Babies.

Blessed with wonderful volunteers

Here we are three years in this experiment of helping those in our own community, and we still have wonderful volunteers.

This week I am going to focus on my piecing volunteers.

I have two bedsize quilt tops that were pieced by volunteers.

Here is the first one.

This quilt top was pieced by Theresa H. it is a generous twin size quilt.  

The fabric was donated by the Ladies of the Retreat a couple of years ago.  Jacque always has a charity project for those attending her retreat.  On the 10th anniversary she asked everyone to donate a 10 inch fall square.  Iowa Comfort recieved enough squares to make 3 bed size quilts.

Here is the second one:

This top was pieced by Penny W for us.  It was made from the same donated fall fabric from Jacque's retreat.

I always find it intresting how quilters interpret fabric.  Both of these quilts are so different.  The top one reminds me of fall foliage.  The bottom one reminds me of Halloween or Thanksgiving with all the pumpkins in it and orange and red fabrics.

I have two quilts to get on the long arm this week, but I hope to get quilt number one on the long arm this week end.  Hopefully I will be able to juggle my busy schedule and pull it off.

I also need to get a donation ready...so if you currently have one of our quilts to bind, if you could let me know how soon it will be ready I would appreciate it.

Thank you again Theresa and Penny for piecing the quilt tops.  You both did a great job!  Also to Jacque and all of you that donated 10 inch squares.

More donations to share next week

The first 4 Christmas quilts

As you may already know I recieved a huge donation of Christmas fabric earlier this year.

This was really pretty fabric, but I didn't think making bed size quilts was the best use for this fabric.

The fabric was donated by Fons and Porter, and I wanted to make sure that what ever I did with the fabric it would be truly appreciated.

So I decided to make lap size quilts that could be given as Christmas gifts to some one who might not recieve anything. 

Here are the first 4 of those Christmas gifts.

Take my word for it these pictures do not do the quilts justice.  They are really pretty.

These quilts were pieced and quilted by myself.  Two were generously bound by Jan M and the other two were bound by Betty W. for me.

I am having to get really creative with my backings.  To be honest I am one of those longarmers that LOVE none pieced backings.  It is just me being lazy.  I don't have to worry about seams not running straight or bumping up against the seams of the quilt tops.  As you can see I needed to piece the left over Christmas fabric together to create the backing for two of these quilts.  The good news is that by piecing the backs I have depleted most of the Christmas fabric in these projects.  I don't think I could have planned it better if I had tried.

Thanks to Colleen and Fons & Porter for thinking about Iowa Comfort when they were looking for an organization to donate this fabric to.

A huge thank you to volunteers Jan and Betty for their continued support of Iowa Comfort.  I so appreciate all of their support.

I have no doubt that these quilts are going to touch someone and make a huge difference in their life.