#Finish it up Friday#charity Quilts#LutheranWorldRelief#Quilts for Refugees

11224462_10153070845032411_7986113609188556336_n — The Pet Expo booth showing the blankets that I made to benefit Hope for Life

After a many month hiatus in posting (sans guest hosting by my wonderful husband this summer), I am back to posting about my crafting life. This has been a summer filled with travel, family and friends, which was a wonderful break from the usual hectic schedule. I have made 60+ dog and cat quilts for Hope for Life this summer, so I have kept busy with some sewing. I have a project in the works to help out a friend for a gift.

This past week or two, I have felt so sad to see the terrible news of refugees fleeing for their lives and safety with only what they can carry. They have met acceptance and rejection, and for me at least, it left me with such a hopeless feeling for the world. I wondered what I could do that was concrete and of help……… Well all you quilters out there know what we can do!

So I did a little research to see if someone already was meeting this need with whom I could like up. I came across Lutheran World Relief who has been distributing hundreds of thousands of quilts annually through their two lard warehouses. Churches across the country have dates that they collect the quilts and ship to the central warehouses, from their they are sent overseas by ship.

As I thought about it, my Mom has quilted for many decades with the ladies at her local Lutheran church, though she worked on quilts for newborn parishioners. She had told me that others in her church made quilts for sending to the needy. So I hit the really great online Labor Day sale at a large retailer and ordered 170 yards of fabric, and a 40 yd roll of batting to go with the brand new 25 yd roll that I had at home. (You are all welcome to give me a crazy quilting lady eye-roll now!!)

Here are the results of the first four quilts that I have done so far! I have mixed a little bit of leftovers from prior quilts into two of them. They follow the online specifications for donations to this organization. 60X80 inches finished size, I did simple machine piecing and quilting instead of tying, a fold over binding. I doubled the batting to make them warmer, as well, so I am really going through that batting!

Quilt #1 is up top, #3 is identical. Quilt #2 is shown above and below (my editing skills are rusty!) Quilt #4 is folded up at the top of the stack. I can barely move from pin basting four quilts in one day and quilting them all in two! But it is a good feeling of accomplishment!