In late March, the seventh Quilts of Valor Foundation sewing event took place at Sievers School. Coordinated by Ellen Graf, Washington Island teams and helpers have made over 80 Quilts of Valor since 2013. Some of the quilts have been awarded on Washington Island, some to veterans who are known to the Island sew-ists and some have been given to the QOV Foundation to be distributed in military hospitals and veterans homes.
Quilts of Valor Foundation (QOVF) is a national non-profit whose mission is to create comforting and healing quilts “for veterans and military service members touched by war.”
Ten quilt tops (two of them stitched by a team in Arizona using some hand-dyed fabrics) were completed during this year’s event. Those are then sent off-island to volunteer machine quilters who donate the batting, thread and their time to return them as finished quilts.
Some of the quilts will be displayed at the W.I. American Legion’s Memorial Day program. Making these meaningful quilts each year wouldn’t be possible without the generosity of several individuals, service organizations and businesses.
In other news, we are receiving boxes every day with yarns, your lovely handmade fine crafts, books and more. Soon the shop will be filled with fiber art happiness!
Our class enrollment is just over 300 at this point and time will go by very quickly until we begin our 40th anniversary year with Open Quilt Studio, just two months from now, on May 28.
As a reminder, the application date for Sievers Scholarships is April 1. Scholarships are available for Sievers alumni or for new students. Those awarded scholarships will be notified by April 10. For more information or to apply, please email us at ma**@si***********.com or contact us at https://sieversschool.com/contact/ .
We’ll be seeing you soon!
Wow those quilts of valor are beautiful!
They are wonderful! The gold pinwheels within the blue and red were a real standout.
Yes….the quilts are amazing! But what thrills me is the photo Carolyn took of the ice breaking up along the shore. I would love to frame that but not today. Our furnace is out and I have five layers of clothing on that are helping my arthritic bones. Wonder if I can stitch today? it’s worth a try!
Oh my gosh, Karen! It’s too cold for no heat in the house. Hope it gets fixed soon. While standing there taking that photo, every so often you could hear the edge of the ice falling off, making a lovely tinkling sound.
Love your picture Carolyn! Also – what beautiful quilts …. lovely way to show ‘love’!
Hugs Sievers friends!
Eileen
Thank you! Hugs to you, too, from all of us at Sievers.
Congratulations on your Quilts of Valor. My small quilt group here in Portland completed 3 Quilts several years ago plus about 30 more patriotic Quilts ( a bit smaller than the requirements for Quilts of Valor) for veterans in our area. It was very rewarding.
Karen Sandberg (Kay Normann’s twin sister)
Thank you, Karen! We love hearing about others doing the same, honoring service members through quilts. Keep on quilting!