charity quilting

Will Panty Raid for Charity!

Panty Raid Quilt Raffle

PMQG is really excited to participate in an event organized by our very own Sam Hunter of Hunter's Design Studio!  One of our small groups has been making a quilt (a pattern of Sam's called Star Stuff) that they plan to raffle off at our January 15th PMQG meeting.

 This is no ordinary raffle though! The proceeds are going to one of PMQG's 2014 Charities: Raphael House, a shelter for women and children escaping from domestic violence. And the proceeds aren't money, they are underwear! Used clothing might be fine when you are in need, but new underclothes are nice to have, whatever your situation.


To participate in the raffle (PMQG members only) and have a chance to take this lovely quilt home, bring new underwear (women or children's sizes) to our January meeting. Please think of picking some up when you are out doing your Holiday shopping!

Update with specific needs from the Raphael House website:
Clothing:
Due to space restrictions, we cannot accept any used clothing.
  • Women’s underwear and bras (new) - all sizes for women and teens, especially underwear sizes L-XXL
  • Children’s good, clean, casual clothing - especially boys sizes 5 to 16
  • Children’s underwear and socks (new) - all sizes

An Improv Charity Project

We didn't have a charity sew this month, but we do have a fun little project if you want something quick and easy to work on in between larger Holiday projects! If you'd like to participate, please create a 12.5 inch block, improv style, out of bright fabrics. Bring it back to our December 11th Guild Meeting/Holiday Party at St. Andrew, or our December 14th Charity Sew at Modern Domestic.

 Here's a fun block Cath made:

 
 And four of them together:

 



PMQG Quarter 3 Charity: Raphael House

Our charity for this quarter is Raphael House.

From their website:
"Raphael House of Portland is a multi-faceted domestic violence agency dedicated to ending intimate partner violence for good. We serve individuals and families of all backgrounds, cultures, ages, and sexual orientations. If you or someone you know is in crisis, we hope you will find the support you need here or by calling a crisis line."

 Here is a little bit about their needs right now:


What size quilts do we need?
All of the beds in our emergency shelter are Twin size, so these would be ideal!  Since families generally come to us with little or no possessions, when they leave our space, we provide them with all the comforters/quilts, sheets, pillows, towels, etc. that were in their room.  With about 100 families staying here every year, we go through quite a few of all these items!

Other items we might need?
In the realm of bedding and such, we could definitely use more Twin sheet sets and bath towels!

Also, we’re holding a Back to School Gift Card Drive through September & we could most definitely use help spreading the word and collecting gift cards!   It’s our hope to empower families to do their own back-to-school shopping, since that’s such an important experience for kiddos and such an expensive one for moms… You can find lots more information about this on our website at
 http://raphaelhouse.com/events/raphael_house_special_events/back-to-school-drive/.

A representative from Raphael House will be at our meeting next thursday to tell us a little bit more about their program. If you have a twin sized quilt to donate, be sure to bring it to our September meeting! Charity Sew days are being scheduled, stay tuned for our next one.

Wonky Kite Quilt from our last charity day
courtesy of Wombat Quilts


 

Baby/Preemie Quilts Needed for Providence NICU *Now with Linky!*

Providence is looking for quilts for their new NICU! Quilts should be:
  • 36 inches square
  • 100% quilting cottons (no minkie, flannel, etc)
  • Washed
  • No dark colors please
Bring quilts to our August 2nd Sew Day at Fabric Depot, contact the guild at our email address, or see link below for mailing/drop off info.

Edit: Quilts may also be dropped off at Modern Domestic through August 16th! Thanks MD!





January Charity Sew Recap



Ten  PMQG members participated in the Charity Sew Day at Modern Domestic on Thursday, January 30. We made enough of these fun wonky stars to complete a top! (Never fear: there are more, and this isn't the actual layout.) Cath will finish the assembly and quilting, and then we'll give it to Camp Erin, which serves children who are grieving.



Do any of these blocks look familiar? Michelle brought in this top, which she assembled from some of last year's Block of the Month donations. Dramatic!



Michelle also recently pieced this lively top from some more donated blocks.



Meanwhile Gail spent the day sewing these tumblers from pre-cut material that was donated to the guild. The photo doesn't do it justice!

Pretty impressive! But what's more impressive is how much fun everyone had. Charity sewing is a great way to learn new skills, meet new people, and practice sewing in a low-pressure environment. We hope to see you at the next Charity Sew Day!




Quilts for Boston

Quilts for Boston

Another great project -- this one from the Boston MQG. Read more about their project on their blog post: Quilts for Boston

from the Boston MQG
"We are asking the modern quilt community to support our efforts by sending us blocks for these quilts. Additionally, we will accept donations of fabric to be used for binding, sashing, and quilt backs. We would like to have the quilts ready to deliver to those in need as soon as possible, so we ask that you send your blocks to us within a month, by May 24th, 2013."

They would like all the blocks to be 12 1/2" tall by the width of your choice and made using fabrics that are blue, yellow, grey and white. They have some great examples of the color story on their blog.

We are happy to collect these blocks and the flags for the Vancouver MQG (see previous post) at our next meeting in May.

Charity Bees and BOM Charity Blocks

We were so excited to introduce our Charity ideas for the year at January's meeting! I'm going to lay out all the information here so that it's clear. We had so much information to cover at the meeting and we don't want you to miss any of the important details!
Make One to Keep, Make One to Give

As we discussed, we are 'curating' our Block of the Month (BOM) for the whole guild to work on. The idea  is that you make one to keep: make a block for yourself, and make one to give: make a block (or more than one!) for charity. You would bring the charity block to the following month's meeting (or whenever you get it done!) Each month we will collect the blocks and pass them out to the newly formed charity bees (more about that below).

The blocks you make for yourself would result in a sampler style quilt at the end of the year: you would have 1 each of 12 different blocks if you followed along all year. The charity blocks may be divided out differently depending on how many we get and how much need there is from the bees, but 1 charity quilt might be made entirely from January blocks, or another one might be made from a combo of January and February blocks, but in general they will probably not be "sampler style" like the ones "to keep."

Each month we'll introduce the BOM, have a short tutorial, and show some different examples of the blocks in different color schemes. After the meeting the BOM links will go up on the BOM tab on the blog home page. The charity group color schemes are scrappy, black & white with a pop of color, and ROYBGIV (Red/Orange/Yellow/Blue/Green/Indigo/Violet).


Charity Bees

We formed some charity bees at the meeting to go hand in hand with the BOM charity program. If you did not get into a bee and would like to, you will have the opportunity to join one at February's meeting, or feel free to create your own. When you do, be sure to fill out the Bee Registration form from the Bees tab on the blog home page. Before you do so, check with your group to decide on a group name, how many blocks you would like for your first quilt, and which color scheme you would prefer to work with. Also, each charity group is free to pick whatever charity is close to their hearts to donate their finished quilt to.

The way we signed up at the meeting was to have one person be the host, ie organizer, one person to piece the front, one person to piece the back, one person to quilt, and one person to bind the quilt. Of course these roles can overlap and you can work together as a group to decide on the details.

Several people have mentioned to me that they would like to see what progress the other groups are working on, and I thought it would be great to create Flickr discussion groups for each Bee. Bee members can discuss details with each other, and other guild members can pop into the thread and give support too. If you are a Bee host, please go to our Flickr Discussion page and create a new topic with the title "(name of your bee) 2013 charity bee group" or something along those lines, and then email your members with the link. Also, feel free to upload in progress pictures of your bee's pictures to the PMQG Flickr pool as you work on your charity quilt. 
Charity Drives

 We will have three Charity Drives a year: March, June and September. 
Our first Charity Drive will be in March. Bees can register through out the months of January and February and to commit to finishing a quilt to donate to the charity of their choice during the month of March. Then at our March meeting we will have an opportunity to form new bees. A bee can continue to participate in the future drives if they want.


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November Charity Quilting Drives!

Hi everyone,

We wanted to share some charity quilting drives that are near to our hearts this month! Please email us at portlandmodernquiltguild at gmail.com if you have any questions about contributing.

Our October charity quilting drive is Treats 4 Troops, organized by Shauna McCain of St. Helens - this is her husband with their little daughters! She's gathering small quilts (throw size is great) to send as comforting holiday gifts to the soldiers in her husband's platoon in Afghanistan. The 697th Engineer Corp. out of Fort Hood has 40 members, and two are female. If you'd like to give a quilt or another gift, check out the Treats 4 Troops FB page or email Shauna directly at skillens02 at hotmail.com - she'll be shipping everything next week. Thank you, Shauna!



 Our November charity quilting drives are both helping those in need after Hurricane Sandy - warm quilts are desperately needed as the temperature drops! 

 First, Victoria Findlay Wolfe and Moda Fabrics let us know that they are hosting a drive called QUILTS & BLANKETS: ASAP! 

 Victoria says: 

 Having missed the entire storm, by being in Houston for Market, I felt helpless as my family were in NYC without me. I started to organize a quilt drive for our area while I was still in Houston.

Once home, I realized how seriously the storm affected my neighborhood, my friends, and fellow New Yorkers, CT, PA and NJ... Homes have been wiped off the face of the earth, people are cold, and wet, and we have rain and snow coming. I need to be able to help NOW.

Send Handmade or Store-Bought Quilts & Blankets to:

Basic Housing, Inc.
Attn: Robert Gonzalez / H.SANDY
540 East 180th Street,  Bronx, NY 10457

PLEASE Include INSIDE THE BOX CLEARLY WRITTEN
your name, email & address & Phone

please ship them with delivery confirmation.

Ale's friend Mike, who's working with The Rockaway Renegades as part of  Occupy Sandy Relief NYC, would also love to gather quilts to give to those in need, particularly vulnerable seniors living in high rise buildings in the city. The Rockaway Renegades are an all volunteer based, direct action group committed to the cleanup and relief effort currently underway in the Rockaways following the devastation left behind by Hurricane Sandy.

Please send quilts for seniors to:

Holly Butler
66 Nassau Ave, Apt 2
Brooklyn, NY 11222

If you'd like to donate quilts or blankets of any size to Quilts & Blankets ASAP or The Rockaway Renegades, you can bring them by Just Quilting PDX during the week (call Nancy first at 503-234-0403) or to our Nov. 15 meeting at PNCA. PMQG will handle and pay for shipping of our collective quilt donations to either of the Hurricane Sandy drives!

Thanks and see you on the 15th! 
-susan

Sew Sew Sew for Pho for Three


At last month's meeting Teresa told us about her Pho for Three Fundraiser and her hope to have something made for all of the orphans in Tam Ky, over 100 children ranging from newborn to 17 years old. If you are interested in sewing something we will be accepting items at this month's meeting Thursday September 20th so you still have time to at least make a few diapers if you want to contribute.Teresa has friends going to Tam Ky at the end of the month and will be sending the first batch with them. It's important to note that Teresa will still be collecting items for a while to be sent at a later date in case you can't make it to this month's meeting.

 Here are some of the tutorials Teresa has put together to make it easy for us. Note that the diapers are different then our American ones.
Items Needed

Messenger Bags



 Pencil Cases

Zippered pencil case from Sew4Home


Pants and Shorts

Basic elastic-waist pants from Dana Made it (pattern here)

Simple Diapers

 Simple triangles of cotton: Easily made by taking a 25-inch square, cutting it into two triangles and finishing the edges (serger or turned seams).

 Have fun and we'll see you next week!
Pétra

PMQG charity quilting - January, February, + March

This year we're sharing a different charity quilting opportunity every month for any PMQG members who might be interested. January's featured organization was Bradley-Angle House, a shelter here in Portland that serves women and children escaping domestic violence. As Violet pointed out, it's the only shelter in Portland that's able to keep families living together as they work towards their new lives. Several PMQG members have teamed up to donate both small quilts for the Bradley-Angle families, and fabric for the women's sewing and quilting circles they host! Here's one quilt from our first round of donations in January - blocks donated by Cool Cottons, top and back finished at a Quilts for Quake Survivors bee, and beautifully quilted by Nancy.


February's charity is Craft Hope's littlest warriors project - they're collecting handmade soft hats and tote bags to give to children fighting cancer. The deadline is March 12 and you can make hats and bags for any age kid, from babies to teenagers, boys or girls, just make them colorful and fun! I just wrote up a simple tutorial for making a patchwork tote from two 12" (or similar-sized) quilt blocks, if you're interested in stitching one up too. Mine are log cabin, but any quilt blocks you like would be great! We're hoping to send out a nice PMQG package by the second week of March, so just let us know if you'd like to sew along! You can use any pattern you like - maybe my tote bag or Monica's Pick-a-Pocket Purse?



In March we'll be featuring Quilts of Valor, an organization that collects comforting, healing handmade quilts to give to returning combat veterans in honor of their service. More on them at the March meeting, but if you'd like to donate or sew for any of these charities, we'd love to have you - please email us at portlandmodernquiltguild at gmail.com!

Thank you to everyone who's contributed so far, and to all the members who've emailed with great suggestions for other charities to include this year. We look forward to twelve beautiful months of quilting craftivism with everyone who's interested!




Charity Quilting

I really enjoyed my time quilting with others at various Quilts for Quakes Survivors bees. I keep meaning to start doing more charity quilting. And as luck would have it,there is another bee this week to work on quilts at the Portland Etsy Craft Party this Friday, June 10. The bee is just part of the event, so check out the details at I Heart Art: Portland or the Quilts for Quake Survivors blog. The quilt raffle and sale is still happening via Modern Domestic too.

When you start looking there our so many different opportunities to give your quilts for good. Some drives are prompted by natural disasters and others are ongoing. Another event prompting a quilt drive that caught my eye: Craft Hope's Project 13: quilts for tornado survivors (with a nearing deadline of June 15). Craft Hope seems like an interesting place to keep an eye on, as each charity project they take on has a timeline. Another group collecting quilts for Joplin Tornado victims is Ackfeld Manufacturing, they might also have a deadline but I'm not sure. A quick search turned up a couple people organizing quilt drives for those in Alabama: Bama Bound Quilts and Julia of Green Quilts. I've probably missed a few.

Closer to home, with a bit of googling, I found Quilts from Caring Hands (and their list of resources seems like a great start).
I know that several PMQG members regularly work on charity quilts (Mary Anne works on Quilts for Kids quilts; Rachel quilts with.. oh dear I forgot the organization's name...)

What charities are you quilting for?

Charity Quilt Sewing Bees


This week PMQG members, Cherri, Susan and Rachel, are hosting two quilting bees for Quilts for Quake Survivors at Cherri's studio Sew On. There will be long-arm quilting, binding and piecing action going on Thursday, April 14th from 1 pm - 6 pm and Friday, April 15th from 1 pm - 9 pm.
Join them for either or both days as there will be work to do. While Cherri and Rachel command the long-arm there is space for cutting fabric, piecing blocks on sewing machines and a cosy spot for hand stitching. Snack and drinks will be available and it'd be great if you could bring something to share too. Drop Cherri a note at getyoursewon@gmail.com to let her know if you can make it so she has an idea of the number of people to expect. If you have fabric, blocks or quilt tops to donate as well as your time please bring those too.


Sew On is located at 6635 N Baltimore Ave, Suite #263, Portland Oregon. It is a big orange building just under the St. Johns Bridge.