Did Anybody Miss Me?

I had such high hopes for keeping this blog updated.  Alas, life has interferred and although I am constantly thinking "I should put this on the blog", my round to its seem to have all but evaporated.  Oh hey!  This gives me an opportunity to make my first resolution for the new year - I will be more faithful in posting the PL news. 
We sure do have PLENTY! 
More new folks have been showing up at the monthly Library Bee's.  In December, we had our largest group yet of new and familar faces.  That was the day that the Daily Advance decided to send a photographer!  A nice young man, Justin hung out with us for a while and they published a lovely photo of a brand new blanketeer and her children who were with us for the very first time that day.  I hope you got to see it. 

Thanks to Jeanette and her sister Rita, we had PILES of blankets for our newest blanketeers to sew labels onto.  Although you can't see all the beautiful blankets that were there, here are a few photos that I took that day.  In the photo on the left are Alice and Lisa.  This was their first day too.  On the right is veteran Mary McFarland.  Mary does every bit of her piecing and quilting by hand!  She is VERY fast too.

Here is a shot of the room before everything got really cranked up.  People were going to town cutting, sorting, planning and stitching. 

Last but certainly not least, here is Chapter Assistant Gloria Roberts peeking out from behind a quilt she designed and made. 

She can't hide behind the blankets forever.  I WILL capture her image on the digital camera for posterity!


I've got so much news and all of it is just grand.  That's all I've got time to share right now though.  I hope to get back here with my smiling fingers in the near future. 

Happy Holidays!

Water, Water Everywhere

In our little corner of the world, everything is getting pretty soggy from the big Nor’easter. I sure hope all our blanketeers are high and dry and enjoying the weather holiday.

There are a couple of cool things to share. I’m not sure exactly when it came out but our Linus Library Bee was featured in the library’s newsletter. Check out the article here:

http://www.earlibrary.org/pasquotank-camden/pdf/newsletter-fall2009.pdf

It was such a nice surprise to open my email one day and find these photos of the L.o.v.e. Ladies from Arrowhead Beach hard at work on a Blanket Making Day! Hope, the #1 L.o.v.e. Lady had invited me to join their meeting today to see the fruits of their labors and accept a fabric donation. I was looking forward to being with this wonderful group of friends again but alas, a giant nor’easter has interfered with a great many plans for this week. I’ll look forward to seeing them again as it is sure to be a special day whenever it comes.

Stay dry, y’all and enjoy these pictures sent by the L.o.v.e. group.

More

What does every Linus Coordinator want? More. More Blankets, more Blanketeers, more resources, and more time – more photos for the blog? Actually, it seems the only thing I really don’t want is more kids who NEED the blankets. Since it seems unlikely that bad things will stop happening to good kids, it’s really wonderful to be part of a group of dedicated people who give a little or a lot of their personal time and resources to keep MORE blankets and quilts coming to our kids.

Last Saturday I visited Quilts and More and retrieved the City Road United Methodist Linus ladies final group of quilts for 2009. This delivery of 25 quilts makes 100 for them this year. Isn’t that fabulous?! The quilts had been in the shop for several days being admired by local quilters. I’m hoping that such displays both help spread the word and motivate others to support the chapter. It was fun to fold each one and ooh and ahh over them. What creativity and talent!

At our November Linus Bee at the library, Blanketeers oohed and ahhed again while they sewed on labels. We’ve had some new folks joining us and that is great fun too. More talent, more smiles, more to learn and share and more love to spread around. We welcomed back some familiar faces we haven’t seen in awhile. It’s good to be with old friends and new ones too.

After a hearty lunch, Marie S., Donna B. and I got to go to Albemarle Hospital and deliver 39 freshly labeled blankets to Debra White, Nursing Director for the surgical unit. She was very happy to receive these for her special patients and we were very happy to share them. See that pretty young mother to be on the left side of the photo below?   Oh wait, you can't tell because of the Linus blanket she is holding!!  That’s my own sweet daughter and soon I will be rocking my very first grandchild!! I just can’t stop smiling.

Hope you all have much to be smiling about these days. I’ll see you back here soon with MORE. 

Wanted!

I just had an exciting conversation with  my new friend Judy.  Judy is Activities Director for an Assisted Living section of a senior residential complex.  She is interested in helping her residents find ways to contribute blankets to Project Linus.  What we need to make this happen is one or more persons who would be willing to spend part of an afternoon with these good folks working on crochet, knitting or quilt making projects.  Some of the residents have some skill in some of these areas but may be a little rusty.  If you can spare some time or know of someone who can, please help us make this happen.  It will be time well spent.  You will make new friends and the chapter will have more blankets for the children.  Everyone wins!  If you are interested in this project, please call or email me so that I can refer you on to Judy.  Let the fun begin without delay.  :-)

Time flies, doesn’t it? Things just keep on happening and I think OH – I should tell everyone about that on the blog and guess what? Something else happens and all these delightful days just keep on rolling along. Whoever said Time Waits for No Man (or woman) sure knew what they were talking about.


Anyway – I wanted to tell you all that the Sale Passes for the Belks Charity Sale are good in any store in the state. You can get one the morning of the sale BUT, if you get yours earlier and from one of us, we get to keep the whole $5.  Email me for an address.  Send your $5 and a SASE and I'll send a pass back to you by return mail.

Today is a BIG Day for our little chapter. Earlier, Marie S. and I took 35 blankets to Kids First in Elizabeth City. When I posted the delivery to the chapter records, I saw that we have given away exactly 3,500 blankets since the chapter started in 1997. WHOO HOO!!! Here is a huge THANK YOU for the generosity of our Blanketeers, the Colonial Quilt Lovers Guild and everyone who has made this possible. I’m also very pleased that just this year alone, we have given away 384 blankets. With 17 remaining on hand and another donation of blankets expected from the City Road United Methodist Church group, I know we will be able to give out over 400 blankets this year. That is very humbling.

I’ve been promising something for quilters among us forever. A lot of quilters that belong to CQL already know about Marcia Hohn’s site, www.quilterscache.com. There are literally thousands of quilt blocks on Marcia’s site, complete with instructions on how to make them. Awesome, huh? She also has a link to a page for suggestions for Project Linus quilts. Find that here: http://www.quilterscache.com/Q/quiltcharitiesPLsugg.html.

Yesterday I stopped by the City Road Linus Bee and my friend Robin C. took these pictures. Don’t you just love the one featuring the Komfort Kids fabric line? One of the ladies joked that they were like a sweat shop but I know this is a labor of love. These ladies do many fine works but the one nearest and dearest to me is their goal of providing 100 Linus blankets each year to our chapter.

That seems like plenty for today. Check back here soon. There will be lots of new activities coming up. Hope to see some of you at the Linus Bee at the Pasquotank Library on Wednesday November 4th.

Do You Shop at Belks?

This morning a friend of mine went to Belks and called to tell me that they are having a big sale. When I went by this afternoon to see about the big sale, I noticed a sign at the mall entrance that local charities should ask the manager about an easy fundraising opportunity. It is probable that I am the last person in the country to learn about this but now that I have, I am SO excited.

Twice a year Belk’s does a private Charity Sale to benefit local charities and schools. It is really cool and believe me, I am not the type that gets super excited about fundraisers. All you do is buy a $5 charity sale pass. The charity gets the whole $5 PLUS a chance to win $1,000. What YOU get is an opportunity to shop the private sale on November 7th from 6 am to 10 am, $5 off your first purchase, additional savings of 15-50% off STOREWIDE including savings on rarely discounted brands PLUS, you get to put your name in for a chance to win a $1,000 Belk shopping spree. If you use your Belks charge card you will earn double or triple points during the sale.

Also, if we can find a few folks to be at the store to sell tickets for Project Linus during the event we get an equal share of all the tickets sold during the event. We still get to keep all the money we raise from the sale of the Charity pass.

Marie Schmus will have the passes at the guild meeting tomorrow; we will bring them to the Library on October 7th and back to guild on the 17th. If you can’t make those dates, please see one of the committee members to get your Charity sale pass or email me and I will work out something with you to get some to you or your group. 

Cool Links and Free Stuff

Do you love to learn new things?  Are you inspired by looking at what other people make?  I've been learning about and making quilts for about 15 years but tonight I got inspired by looking at crocheted edgings on fleece blankets and other items.  I got the link from another Linus Coordinator who got it from one of her blanketeers and now I'm sharing it with all y'all.  ( I am southern to the core, so I actually do talk that way.)  Anyway, go see what you think of these patterns:  http://www.edgerydoo.com/edgerydoo.html
Just a couple of clicks on the pattern links will get you right to the instructions and some of them even have pictures.  A lot of work has gone into this site.
This nice lady has created some tools that can help with spacing and making the holes for edging.  I think I would rather use the skip stitch rotary cutting blade that is available through Project Linus but there is no one way to do anything.  I put the link in my Links section on the left side of the blog too so you can find it if you need it again. 
Soon I'll post some links to some free quilting patterns.  If some of you want to share your favorite, inspirational pattern links, please email me with them.  I'd be glad to post them here for others to enjoy.