My Day on the Bee Kind Blog Hop

Our wonderful friend Joan from Moosestash Quilting is our hostess for this hop and came up with the fun challenge which is:

“September is the time to remember that a little kindness goes a long way. Share your “kind” projects. Your favorite charity project, a free online pattern or anything that shows you spread a little kindness, everywhere you go. But that’s not all, anything with a bee on it fits this challenge!”

If you know me, you know every year I make quilts for our local food bank’s Christmas Hampers program. The quilts go to seniors, people with disabilities and families that are affected by the increase in food prices with the inflation we are experiencing.

I don’t just start in September, but do work year round on these projects.

In the past couple of years, I have a wonderful friend, Denise, who sends me her “scraps”, orphan blocks and extra bits and pieces from her quilting projects.

So far I do have some finished quilts and several that just need the binding. Each of these were quilted with straight line quilting on my last trip to the studio. It’s not fancy but is quick to do on the long arm, and it works to stabilize the quilt and lets the quilt pattern be the focal point. Who doesn’t like stars, random confetti or plus signs? Here’s a gallery of this year’s quilts that I’ll be donating:

Each of these quilts are larger than most throws or lap quilts since I keep thinking of a young Mom I met this past summer at the Resilliency Center during our horrendous wildfire season with 3 nearby towns evacuated. She has three littles under five and doesn’t have a lot of money. We were talking about life here and crafting and hobbies. She is a knitter and I mentioned being a quilter. She talked with fondness of a quilt she had when she was younger that her grandmother had made. She said one of her favourite memories was snuggling under that quilt with her mother and brother on movie nights. She does the same with her kids. She mentioned having gone to the Christmas dinner and that she was disappointed by being too late to choose one of the quilts that were there among the donated gifts (quilts, knitted hats, scarfs or shawls, bowl cozies, mittens,gloves, hand warmers, etc. all made and donated by crafters in our community) t

hat people were able to choose from. Before the Pandemic the gifts were usually in a side room during the Christmas dinner, and the kids got to pick out and wrap a gift for Mom and/or Dad with help from volunteers. That stopped during the Pandemic since the dinner was cancelled. Apparently the Christmas Dinner will happen again this year. The kids will get to pick gifts for their parents first. Then seniors and people with disabilities. I’m hoping to volunteer this year if I can.

I can admit now that I had a chat with the person in charge of the Christmas Hampers and Dinner program and asked that the young woman’s kids be one of the first to go choose gifts and that a volunteer will “help” the kids choose a quilt for their Mom. Sometimes it’s a bonus knowing people.

I also will make a couple of lap quilts that will work in a wheelchair. I usually use a couple of different patterns that were designed by Sandra from MMM Quilts. I have done several of her QALs and tested several patterns for Sandra. I really enjoy her designs and several of her patterns work perfectly for lap quilts for wheelchairs.

Now I’ll show you the quilts that are still WIPs and are either on my design wall (my bed when I’m working on layouts😉) or on my sewing or cutting tables;

If I have time I’m also going to make up a quilt or two out of some fun Christmas fabrics I have in my stash. my goal this year was to have a dozen quilts to donate to the Christmas Dinner but I’m not sure if I’ll manage it.

I also have been asked to make a quilt for a friend’s daughter who lives in Israel. This lovely young woman loves Mandalas so I’ve been searching for a pattern that I can adjust to make the queen size quilt that she needs!

Last week, one of my favourite designers Sandra Walker from MMM Quilts sent me one of her latest patterns and it will be absolutely perfect for this project to give a young lady comfort and a big hug from her Mom in these trying times. Let the fabric pull and the fun begin 😉

In the meantime while I’m sewing, cutting and planning I’m having so much fun visiting the participants in this hop and I just know I’ll be adding a few projects to my Must Do List 😉

Here is the list of participants that I’m sharing my day with:

 

Tuesday Sept 24

Patchouli Moon Studio

Quilted Snail

Quilt Schmilt

Quilted Delights

Hazels Daughter

Please stop over to visit everyone and show some love by liking their posts or leaving a comment. We all love reading and replying to them if you do.

As usual Joan has set up a Pinterest board for everyone’s projects to be showcased and here’s the link for the board:

https://www.pinterest.com/moosestashq/bee-kind-blog-hop/

Thank you Joan for another great hop which allows us to think about the kindness we share with family, friends and community with our quilts. I’d also like to thank each of the amazing people who take the time to join the hops for our entertainment and for their creativeness in interpreting the theme of the hop. Most specially I would like to thank you for stopping by and reading my very photo heavy post about some of the kindness I try to do for my community. Did you find the bees in any of my projects? They are there I can assure you. 😉

🤗 Carol