Featured Quilter Karen G.

Our featured quilter on this lovely December morning is Karen G.

Karen lives on a beautiful Minnesota farm known for it’s long white fences. On top of all this she is the mother of 7 (that’s right seven) beautiful daughters.

From the looks of her quilts, we can see she loves to piece with Itty, Bitty pieces, especially in civil war fabrics. It makes it even more fun when she brings her little featherweight sewing machine to retreats.

Civil War Fabric Quilt

Karen is one of the RN’s in our group, which makes us feel safe.

New channel on YouTube!

Video on an intro to Quilt Blocks.

http://www.youtube.com/user/SassyQuilters?feature=mhum#p/a/u/0/vTBW60_9S6E

SASSY QUILTERS DONATE QUILTS TO VFW AUXILIARY

 The Chatfield Giese-Kelsey Post 6913 Auxiliary has been the recipient of several quilts donated by the ‘Sassy Quilters,’ a local quilting group in Chatfield, Minnesota.

In 2006, the Sassy Quilters donated two quilts which were given to Veteran’s Homes in Hastings and Minneapolis, Minnesota. The donations were very well received by the veterans and the group continues to donate to the Auxiliary every year. A total of twenty quilts have been donated over the last four years.

The Auxiliary takes joy in giving the quilts to veterans who deserve and appreciate the comfort of a quilt made especially for them.

Quilting is a gift a quilter gives herself; it is in giving them to others that brings the most joy.

Baby Quilt Project

Sassy Quilters formed in January 2002 to work on our community’s sesquicentennial quilt.  That same month one of the members read in a magazine of a project occurring in Ohio.  She brought the idea to the newly formed group to see if they were interested in doing the same in our area.  The idea was willingly agreed upon as a fun civic contribution for our group to do.

National Quilt Day is the third Saturday of March every year.  Beginning in March of 2002, Sassy Quilters began providing a baby quilt to each baby born in the two hospitals in Rochester, MN on that day.  With as few as 5 births on a given Saturday to as many as 12, approximately 75 quilts have been given to newborns to date.

A call is made early Sunday morning to see how many quilts are needed for the previous day’s births.  The quilts are delivered to the hospital staff on Sunday morning to distribute to the families.  The hospital staff in turns runs them through x-ray to insure no pins or needles have mistakenly been left in. 

A simple note is attached to each quilt with an explanation of National Quilt Day along with the name of the quilter that made the gift for their newborn.  Many times a quilter receives a heartwarming thank you note from the family.  The following note is one received this October from a quilt given in March 2010. 

“It’s been a while, but we haven’t forgotten the kind and wonderful gift you made for our sweet baby girl.  Thank you so much for the beautiful quilt.  Quilts are big in my family—my grandmother made me one as a baby and others as a child.  Whenever I see a quilt, I think of her—a fond memory of a fabulous lady.  My daughter will never meet my grandmother, but the quilt she has from you will inspire and remind me to tell her stories and keep the memory of my grandmother alive.  Your gift means more to us than you will ever know.  Thank you so much.  God Bless You!”

We realize that many that we give a quilt to do not respond back with a thank you note, but when we receive notes like this, we all understand why we do what we do.  It is something so small on our part, yet so loved by the families.  What great joy we have in providing a simple gift from our heart for a new young family!

The Pillow Case Project

Many quilters make fun pillowcases for our grandchildren, families and friends.  A quilter from the group again brought an idea to the group for consideration.  Sometimes this circle of quilters that have a formed a great friendship and bond, perhaps shutter when this particular “Sassy” says “I have an idea…. Do you want to???...  Let’s try this….”  However, each idea that is thrown at the group to do is overwhelmingly agreed upon as a great project for us to start.  Quilters by nature have generous, giving hearts and are willing to share their talents.

With the fun, bright, seasonal and great fabrics we have available to us today and the fact that pillowcases are so quick to make, our group decided to do something with them.  We have purchased pillows and made endless numbers of pillowcases for our local Women’s Shelter.  Since the project was started 3 years ago, about 110 pillows and pillowcases have been donated by Sassy Quilters to the shelter.

The pillowcases are made not only for the women needing the services of the Women’s Shelter, but also for her children.  The shelter is especially in need of new pillows, so the pillowcase is carefully tucked inside the plastic of each new pillow.  Traditionally we have given them to the shelter each November, but also realized the need throughout the entire year, so accordingly, have given them to the shelter as we accumulate them.

Currently a project is underway for us to provided “Christmas Pillowcases” to our local Care Center along with the Assisted Living Center.  That involves approximately 175 pillowcases.  Won’t it brighten up the rooms of the residents at the Care Center to walk past their rooms and see those holiday pillowcases?   We are hoping that it will warm the hearts of the residents to know that we thought to brighten their rooms and hopefully their days with the holiday pillowcases this season!

What Have You Learned about Quilting Today?

Quilting is an enlightening process, a somewhat spiritual process. When you start a project you must learn about the person you are quilting for, learn what design, pattern and fabric would suit that person, and learn the steps to accomplish the goal of creating a personalized quilt.
    
For instance today this Sassy Quilter learned two very important lessons. When making a T-Shirt quilt (a quilt cut from T-Shirts), the fabric should be prepared by washing without fabric softener. If you use fabric softener on T-Shirt material, the adhesive stabilizer does not adhere to the fabric as well. So, first step to start this quilt is to wash all T-Shirts in the laundry without fabric softener. Then, cut each T-Shirt in a square larger than the finished square - say 15 1/2 inches. Cut each iron-on stabilizer piece the same size - 15 1/2 inches. Then iron each stabilizer piece to the back of each T-Shirt square using a hot, non-steam iron with paper covering over your ironing board (as to not stick adhesive to your ironing board) AND using a press cloth on top (as to not stick adhesive to your iron). Always good to know BEFORE you start a new sticky project.

The second tip I learned today was how to make a fan-patterned quilt out of scrap material (for the fan piece) and how to arrange it. Wisconsin Public Television features quilting shows every Saturday morning. Thank you WPT! We learn something new every week from your programming. I am not going to start a Amish-style fan quilt today, but I've taken notes for a future quilt.

Simple tips about quilting are learned each day. What have you learned about quilting today?

Another Sassy Quilter Story

  The Sassy Quilter Story:
       Sassy Quilters were founded during Chatfield's Sesquicentennial Year, 2002-2003. Local artist Harvey Bernard, Sr suggested creating a Sesquicentennial Quilt to commemorate the Chatfield's 150th Birthday. With his direction, the quilt was completed (now hanging in the City of Chatfield offices) and the Sassy Quilter group was formed.

       A news article was published in the Chatfield News explaining all
the community projects enhanced by Sassy Quilters. Among the wonderful
projects donated by this group of industrious quilters is a book shelf wall
hanging. This beautiful creation was given to the Chatfield Public Library
and now hangs in their Children's Reading Area. (Below on the right.)

       Sassy Quilters sew beautiful projects for themselves and their families. They utilize the lower level of the Chatfield Public Library for winter quilting retreats, to swap quilting tales and to reflect on the quilting life.

Designing a Quilt Block Garden

The Sassy Quilters and Friends of the Library developed the beautiful quilt
block garden you see gracing the library's front lawn this summer. The Sassy

Quilters meet at the library the 2nd and 4th Thursday evenings of each month

and the Friends meet at the library the third Thursday evening of each

month. Both groups warmly welcome new members. Thank you, ladies!

Sassy Quilters and their Quilt Block Garden

Garden Medalion

The Beginning of the Sassy Quilters Dynasty

     Starting in January, 2002, a group of women met at the Chatfield Public
Library (http://www.chatfieldpubliclibrary.org/) for the purpose of making the
sesquicentennial, commemorative quilt which now hangs in the Thurber
Building. (Chatfield City Hall http://www.ci.chatfield.mn.us/) They called
themselves the Chosen Valley Sassy Quilters from the play on words of
Sesquicentennial Quilters, thus becoming the Sassy Quilters.

     Designed by local artist Harvey Bernard, the commemorative quilt began to
take shape when the group took a trip to a quilt shop to select fabric.
Chatfield women did the hand embroidery, and the Sassy Quilters did the
machine piecing and hand quilting, meeting weekly at the library. They
presented the finished quilt to the City of Chatfield at the kickoff of the
sesquicentennial festivities on January 4, 2003. With this major project
completed, the group did not disband but decided to form a Chatfield quilt
group and liked the idea of remaining the Sassy Quilters.

     The twelve women decided to tackle the formidable task of organizing and
sponsoring a quilt show as part of the sesquicentennial Western Days
festivities. Along with this, they planned and made another quilt to raffle
off at the quilt show. This second quilt was machine pieced, hand quilted
and hand appliquéd in the pattern of a nine-patch hour glass.
"Quilts Through the Window of Time" was the city's first quilt show. Held at
the newly remodeled Thurber Building, the show had entries from area
residents and their families and friends. It featured over seventy-five hand
made quilts both old and new, such as bed quilts, wall quilts and miniature
quilts. During the show, they had a silent auction of small quilts hand made
by the Sassy Quilters and other area residents. A queen-sized, hand-quilted
and hand-appliquéd quilt was raffled off at the end of the show. Proceeds
from the sales will be returned to the Chatfield Community in the form of
books for the public and school libraries and a donation to the Chatfield
Community Foundation.

     Another project which the Sassy Quilters plan to do annually is to present a
crib-sized quilt to each baby born at the two Rochester hospitals on March
15th, National Quilters Day. Baby quilts have been given every year since
2003 and have been well received by the Quilting Day babies and their
families. The group also participates in quilting retreats and quilting
outings. The Sassy Quilters meet biweekly the year round at the Chatfield
Public Library to work on their own quilting projects as well as community
based projects such as: Veteran's quilts, pillow cases for the Rochester
Women's Shelter, Bundles of Love crib quilts, pillow cases for the Chosen
Valley Care Center, and quilts for Chatfield residents who have lost their
homes to fire. Any Chatfield area resident is welcome to join the Sassy
Quilters.