Quilts for the Navajo Nation

Quilts Beyond Borders is once again supporting the Forgotten People of the Navajo Nation in Northern Arizona. Recently 100 quilts for children and elders were delivered to Flagstaff with a sweet Holiday Elf named Marsha who organizes the distribution of quilts each year at school Christmas parties and nursing home celebrations. As Marsha prepared to journey with the quilts for distribution, she was surrounded by boxes and boxes of quilts. Stay tuned soon for some photos provided by Marsha of smiling faces, so happy to receive their own personal quilts!

Marsha M, the Holiday Elf who organizes distribution of the quilts to the Navajo Nation.

The following quilts were supplied to Marsha by the QBB Arizona Regional Coordinator.  Thank you to the many quilters who pieced and quilted these lovely quilts to bless the Navajo Nation. You can click on each photo to see a larger image and read the maker’s names.

Sherree Newhouse

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Announcing the November 2018 winner of QBB’s Fat Quarter Challenge

And the winner is … is Beth Holland From Eden Prairie, MN. Congratulations, Beth! And thank you for supporting Quilts Beyond Borders. See Beth’s beautiful scrappy fat quarter quilt in the photo below.

Beth will receive a $25 gift certificate to spend at the Fat Quarter Shop. Many thanks to the Fat Quarter Shop for sponsoring our challenge. Be sure to check out the SEW amazing inventory they have for quilting!

It’s not too late to join our challenge and you could be our next winner. Get the challenge info and quilt dimensions here.

Stay tuned to hear about some Challenge twists we have planned in 2019 and other opportunities to win prizes for sending in Fat Quarter Challenge quilts. Get a fat quarter out, get your rotary cutter warmed up and get started today!

-Sherree Newhouse

Quilts Baja Bound!

Baja Bound is an organization which builds orphanages, camps, churches and affordable housing for the working poor in Ensenada, Mexico, including immigrant families working in the agricultural fields of Baja.  This summer we were asked by some of the people headed down to Baja to participate in the program to provide them with 40 quilts to be given to needy people they encountered.  They gave 4 quilts to children who would be living in the home they built, and gave the remainder to needy migrant children.

You can tell by the expressions on the children’s faces that they’re very happy to receive these beautiful quilts!

 

Great thanks to Baja Bound and the wonderful quilters who made these beautiful quilts for providing warmth, comfort, happiness and shelter!

Carla

 

Houston Quilt Festival Highlights

We had such a blast at the Houston Quilt Festival 2018! We loved meeting so many of you, receiving your finished quilts and tops, and handing out kits.  We received 163 finished quilts and and 74 completed tops, many with backing and binding.  We also gave out 325 kits to make tops, and kicked off the start of a new Fat Quarter Challenge year.  We are planning to bring a bell next year to add even more excitement when completed quilts and tops are returned!

Please enjoy some highlights of our week below…

Two beautiful quilts from a long-time donor from Australia.. From left to right, Carla Triemer, QBB President, Helen Southeren from Australia, Roberta Katheiser.

 

These two (Effie Stevens and Kathy Kennedy) checked out kits and returned the tops in the same week!

  

We think the rogue bunny ears and nose added by my camera make this picture even more special!

 

Annabelle Kimball made another one of her very beautiful strip quilts for us.  The colors and fabrics she chose really make this one pop!    And we thank this generous quilter for the beautiful purple Round the World quilt.  (If you send us your name we’d love to give you credit! )

 

 

                                                               

 

 

Last call for November Fat Quarter Challenge Quilts!

Did you pick up a fat quarter at our booth in Houston?  The new year for Fat Quarter Challenge (FQC) quilts starts this month.  Send in your FQC quilts now for the best chance to win a $25 gift certificate to Fat Quarter Shop. The drawing for November quilts will be announced here in early December.

And it’s not too late to get started on quilts for the December drawing!

For mailing information and rules about the FQ Challenge, click here: Join the Fat Quarter Challenge and Win! Remember, each FQC quilter will be eligible for every monthly drawing all year long.

And, if you have a finished quilt using a fat quarter that you picked up from us in prior years, stay tuned!  We’re planning to have an “Amnesty Month” for those who didn’t make the deadline in previous years.  Details to follow!

Learn more about the Fat Quarter Shop’s fabrics and other goodies here: https://www.fatquartershop.com/

From The Northwest and Beyond – More Photos of Quilts for Israel

Here are 100 of the quilts recently sent to a new initiative in Israel. We were so happy to help provide quilts to children who have been orphaned or removed from their homes due to abuse. You can go to the October 16, 2018 post to learn more about the 2 programs that are helping these children and providing a safe place for them to live.

Thank you to all the dedicated quilters from our group for providing beautiful quilts to help provide warmth and comfort to a child in need. Please enjoy these photos, you can click on each one to see the maker’s name.

– Susan Schmidt   Northwest Regional Coordinator

October FQ Challenge & Annual Winner

Hard to believe a whole year of our Fat Quarter Challenge has come to an end with the October drawing.  During October I received 3 beautiful quilts!  And one of those quilters was randomly drawn for the $100 annual prize.  More about that shortly.  Our October random prize winner was a repeat winner, Donna Dellacamera of Unionville, CT.  She submitted her quilt in April.  Donna will receive a $25 gift certificate from the Fat Quarter Shop.  We can’t thank them enough for sponsoring our monthly prizes for the past four years and they have agreed to do it again for next year.  Please take a look at their site.

Our 3 beautiful quilts received this month are from Jackie Fitzgerald (New Braunsfels, TX), Jane Reardon (Narragansett, RI) and Susan Seward (Superior, CO).

Our $100 cash prize winner for the year was randomly chosen from all the fat quarter challenge participants during the past year.  That winner happened to be Susan Seward who turned in her quilt this past month.  Congratulations!!

We will be starting a new year for the Fat Quarter Challenge.  If you are in Houston, this week, you can pick up a fat quarter at our booth.  Otherwise, you can supply your own fat quarter and get more information on the right hand side of our blog (under pages) about the challenge.  It’s been a fun year.  Sherree Newhouse, our Regional Coordinator from the Southwest will be coordinating next year’s fat quarter challenge.

Cheers, Tina

 

The River Keeps on Flowing…

As quilts flow into my house and back out again, I am always amazed at the generosity of quilters.  I no sooner empty my house of quilts than I get a shipment from someone else and the stacks begin to grow again. Please enjoy these photos of recent quilts that joined the outpouring of quilted comfort!

A huge thanks to all the teams in California who send quilts my way to be distributed to QBB initiatives.

Sewing Servants is a group of ladies at North County Church of Christ in Escondido, CA.  They not only make quilts for QBB, but also send them to orphanage homes in Mexico.  These wonderful women meet every Monday night and sew beautiful quilts.

Ruth O’Neill picks up quilts from her guild, the Friendship Quilters.  She brings the quilts to me from time to time.  She has taken quilts to Guatemala when she goes to help install stoves in homes.

Thank you to all of you who quilt in a group or independently and donate so generously to Quilts Beyond Borders.  Many people will be warm due to your kindness and thoughtfulness.

Ann Drake, Regional Coordinator, Southern California

Quilts for Israel

One of our magnificent volunteers and prolific quilters, Donna Sciandra, is also a volunteer for the Georgia-based non-profit maasayyahdav, which serves those in need in Israel. Through Donna, we learned that Maasay Yahdav Board Member Doris Mintz would be taking a trip to Israel in September and that there were several opportunities to provide quilts to needy children there:

• Beit Singer is a home and school for children who have been abused and/or orphaned.  They have about 95 children there between the ages of 5-13, so we gave them 100 quilts.
• Neve Michael Children’s Village has two programs that we will be providing quilts to:  The Children’s Emergency Crisis Center (usually 15-20 children, ages 5-18) and the Teenage Girls Emergency Crisis Center (usually 40-50 girls, ages 13-18).  These children and teenage girls have all been removed from their homes because of abuse.  We gave them 70 quilts.  You can read about those programs here:  About Us – Neve Michael Children’s Home

Here are just a few photos of the 170 quilts sent to Israel for these initiatives, enjoy!

(Photo from Kim Bell above) From left to right:

1. Doris M & Sunshine Quilters

2. Doris M, Tammy S & Sunshine Quilters

3. Linda Kowalski

4 & 5. Doris M, Tammy S & Sunshine Quilters

    

Top Left, Left to Right:  Nancy Sturgeon & Carol E; Debby Connor & Dorothy K; Judith White & Norine Stein

Top right:  1st Quilt – Nancy Sturgeon & Theola Breaux; 2nd, 3rd & 4th quilt – Nancy Sturgeon & Lisa Cadzow

Middle Row, Left and Right:   All quilts by Dianne Combs

Bottom Left:  All quilts by Dianne Combs

Bottom Right, Left to Right:   Debby Connor & Norine Stein; Debby Connor & Geneal Smith; Nancy Sturgeon & Donna Sciandra.

Save the Date for IQF Houston

It may still feel like summer in Texas, but November and the International Quilt Festival in Houston will be here before we know it! We are excited to announce that Quilts Beyond Borders will have a booth again in 2018 and we are looking forward to meeting our supporters and spreading the word about QBB.

The upcoming show dates are November 8-11, 2018 with a preview night Nov. 7th. We will be sharing information about our cause, selling beautiful handmade items to help raise funds to offset our shipping costs, and if you have picked up a quilt kit at a past show, we will be happy to receive them back as finished quilts or tops (preferably with backing and binding).

We will be located at the back of Hall C, behind the main aisle and “Open Studios” in Row 100, Booth 147.

See you there!