October 2019 Work Day Recap

Hope Quilters will be going through some changes and as with all things in life, these changes will create some sadness, but also some fortitude and even some excitement as we wait on the Lord to see how He wants this ministry to develop and continue to serve HIS purposes!

It was still a bit of an emotional weekend at Hope Quilters though as we made hard decisions on what stays and what goes in our HQ "closet" stash that we've gratefully used and relied on for years, but needed to downsize some supplies.  But all is not lost as we were offered storage space at the Waukee Campus and are so very grateful for that opportunity!   

Attendance was excellent both Friday and Saturday.  Many volunteers stepped up and jumped in on the JOPPA blanket-making, quilt binding and labels as well as closet cleaning.  It was a tremendously productive weekend for our mission outreach.  We had 66 quilts and blankets turned in this weekend!  What fun it was to see the variety of creativity that everyone participated in!  We still have several JOPPA kits that need to be sewn together so we'll continue with those in November.

Some changes to look forward to in the future:

1.  Learning opportunities.   We are going to take the time to do some teaching on techniques.  We had several examples of how people are managing to make quilting easier.  Look for an upcoming session on prepping your quilt for quilting.  Improv or Crazy quilting is an interesting way to use scraps to make interesting quilts.  Not interested?  That's okay.  These will just be options.  The monthly email will include the Technique we'll work on and supplies needed (if any) and then you can choose whether to participate or not.  There will always be all the other fun Hope Quilters activities going on too.

2.  Quilting:  Our focus will be turning more towards helping our members learn how to finish their own quilts.  There are always options.  We haven't explored as many of those options as we've relied on our long-arm quilters.  This does not mean that you each have to quilt your own top.  Some ideas we will be exploring:

          1. Some long-armers are willing to open up their quilting rooms to have a group 

              over to learn the art of quilting on a long-arm machine. 

          2. Others are willing to quilt their own but haven't had any training and need some 

              tips.

          3. Coordinate directly with long-armers to get those larger quilts finished.   

              We will be exploring our options in the months to come.

  

3. Basic Quilting How-Tos:  As we've grown in size and activity, one need that has emerged is providing the basics needed on making quilts from start to finish for new people joining our group.  Volunteer coaches will work with newcomers to walk through all of the basic steps to get familiar with them.  Additional basic information will be supplied on our Facebook Group Page and the Blog.  

So as we change course, let's take some time to figure this out together.  We can spend the rest of the year finishing up some projects and consider planning how to approach others in 2020, prayerfully and with His guidance.

"I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; 

I will counsel you with My eye upon you."  

Psalm 32:8 

And some of those 66 amazing quilts?  You can find them here: PHOTOS

And a limited-time page for those absolutely adorable EMOJI quilts is up, so take a look!  EMOJI

Lastly, in September we had a representative from the Iowa Chapter of Sleep in Heavenly Peace share with us about this ministry.  You can check out some photos on this limited-time page:  Sleep in Heavenly Peace