Knit Blanket from Elizabeth A.

I just received a package from one of our guild members in California, including this beautiful, hand-knit blanket:

It's a lovely pink color, and is super-soft and cozy.

Thank you, Elizabeth A.!

I know that you knit love into every stitch.

Blessings to you and your family.

Jo-Ann Craft for a Cause Contest

Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft stores is sponsoring "Craft for a Cause 2010."

Here is a link to use if you want to learn more about how you can win a $1,500 Jo-Ann Gift Card, and how your favorite charity can win $50,000!
Thanks for the link, Karla!

Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores VIP Discount Cards

Dear Katie’s Comforters Guild members,

I hope you are all enjoying a happy and creative summer. Katie’s Comforters Guild is having a good one: we’ve received wonderful donations of quilts, fleece blankets and fabric/supplies, and our membership continues to grow. You can keep up with the news, and see photos, on facebook and here, on our guild’s blogspot. I hope that you will continue to help spread the word about your guild.
One of our members (thank you, Karen W.!) asked me recently about the discount cards that Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores generously provided for our guild members this year. The cards are due to expire at the end of August, so I wrote to our contact at Jo-Ann’s corporate office, and received the following kind and generous offer:

“The VIP cards from last year will in fact expire at the end of the month. We have changed the process a bit and now send the cards, with the member's name on them, directly to their homes.

“The new Jo-Ann VIP Discount Card is valid from 8/1/10-8/31/11. The VIP Card can be used for 10% off your total purchase, including regular and sale priced items. For in-store purchases, the Jo-Ann 40% off regular priced item coupons can be used in the same transaction as the VIP Card 10% total purchase discount, although the 10% would not apply to the item that receives the 40% discount. For online orders, the VIP discount cannot be combined with any other offer. The Discount Card is valid at any Jo-Ann store, and is also valid online at www.joann.com by using the promotion code supplied on the back of the card.

“[Guild] Members can request their card online at www.joann.com/VIP for expedited processing. For members who do not have internet access, they can phone in their information to 877-604-2280.


“Please be sure your members are aware that their new cards will need to be validated by store management prior to first use by providing proof of organization membership and a state issued photo ID.
“I look forward to working with you in the future.
Best Regards,
Rochelle”

If you would like to renew your Jo-Ann Stores VIP Discount Card, or if you’ve never had one and would like to receive one, please follow the directions that are highlighted in yellow, above. This is a wonderful opportunity for all of us to enjoy great prices all year long, when shopping for supplies for our guild. (This offer is for guild members, and is to be used for items purchased for the guild.)

Thank You, Jo-Ann Stores!

Girl Scout Troop Donates 25 Fleece Blankets

I have had the pleasure of corresponding with a Girl Scout Troop Leader, Heidi R., over the past few months. Heidi learned about our guild through the Internet, and she told me that her troop needed a community service project.

She asked whether a Girl Scout Troop could help Katie's Comforters Guild.

Could they ever!

Heidi R. and her troop are an industrious and lovely group of young ladies. They not only made blankets, they also traveled all the way to Seattle Children's Hospital on a summer day, to donate those 25 beautiful blankets (which they had made out of fleece) in person. (The troop and their parents gave me permission to post photos of our visit.)

First, they stopped in the Volunteer Office, to meet with Guild Association Board Member Jane H., and to fill out the brief  paperwork at the desk. Then they put the blankets in the Blanket Closet.

Here they are with their donations (on the shelf above them).

Then we took a tour of the hospital, (guided by Ashley, from Childlife) and visited the Giraffe area, Playroom, Hematology-Oncology area, Family Resource Center and Whale atrium.

The troop in the Giraffe area.

By the way, the hospital has its own beautiful quilt near the Giraffe elevators.

If  you are a leader of a Girl Scout Troop, or a Camp Fire Girl Group (or know of one looking for a community service project), please feel free to contact me about helping Katie's Comforters Guild! If every troop or group made just one batch of blankets, so many children would be blessed with comfort - and the troop/group members would be blessed by the gift of giving comfort to others.

Thank you, Heidi and all of your Troop members!

Thank you, Ashley of Childlife & Jane H. from the Guild Association's Board!

Gifts from Janice S.

Our guild has been blessed with great generosity recently. I received an email from Janice S., who had read about Katie's Comforters Guild in the article (written by Marietta Nelson) in the Kitsap Sun. Janice wanted to donate some of her quilting "stash," and had washed, ironed and sorted her fabric for us. She also wanted to donate some batting.

Gregg and I drove to meet Janice and her husband in our town, and they gave us the gifts for the guild. We appreciate them so much! (I forgot to bring the camera along to photograph the two of them, but here are photos I took of their donation, when I got home.)

Aren't those fabrics lovely?

Thank you so much for this generous gift, Janice!

It will be shared with a quilter (or quilters) in our guild, who will form and fashion it into COMFORT for a sick child at Seattle Children's Hospital. Thank you - this is a big help!

More Generous Gifts from Lucile

Today, Gregg and I made a trip up to visit Lucile and Noble Nilsen. You may recall Lucile as a generous quilter in her 80s who has made several thousand quilts for charity - she averages sewing about one quilt per DAY!

We took a drive north of our home, and found Lucile and Noble at their house, with 40 quilts to donate! We had a glass of lemonade together and a nice visit, and had the pleasure of giving Lucile the fabric that Sue A. donated. We also gave her some batiks that were donated by Gregg's cousin, Karol. Here are the batiks:

Lucile will have these new materials to work with as she makes more beautiful quilts for Katie's Comforters Guild to give to Seattle Children's Hospital. She has donated 106 quilts to the hospital, to date!

Lucile has a multicolored supply of embroidery floss that she would be happy to share . If any of you needs embroidery floss for tacking your quilts by hand, please leave a message here and I will get some for you.

Thank you, Lucile & Noble!

More Gifts of Fabric and Quilts!

We are having a great week at Katie's Comforters Guild: a new donation of fabric and 12 beautiful quilts were received.

I'm very thankful, as always, for the quilts (I am going to make a delivery to the hospital next week).

Aren't they luscious? I'm thrilled.

I'm also thrilled about the fabric, because we can share it with quilters who donate generously of their time and talent to our guild. This fabric will make it easier for them to continue to support Katie's Comforters Guild.

Thank you to Sue A.

for the fabric,

and Thank you to the Coleman family

for the gorgeous quilts!

Your gifts will soon make a wonderful difference to a sick child at Seattle Children's Hospital!

If you are a guild member and haven't received your discount card for use at JoAnn Fabric and Craft stores, please contact me! We still have a lot of them to give to guild members for use in buying materials for making blankets for the hospital.

A Way to Label Blankets

One of our guild members, Karen W., has given us a number of helpful suggestions. She shared a good idea about labeling the blankets we donate, using the cards that I made that tell about our guild.

If you haven't seen the cards, and want to receive some, please send me an email. The front looks something like this (I'm having difficulty with the formatting on blogger, so it looks better in person), and the back side has a brief explanation of what our guild does:

Katie’s Comforters Guild at

Seattle Children's Hospital

M/S S-200, PO Box 50020

4800 Sand Point Way N.E.

Seattle, WA 98145-5020

www.katiescomfortersguild.blogspot.com

Karen W. sews the paper cards onto the blankets that she makes with a small stitch onto the corner of the quilt, and ties a knot in it. The recipient can easily remove the small knot (and card) when they receive the blanket. She suggested that this might even inspire friends or family members to share our story and spread the word about the guild.

A family friend, Marisa, recently donated some beautiful batik fabric. Here are photos of the pieces:

Aren't they gorgeous? If you need fabric for making quilts, and would like to use some of this batik, please let me know.

Thank you, Karen & Marisa!

Five New Quilts from Bonnie P.

On Friday, I had the pleasure of a visit from one of our guild members, Bonnie Petersen. Bonnie delivered 5 beautiful quilts that she made. Here she is, surrounded by them:

One of the great things about these quilts is that Bonnie very cleverly made 4 of them out of donated materials! Now, THAT is thrifty.

Please remember: if you are going to use donated fabric, it must be NEW, not recycled (no cut up blankets, sheets, etc., but only NEW, unused fabric). This fabric was donated by a quilter who was clearing out her "stash."

Look at how wonderful the quilts are:

Bonnie also bought some Yogi Bear fabric to make a quilt. Do you remember Yogi & Boo-Boo? I loved that cartoon when I was little!

Thank you, Bonnie!

Art Glass Raffle for Cancer Research

A little while ago, I mentioned the Seattle Children's Cancer Advocacy Network (Seattle Kids C.A.N.), a group of which I'm a member. We are gearing up for Pediatric Cancer Month, which is September, and one of the great ideas that has come from our members is a raffle of art glass made by some of the cancer research team at Seattle Children's Hospital. Information about the raffle and photos of the gorgeous glass pieces can be found on http://www.seattlecancerblows.blogspot.com/ .
I love the name, since the pieces were made at a glass blowing studio! Please check out the website, and consider buying a raffle ticket.