These are the last two laundry bags of the 16 I have made to go to our friendly Warrant Officer for those in the teams coming to replace his lot. I hope they like them. I wonder how they will decide who gets which one as I am kind of hoping that a bald guy (a.k.a Curly) gets the curly fries one. My son thinks I am really cruel using that fabric as he thinks it will make the recipient crave curly fries for the duration of his tour. Hmmmm, that might be the teenager in him talking!
A friend of mine told me a story today and I thought I would share it with you. Her husband had to go to a rehabilitation hospital to recover from an illness and whilst visiting him there she noticed a young man in wheel chair using a beautiful quilt. One day she commented on how beautiful the quilt was and told him someone must love him very much to have made it for him. Later than day his wife approached her in the tearooms and thanked my friend for noticing and commenting on the quilt. My friend said that the wife had done a beautiful job on the quilt and the young wife replied that she hadn’t made it. When her husband was terribly injured whilst serving overseas with the Australian Military he spent some time in a military hospital in Germany and there he was given the quilt. It is a Quilts of Valor Quilt! I love that story though it brings me close to tears every time I hear it. I am so grateful that he was given a Quilts of Valor quilt but I can’t help thinking there should have been something from his own country to give him. Well, now there will be, maybe not for every injured soldier at first, but at least for some.
Wendy L, Sue P and Debra have already promised to make quilts to send to the hospital in Kandahar and we have only been asked to send two to three. Of course we are going to send three. I would send five if I could but I don’t want to push my luck! The chaplains are going to let me know if those three are used so that I can send more and I hope to keep a supply of quilts in my home so that I can get them in the mail as soon as they are required. If anyone wants to make an Aussie themed quilt and send it to me, although you will have to pay postage, I will keep it here for when it is needed.
Every quilt that is going for this purpose must be sent in one of those vacuum sealed bags that you can suck the air out of with a vacuum cleaner – this is so that when it is given to the soldier it is not full of an covered by dust already. I have been told that the dust gets into everything over there. I have found some of these bags at Bunnings – they are $8 each and are 50x60cm which I think is a bit big. I will test one out but for the time being that is all I have to work with. If anyone knows where you can get slightly smaller bags or cheaper bags please let me know.
And now for a girly quilt update. The lovely Lucy from Patchwork Orange sent down these four gorgeous girly nine patches for our special quilt.
This is my favourite – look at those amazing bugs!!! So cute!
And as if that wasn’t enough, Lucy also included enough of this cute print for the backing of our little girl’s quilt! Thanks so much Patchwork Orange – so generous!
And finally here is a laundry bag that Cathy sent me. She recently sent of 16 laundry bags but this one wouldn’t fit in the boxes so she sent it up here. I am sure I will have no problem finding it a good home.
Not sure if I will get to blog tomorrow – my house in being invaded by 15 to 20 of my son’s lovely friends from Youth Group. They will be here from midday till 6pm – eating party pies, cocktail frankfurts and movie munching junk. They are having a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon. I have just spent tonight making their deserts – jump over to Cherry Red Quilter if you want a look at them. I will be spending the morning clearing away and making room for them and finishing off the deserts, the afternoon working on my dining room table where I can hear what is going on just to make sure that there are no shenanigans going on – no over enthusiastic teenage sky larking that might damage someone or something – can’t sit and sew as I don’t want to be out of ear shot. I think I might work on the April BOM.
Till next time…………..keep spreading the word and happy stitching!
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