Our guild charity initiatives have carried on during the winter months despite not meeting in person from January through March.
Our March guild meeting, via Zoom, was a sew night where we worked in the comfort of our own homes making little 24"x 24" "Preemie" quilts for babies in the Ottawa Hospital's neonatal Special Care Nursery.
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In March our Charity coordinator Marilyn delivered 5 quilts (pictured below) to Interval House in Carleton Place.

This was a very active meeting! On November 22 we had a Charity project sew night combined with a challenge. The hall was set up with several sewing stations fitted with sewing machines and other equipment and tools that the members brought.
We were placed in teams of 2-4 people and our challenge was to make 12 blocks from the small paper bag containing instructions for a simple block, and strips of coloured and white fabrics. Tasks included cutting, pinning, sewing and (optionally) pressing. Each 12 1/2" block was assembled from 2 of the colourful individual units. The blocks were to be assembled in an alternating horizontal/vertical 3x4 configuration.

Away we went and the hall was filled with quiet chatter, laughter and heads down workers!
This first photo shows some of the blocks coming together.

Challenge Winners!
Congratulations to Brenda G and Debbie C who were the first, and only team to complete the challenge at the meeting!

Charity Project Kits
The challenge wasn't the only activity going on.
Some members chose to work on preparing and assembling kits for Charity quilts, placemats, and fidget quilts. The kits are available to any guild members who would like to make a quilt top (or an entire quilt) for one of our Charity initiatives, or a smaller item.

There was even time for Show and Tell.  Show and Tell Photos

Marilyn, our Charity coordinator, showed a very creatively designed Charity quilt top that a member made incorporating a donated panel fabric.

Draws
The meeting wrapped up with our draws and some happy winners!
Guess the Number of Pages - Jo P
Gift Basket - Barb H
50-50 Draw - Carolyn P
Door Prizes  - Jo P and Joyce M

Many thanks to those who brought the tasty snacks and prepared the coffee and tea.
And a very big thanks to Joyce Murray who organized the challenge including preparing the bags of fabric and instructions. Well done Joyce!
And special thanks to the meeting attendees who so happily worked together on our Charity sew night.
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-- Janet Brownlee

This Charity workshop evening on Wednesday November 23rd was a huge success, both in the camaraderie and the amount of  work that was done by the 33 attendees.  It was a very active and busy hands on meeting making Christmas gift bags and placemats, and preparing materials for these and other guild Charity projects. We enjoyed meeting and talking to people we hadn’t talked to before or for a long time, including our 2 brand new members, Lucy and Nadine who were attending their first meeting.

Marilyn and her set up crew had many work stations clearly labeled and ready for us to quickly get started on various activities from cutting fabric for Christmas gift bags and placemats, sewing gift bags and placemats, attaching bindings to placemats, attaching the drawstrings to the gift bags, assembling kits to make fidget quilts, cutting batting for preemie and other Charity quilts, and ironing, ironing and more ironing in the kitchen!

A number of completed Charity items were brought to the meeting.

Thanks to all who participated in this big work evening. And an extra thank you to those who took home works-in-progress to finish off for our Christmas donations.

​Show and Tell
We  took a break for Show and Tell. Photos here

The program for our March guild Zoom meeting was very unique as we welcomed multiple guest presenters who represented several of the charities that our guild supports with donations of our crafts. This was an extraordinarily touching and very informative evening as we heard first hand stories of how our donations are valued by their recipients, and by the people who work or volunteer at the charities.

​Our guests included:

Nancy Peck  of Arnprior-Braeside-McNab Seniors at Home, recipients of the placemats that we donate at Christmas time, which are delivered along with the Christmas meal to the Meals on Wheels clients ​

 
Pat Tait, volunteer team lead at the Arnprior & District Food Bank Inc. who fill and distribute the fabric drawstring bags that we donate.

​Cathie McOrmond, Resource Development, at Lanark County Interval House and Community Support in  Carleton Place who have been recipients of twin bed quilts

​Nancy Arbogast, Regional Representative in Ottawa for Quilts of Valour, Ottawa. Our guild members have donated quilts of comfort for injured Canadian Armed Forces members past and present.

Gwen Pennings, Vice-President for the Pakenham group of Victoria’s Quilts who make and donate quilts to people living with cancer in Canada. Gwen is one of several of our guild members who are members of this Pakenham group.

We were in awe of the huge impact that our donations can have, and resolved to increase our efforts to support these charities.