“Stand down” quilts will be an ongoing project for the guild. each year, quilts will be given to a veteran at the annual “Stand down” event at Frontier Village in Prescott. Quilts can be made in any pattern but should be approximately 80” X 80” so that the veteran can bundle up in it to keep warm. The pattern below is easy to make but is only one example. Any fabric is acceptable but darker colors are best since many of these veterans live in the national forests and the quilts will often be used outdoors and in tents.

This year, David “Mac” Macfarlane, General Manager of Findlay Subaru, has graciously agreed to help the guild with expenses by donating funds to purchase batting and backing fabrics for our stand down quilts. Last year, Patsy absorbed much of the expense “out of pocket” so this will really be great.

Patsy has provided a new pattern to try this year, the leaf pile quilt

Hey Lonesome Valley Quilters – it’s time for Stand Down Quilting. I know you would all love to get together to sew, but we are not yet able to gather at our usual location. I know also that many of you don’t want to give up on sewing for Stand Down either. So – we’re all going to jump in and try something different. Everyone with me sew far? OK – so we’re going to do this using the popular Zoom electronic meeting. Now – I can hear some of you saying that you’ve never done Zoom, you are not tech savvy, and a whole bunch of other stuff. About 6 weeks ago I was saying the same things – but I jumped in with both feet and I’m now fairly good with it. AND the best part is I can walk you through it in a phone call. It’s super easy. So we will have our Zoom date on our usual Internal Workshop date & time and we will have two Zooms that day. The details are:

Monday, June 15 v First Session: 9:30 a.m.

Second Session: 2 p.m

Each Session will last about 1 hour (depends on how much we talk!)

At session 1 – we will check in to get comfy with Zoom, and see who else is on our call. Then Patsy will give us an update as to how many Stand Down Quilts she now has accumulated and how many more we need to reach our goal. Mary Pirtle will then show us the tricks to make her 10-minute block. Patsy Franko also has a new block to show us. The block pattern is on our Facebook page. If you do not use Facebook, Patsy can email you the directions. In the first session we will learn the block, get update from Patsy, show off our fabrics and show/tell about other Stand Down quilts we have been able to finish during our quarantine time.

If you have never done Zoom and are uncertain – please let me know and I will walk you through it. If you do not have access to a laptop, Ipad, or smart phone and would still like to participate, you may be able to get together with a friend at her home and you can both participate. I will need a list of participants, so please let me know if you will participate so I can send you a Zoom invite.

Contact Marcia Rowell