Board Basting Beauties & More Hearts of Hope Info!

While some of us went hiking up to Grayson Highlands to see the ponies with Zoey & Mabel, another group enjoyed the warm spring weather and set up to board baste Christine's finished Wonky Wishes quilt top to get it ready for hand quilting!

I am absolutely thrilled to have hand quilting happening at Quiltville Inn, be it in the Hen Den in comfy chairs, or on the porch when the weather permits.

Board basting is a technique taught by Sharon Schamber, and you can find her tutorial on her YouTube video HERE.

The video tutorial is about 13 minutes long and is PACKED with information.

Whether you are a traditional hand quilter, or finishing your quilt with big stitch quilting - this just might be the best basting method you've ever seen.

Best of all, you do at at a table - no crawling on the floor required.

Backing fabric rolled on!

We used table risers (bed risers) to raise the table to a comfortable standing height.  This really helped tons.

Rolling the top onto the top board.

Getting the batting in there just right.

Just a bit more adjusting needed!

Smoothing everything all out.

Barbara shared how to use a spoon to deflect the needle while thread basting.  it really helps with sore fingers.

Thread basting stitches in place!

Things to love about thread basting - no pins to catch your thread on while quilting.  No worry of rust spots left if this becomes a long term UFO.

I can't wait to see Christine's progress on this beauty!

After all the cars were gone yesterday, I was in hyper-drive to get all of the laundry done for today's arrival of Gail's Quilt Buddies.

Susan worked her magic on getting the downstairs ready, and we'll finish the upstairs and make the beds this afternoon before they arrive.

I also had to hurry home and get ready for something special:

I was on Tipsy Tuesday last night with Gudrun of GE Quilt Designs!

I talked with Gudrun over the weekend about making a bigger difference by pooling our efforts with the sew-alongs we are both doing.  Remember when we did this in 2020 when Covid hit?

Gudrun is hosting a HOPE Sew-along using her HOPE pattern.  Many of you will already have this pattern from a previous fundraising sew-along she hosted, but for those who don't have it - ALL proceeds for both printed and digital patterns are going to be donated to Together Rising through our joint GoFundMe, Quilters For Ukraine.

From Gudrun:

Hope for Ukraine, is a fundraising quilt project in three parts!

First, to support the refugees for their immediate needs I will be donating all the net proceeds from the sale of the Hope for Ukraine Mini Mystery Stash Builder Bundles and the Hope Quilt pattern, both printed and PDF versions, directly to this fund. I will update the fund weekly so you can see how your impact is helping. 

The Hope for Ukraine Mini Mystery Stash Builder Bundles are 6 half yards of blue and yellow fabric. This is 3 yards of high quality quilt shop fabric for $30. The Stash Builder Bundles are currently listed as a preorder while we await restock. Our original inventory sold out in 10 minutes on Friday thanks to you awesome people! Fabric is on it's way, as I type.

• Hope for Ukraine Mini Mystery Stash Builder Bundle
• Hope Quilt Pattern printed version
• Hope Quilt Pattern PDF version

We are doing this jointly, because we are stronger and can make a bigger impact when we work TOGETHER.

The GoFundMe Quilters For Ukraine will feed directly to the non-profit Together Rising.

Together Rising Mission Statement:

We live in a world where people believe that We Belong To Each Other.

We live in a world where people give away hard-earned money to strangers.

We live in a world where Love Wins.

By Together Rising | March 4, 2022

On Monday, we announced that more than 13,000 of you donated an incredible $1,003,617.38 in less than 72 hours to support Ukrainian families. We promised you that our team was working to deploy every penny in the most impactful ways.

As of this afternoon, Together Rising has sent $1,003,617.38 to seven trusted, boots-on-the-ground partners to provide 100 pallets of critical medical supplies, food, medical and psychological support, and resettlement and evacuation of refugees and evacuees, including BIPOC and LGBTQIA2S+ communities:

$25,000 is being deployed to Vostok SOS, a Ukrainian-led, grassroots organization, to provide critical aid, support evacuation efforts, and resettle families in safer parts of the country.

$100,000 is being deployed to Rescue Foundation, whose team immediately jumped into action on behalf of BIPOC students who were being denied passage across the Ukrainian/Polish border, securing buses and safe transport for them.

$225,000 is being deployed to Afya Foundation, to gather, pack, and ship 100 pallets of vital medical supplies from New York to Ukraine, an urgent shipment funded solely by our investment.

$153,617.38 is being deployed to OutRight, to provide urgent support to LGBTQIA2S+ Ukrainians still in-country and evacuees in neighboring countries.

$200,000 is being deployed to Estonian Refugee Council, to provide critical aid and evacuation assistance. With almost a decade of active presence in Ukraine and border regions, they are deeply embedded and uniquely positioned to provide these vital services.   

$200,000 is being deployed to World Central Kitchen, to provide hot meals to Ukrainian refugees and evacuees on the ground in Poland, Ukraine, Moldova, and Romania. 

$100,000 is being deployed to World Jewish Relief, to provide Ukrainians of all religious backgrounds with the food, cash, and medical and psychological support they need.

Together Rising’s vetting assesses an organization’s size and infrastructure to determine what level of grant can be most effectively and urgently deployed. Varying grant size is not indicative of Together Rising’s level of enthusiasm about a particular organization—it is indicative of our assessment of how the level of grant each organization can most rapidly and impactfully utilize.

Since our last update, more than 3,500 of you raised an additional $316,123.19, bringing our total funds—including our initial $250,000 commitment—to $1,569,740.57 for Ukraine.

We will continue to stand with Ukrainian families and all those impacted by this devastating crisis. Let’s continue to harness our heartbreak into help, together.

What I love about Together Rising is that we can see instantly where this money is going.  We are real people helping people.  It's what we do best.

Where my Hearts 0f Hope Sew-Along comes in:

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The introductory post goes live here on my blog on March 18th and Part One of Hearts of Hope will be available March 25th.

While it is free to participate in the Hearts 0f Hope Sew-Along, perhaps you would consider donating to our Quilters For Ukraine GoFundMe which will directly be sent to Together Rising so they can continue getting needed items, meals and more to the people of Ukraine.

You can pre-order a Hope for Ukraine stash builder from Gudrun in blue and yellow for use in your Hearts of Hope quilt you'll be sewing with me, and no one says you can't do both quilts!

While my sew-along is free to participate, my hope is that your guild or group will make quilts and raffle (or donation quilt whatever terminology is needed in your state) them, and then donate the proceeds to the organization of your choice for supporting Ukraine.

If you want to donate to our Quilters For Ukraine page, that's wonderful!  If you have a different one, that's also wonderful.  The most important thing is that we give what we can with our full hearts.

In time, after basic needs are met, there will be a call for quilts for refugees and those who are having to start their lives over.  Your quilts made in the colors of their home country may be a source of love and comfort.  So by all means, make quilts.  But money is needed first.

I'm thinking that Lutheran World Relief will be a great organization to send quilts to when the time comes.

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Please share to your own guilds, groups and news feeds to help spread the word.

Okay, I know this is a lot.  But we can do this!

Quiltville Quote of the Day -

I love this perspective on looking back - no, we are not going that way but we can sure gauge how far we have come, turn around and keep moving forward.

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Wonky Wishes quilt pattern available in the Quiltville Store.

I'm off to finish up laundry at the inn.

Have a wonderful Wednesday, everyone!