Quilters are known for their generosity,their compassion and generally just being really nice people...I want to introduce you to one of my students, Sally Fried, who is no exception and takes things a step further.
Sally lives in Magalia, CA and is a first grade teacher in Red Bluff. Not only is she an amazing, fun teacher but she also takes the time to teach her students to quilt. For the past 10 years she takes time each Friday, along with a few parent volunteers, to work on the students' blocks. Each child makes a painted hand print animal, makes a quilt sandwich, hand quilts their piece and hand sews the binding around the edge. We figured that she has done over 1000 of these over the past 10 years. Funding was recently cut and she was left without a means to purchase the fabric needed...our group of quilters from our weekend retreats came forward and donated what she needed to keep those kids quilting!
Another amazing and special thing Sally does is create memory quilts from the clothing of a family member who has passed. Sally is pictured holding a quilt created for Patricia. Her husband, Byron, passed recently and she gave his shirts to Sally to create a memory quilt for her. He was a salmon fisherman so another one of my students, Amity Jones, embroidered the logo of his ship on four of the blocks. Even the orange sashing was one of his shirts.
The brown Hunter's Star quilt was made at the request of a daughter whose mother had passed. The quilt was created from her pants, blouse and mumu. She wanted a brown quilt so Sally added a few of her own fabrics to keep it in that tone. The other daughter wanted a splash of color and lots of white so the white nine-patch was made from the rest of her clothes.
After spending the weekend with Sally at our Good Times Weekend retreat, I just had to share her with all of you. She is our resident "blonde" and keeps things rolling all weekend long. She is an inspiration to all of us and I hope she has inspired you as well.
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