Meetings
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The guild has a Day Group and a
Night Group. Both groups meet at Central
Lutheran Church located at 15th and Cordova Streets. The Day group has additional sessions as
indicated below. Each group schedules their own programs. All members are welcome at any meeting.
Programs for both groups are published in the newsletter.
The Day Group meets at 10:00 AM for informal visiting with the actual
meeting/program beginning at 10:30AM. Show and Tell follows the
meeting/program. Each day meeting will
have at least one table on which members may put items that are free to others
and from which she/he may take items.
· First Thursday: business meeting,
birthday celebration, Show and Tell
· Third Thursday: Program meeting,
Show and Tell
· Fourth Thursday: Open Sew – bring
your machine or handwork and visit with other members while you work…or just
come and visit.
· Fifth Thursday: Comfort Quilt
Workday. When there is a fifth Thursday, come and help other members make
comfort quilts that are distributed to local charities.
The Night Group meetings are less formal and strives to meet at 7:00pm on the third Thursday. Sessions are less formal and have fewer participants
than the day group. They begin each meeting with “around-the-table” Show and
Tell then move to a program as time permits. The group plans programs in
advance annually or semi-annually. Contact the guild at anchoragequilters@gmail.com to confirm the meeting.
Visitors and new members are always welcome at Day Group and Night Group meetings.
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Annual Meeting
The guild’s annual meeting is held in September of each year. The meeting
alternates between a night meeting in even numbered years and day meeting in
odd numbered years. At this meeting, new officers are elected, the annual
budget is approved and other essential business is conducted. We celebrate
together with a potluck meal while food and fun rule. Each year, the President
provides a challenge fabric for the coming year and members bring their item(s)
made from the previous year’s challenge fabric for display.
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Comfort Quilts
Guild
members make over 100 quilts annually and give them to community agencies which
serve the elderly, ill, poor, homeless and others who are in need of warmth and
comfort. All sizes of quilts are used:
infant, crib, wheelchair, lap, twin and full. Teen-age new mothers need
baby wraps, especially with big, bright colors and patterns. Elderly nursing
home patients, who may be in wheelchairs, need smaller lap-size covers that
aren’t too big to handle and won’t drag on the floor. Bed sized quilts are used
to sleep under.
Comfort
quilts are works of love and concern, not aspiring to be works of art; they
could be called “opportunity” quilts because making them gives our members a
chance to try out new methods, fabric and color combinations, and unusual
ideas. Every fifth Thursday, the guild has a Comfort Quilt workday where
members can enjoy working together with other members in “marathon” work
sessions. Most comfort quilts are machine quilted or tied, rather than
hand-quilted. The guild buys batting, sets up patterns and kits and accumulates
fabric for the guild “stash”, which any member can dip into for comfort quilts.
A group “tape-and-pin-baste” operation has the flavor of an old-fashioned
quilting bee, with a half dozen or so people around a table taping down
backing, carefully laying out batting and top, then basting the three layers
together with safety pins.
Some of
the agencies that have received ALCQ comfort quilts through the years include:
AWAIC (Abused Women’s Aid In Crisis), Booth Memorial Home, Clare House Women’s
Shelter, Serendipity Adult Day Center, Clare House Women’s Shelter, Mary Conrad
Center Nursing Home, 4-A’s (Alaska AIDS Assistance Association), McKinnell
House, Charley Elder House, McAuley Manor, Cares for Kids, Lutheran Social
Services, plus other arms of the Salvation Army and Catholic Social Services.
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Christmas Stockings for Children
The Night
group works with the Office of Children’s Services and donates Christmas
stockings filled with “goodies” for children who are in the system. The group
normally makes stockings at one of the summer meetings and stuffs them in
November or December.
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Teddy Bears and Quilts
This is a
community service program that brings together children, teddy bears and
quilts. Members rescue new and gently used teddy bears and other stuffed
animals and make teddy-sized quilts to reflect the personality of each animal. In the Spring each year, the guild hosts an
annual Teddy Bear Tea during which the public and local agencies are invited to
see all the animals showing off their specially made quilts. Since the program
began in 2003, hundreds of critters with quilts have found children of their
own through this outreach program. The guiding principle is “Every child
deserves a teddy bear, and every teddy bear deserves a child.” Agencies
frequently tell us stories about how much it means to the children to receive
such a special handmade gift.
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Annual Quilt Retreat
Annually ALCQ holds a retreat for
members and other quilters. This 3 or 4 day quilt getaway lets quilters
socialize, work all hours on quilt projects…or not, eat great food that someone
else prepares, try novel techniques, entertain new creative and wild-eyed
notions, share project ideas, laugh a lot, and come home revitalized. In recent
years, our retreats have been held in the Spring in the Willow/Hatcher Pass
area at the North Star Bible Camp.
