Quilts for Ukraine - an update

This week I spotted two of our New Zealand quilts that are ready to donate to Ukrainian children in Germany.  The kiwi block makes the first one quite recognisable! But I also recognise the borders because I assembled our quilt tops before I sent them over to Claudia in Germany.  

Claudia received far more quilts and blocks than she ever could have imagined, and she has been donating quilts as quickly as she can.  I'm not concerned that our tops from New Zealand are still working their way through the finishing stages.  It's lovely to see that they have been quilted beautifully, and have matching binding applied by a volunteer.  

I'll keep an eye out for more photos in case they pop up. 

My fabrics for the Swatch quilt

I had a great weekend away on my work social weekend in Kapiti Coast.  They weather is starting to get a bit cooler now and I'm starting to think about quilting again.  I was inspired by the Ruby Star Society Spring sew along I saw on Instagram this week so I looked in my stash and cut blocks for the Swatch quilt:

I see that they have designed their blocks to fit across one width of the fabric, but I wanted my quilt to be larger than 48" x 60", so I've cut my blocks a bit bigger and added two extra rows.  

I'll show you next week when I have it all sewn together.  

Now it's time for the Peacock Party.  Feel free to link up a recent blog post below:

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Quilts for Ukraine

Look at what we've done! Eleven quilt tops and 140 loose blocks are heading to Germany today. 

Thank you New Zealand and Australian quilters. (Full sized photos at the end of this post.)

Two months ago I decided to make a few blue and yellow blocks for Ukrainian refugee quilts. I never imagined it would grow to this.  We've made 360 blocks in total.  I received blocks from:

Tauranga Patchwork and Quilters 

Capital Quilters

Howick Quilting Friends (both groups)

Glenys in Auckland (the kiwi blocks)

Marina in Feilding

Jeanette in Australia

Vivienne in Napier

Mary in Ashburton

Sue in Auckland

plus kind people in Dunedin and Lincoln.  

As I received more and more blocks, and saw how many Claudia was receiving every day in Germany, I decided to make up some quilt tops to ease the load on Claudia.  As the blocks rolled in I made more and more quilt tops.  I started to run out of fabrics for the sashing and borders, so Jenny Hunter from Plume Art + Stitch very kindly donated some blue and yellow fabrics and that allowed me to finish 11 quilt tops for Ukrainian refugee children. 

Four different people have kindly contributed to the cost of postage.  So it's been a real team effort. Thank you everyone.  Claudia is a very busy lady sorting all the blocks, quilt tops and donation events, but if I see photos of our finished quilts being donated to children I will be sure to share them with you.  

Here are some close up photos of each of the quilts.  If you donated blocks I hope you can see some of your blocks in these quilts.  There are another 140 loose blocks that I'm sending over too.  Every block is going to Germany. 

Thank you everyone.

Number 1

Number 2

Number 3

Number 4

Number 5

Number 6

Number 7

Number 8

Number 9

Number 10

Number 11

Now it's time for the Peacock Party.  Feel free to link up a recent blog post below. 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Quilts for Ukraine update

So much has happened since I first wrote about the quilts for Ukrainian refugee children a few weeks ago. (You can read that post here.)

from Glenys in Auckland

My first 20 blocks turned into a quilt top

I got carried away and made 20 blocks before I even knew what I was doing! I could see on Instagram that Claudia @pfeilclaudia in Germany was receiving blocks from around the world every day, so I decided to turn my first 20 blocks into a quilt top to speed up the process when it gets to Germany. I asked Claudia for the measurements for the sashing and borders to make sure that my quilt top matched those she was assembling. 

at Howick Quilting Friends (Saturday group)

In early April I was invited to Howick Quilting Friends guild in Auckland as the guest speaker, and the ladies there had made 39 blocks for me to bring back to Wellington. And they kindly donated the cute star fabric in the background below that I can use for sashing and borders. 

Quilt top number 2 with blocks from Howick Quilting Friends

My mum was keen to make blocks too, so I posted her some of my bright blue and yellow stash. Now mum has made about 60 blocks! 

Over Easter a lot of blocks arrived from Jeanette in Australia and I've incorporated some of them into quilt tops already. Blocks have also arrived from Vivienne in Napier, Marina in Feilding, and Glenys in Auckland. And I know there are more in the post.  

Top number 3 with blocks from everyone!

Top number 4 with my next batch of 20 blocks

It's so good to see photos of Claudia donating the quilts to the children.  That is why I decided to get involved - I knew the quilts would reach the children in need.  Claudia now has enough blocks to make 700 quilts (after initially aiming for 5 or 10 quilts).  She will keep going, but she is now facing large costs for batting, backings, binding and sashing.  If you would like to make a donation to help with costs you can deposit any amount of money into Claudia Pfeil's PayPal account:

post@quilt-und-co.de

Log in to PayPal, then go to Pay & Get Paid, Make Payments, Send Payments. 

Every donation will be appreciated and will speed up the process of getting the quilts into the hands of the Ukrainian refugee children. 

Top number 5 in the planning stages - mainly blocks from Australia and Auckland

I can't promise to incorporate all of the NZ blocks into quilt tops, but I will send all of the blocks to Claudia in Germany.  Thank you everyone who has contributed, both with blocks and money towards postage. I will take photos of all the tops before I send them off and post them here on my blog.  

Remember, if you are sending any blocks yourself, you need to put $1 value only and clearly label it GIFT or DONATION.  Claudia has had to pay a lot of money in customs duty because people have put higher values on their parcels.  

Well, after that big update, it's now time for the Peacock Party.  Feel free to link up a recent blog post below:

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Quilts for Ukrainian refugee children

Claudia Pfeil in Germany is leading a team of wonderful women making quilts for Ukrainian refugee children.

I became aware of this via her Instagram account, and I offered to collate blocks from New Zealand quilters and post them over to Germany.  

The charity quilts ready to be gifted.

Ukrainian children receiving their quilts in Germany

I've chosen to get involved because Claudia is a woman of action.  She isn't just calling for blocks, she's finished some quilts already and has already started distributing them to the Ukrainian refugee children in Germany. Here are some examples of the finished quilts that have been gifted already.

Some stats:

Claudia has already received 4,860 blocks - enough for 240 quilts.  

37 quilts have been finished, and most of them have been gifted already. 

Block size - 8.5" unfinished, for an 8" finished block in the quilt

Colours - blue and yellow

Pattern - any pattern you like

I started making some blocks on Sunday and these are the ones that I've finished already:

You can see that they don't have to be fancy.  Once the blocks are mixed up and put into quilts they will hopefully remind the children of happier times in Ukraine. 

If you're in New Zealand, and would like to make some blocks, I can send them to Germany with mine if you get them to me in Wellington by Friday 22 April.  Just send me an email when you're finished and I'll let you know my address.  email wendysquiltsandmore@gmail.com

Or, I could collect them from the following locations:

Botany Downs, Auckland on Sat 9 April. 

Queenstown Sat16 April

Stitch Witches Dunedin Sat 30 April

Capital Quilters, Waterloo School Hall Sat 30 April.  

The end of April is the absolute last day for collection. 

If you or your guild have a lot of blocks to send, please consider positing them to Claudia yourself.  I can give you her address if you need it. To avoid customs duty in Germany, please state "no commercial value", gift / donation and maximum value $1.  

I believe there are collection points in Australia and USA too.  Just google to see what's happening in your country.  

Thank you.