Swooning with Oakshotts, aka Amish Stars, and a little quilt named Mabel

The West Coast Mennonite Relief Sale (WCMRS) is just around the corner, this coming Friday and Saturday. While there is a LOT of fabulous food for sale, along with used books, plants, antiques, collectibles, fair trade items, a 10K race and 2 mile fun run, the main money is raised through the auctioning of handmade items (over 500 quilts, afghans and comforters).

Today I want to share the past quilts that have been made by me and quilted by Mark's cousin, Ione. We partner every other year to make a quilt.

This sale is held every year (there are several similar sales held through the United States and Canada) to help fund Mennonite Central Committee, whose mission is to spread relief, development and peace in the name of Christ. It is an incredibly well-respected charitable organization. In fact, nearly 90 percent of all money donated goes to the work of MCC.

Where is this work carried out? In the words of the West Coast director, Sheri Wiedenhoefer, "All those places you wouldn't want to go for vacation? Those are the places where MCC is present."

MCC has an ongoing presence in many, many countries, and is always one of the first responders whenever there is a disaster happening anywhere in the world.

 Where we work

AFRICA Burkina Faso Burundi Chad DR Congo Ethiopia Kenya Mozambique Nigeria Rwanda Somalia   South Africa Sudan Swaziland Tanzania Uganda Zambia Zimbabwe	ASIA Afghanistan Bangladesh Cambodia China India Indonesia Laos Myanmar Nepal North Korea (DPRK) South Korea (ROK) Vietnam	EUROPE Bosnia & Herzegovina Croatia Kazakhstan Kosova Russia Serbia Ukraine West Europe
	LATIN AMERICA & CARIBBEAN Bolivia Brazil Colombia El Salvador Guatemala Haiti Honduras Mexico Nicaragua Paraguay	MIDDLE EAST Egypt Iran Iraq Jordan Lebanon Palestine & Israel Syria	CANADA & UNITED STATES Canada United States

 

 The first quilt collaboration was this Shoofly quilt (84x96).  Ione had made at least one of these before, I fell in love with it, asked if she would consider quilting it if I made one for donation. She did a beautiful job, and the variegated thread really popped against the black. This quilt sold for the highest amount that year (2003): $3,400!

In 2004, we collaborated on Stars Over Ohio (86x113). Each star had the same focus fabric, and all the blocks were some kind of variation on the Ohio Star. It sold for $3,100; I believe it was the second highest that year.

 California Kaleidoscope (108x108) came next, in 2007.  It sold for $2,100.

 2010, California Flower Garden, which had 3,460 pieces! (size 110x112). It sold for $3,700.

Color Box was auctioned two years ago and went for my personal best, $5,900!

This weekend, a quilt I have mostly called Swooning with Oakshotts, but changed to Amish Stars for the auction program, will be on the auction block. I'm already starting to get a little nervous. The fabric is the incredible Oakshott. I can't say enough about Michael Oakshott, who gave me a very generous discount on the fabric after I told him a little about MCC and its work around the world. He took my word for the plans for this quilt totally on faith, even though I told him it would be two years before it would be auctioned off. Thank you, Michael!

I'll post a bit more about Amish Stars on Friday. Tomorrow you won't want to miss seeing the quilt that Christa made, along with help from one of her friends.

If you are wondering about the little quilt named Mabel, here she is so far. The name doesn't make sense to anyone other than me at this point, but it will all be revealed soon. Promise.

Since she is obviously a work in progress (only the top two rows are sewn together at this point), I'm linking up to Lee at WIP Wednesday and with Lorna at Let's Bee Social.