Giving something back

Like many other quilters, I make (or certainly start) more quilts than I can find homes for. My mum, my children, my nephews and nieces all have at least two, and there are a fair number on a shelf in my sewing room waiting for a good home.  They aren't easy to sell for a price that even covers the cost of the fabric, let alone the hours of work.

So I have been looking for a charity that clicked with me. There are many that ask for quilts, and I have donated a fair few, but until yesterday I hadn't found one that felt right. Lily, at Lily's Quilts, introduced me to a charity in the UK called Siblings Together - an initiative dedicated towards promoting positive contact between siblings separated by care.

The charity arranges holiday camps for 40-50 children at a time - all siblings separated by the care system. The siblings get time to play and just be together which is so important for their short and long term well being. The organisers would love to be able to give something to these kids - something to comfort them, keep them warm, take away from camp as a reminder of the time they've had with their siblings, something homemade, just for them, to keep. Children moved from pillar to post in the care system often won't have something special like that, homemade just for them, to bring them warmth and a little comfort and maybe a few happy memories. [click here for Lily's post]

I think this is the charity for my spare quilts. As childminders we worked with a foster carer, trying to keep family groups together, we wanted to be foster carers ourselves, and both our nephew and friends have been through the red tape that is the adoption system.