The Angel Tree

Every year during Advent our church has an Angel Tree.  On each of the paper angels is written something that is needed by one of several charities that our church supports.  Some have baby clothes and gifts for the local Pregnancy Support group.  Some have Christmas gift needs for the local Women's Shelter.  Some have gift cards and other needs for our grief and pastoral ministries.

Most years I pick one that has a gasoline gift card.  This year, the first one I picked was "lap throw."   I thought I'd try for a gas card again, so picked another.  "Twin comforter."  OK, it's a sign from the Angels after all.  I went home and searched through my quilts.  Time to pass along some of the quilts I have made to someone who needs them.

Today a basket of seven quilts went up to the church.  Most are lap quilts and a few baby quilts.  Several were made as mystery or challenge quilts.  They were fun to make, and I learned some new skills, but never made them for anyone in particular and never used any of them.  A bit more quilting was added to the borders of two of them before they left the house, and of course they all went through the washing machine one last time too.

I'm usually too self conscious of my quilting skills to give away quilts like this, but strangely, I'm not feeling uneasy about it at all.  I guess the time was right to do some letting go.