If you think of a quilt show as just another craft show, you're missing out on the art of it.
"Quilting and sewing have made a huge comeback," said Elaine Lemley (top photo), chair of the Stitches in Time quilt show at the Alexander Fire Hall on Friday and Saturday. "A lot of people think of the Amish quilts, which are beautiful in themselves. But quilting has evolved through the years to expand to art quilts and rearranging the traditional patterns of the quilts. If you walk through here, you'll see it's very, very different now than some of the traditional quilting that grandma may have made."
The Museum Quilt Guild hosts the show every two years. It's a chance for the 75 members of the guild to display their best work, but it's also a fundraiser for the guild.
"We do a lot of community service," Lamley said. "We have a community service section in the back corner of our show going on right now. We donate quilts to the Batavia VA Hospital, the New York State Vets Home, Arc, All Babies Cherished, both cancer centers here in Batavia. And there's an association in Buffalo called Sleep in Heavenly Peace. They take twin-sized bed quilts for kids who are sleeping on the floor. There's another organization as part of that, that actually makes up the beds for these kids so that they're getting a good night's sleep. We've been donating quilts to them recently."
Why quilting?
"It's so relaxing, so much fun, and it's addicting once we get going with it," Lamley said.
To learn more about the Museum Quilt Guild, visit the group's website.
Photos by Howard Owens.
