Bonnie Jones belongs to a social media page where she saw an idea a couple of years ago that stuck with her. A group of community quilters had made placemats for their local Meals on Wheels program and this year, more than ever, Jones thought that would be a great thing for Fallon seniors.
“This year with things so bad and people being so alone, it is probably worse for those who are alone and homebound, and this would be the year to cheer them up,” she said.
Jones belongs to a quilting group called The Fallon Cut Ups and she asked a couple of those friends if they would be willing to help. They all jumped at the chance, and then she called the senior center to make sure they thought it was a good idea.
The placemats are made from quilting scraps and are two-sided so they can be turned over. They will be delivered in the Meals on Wheels Christmas dinners.
“They were thrilled to pieces at the senior center and I was so excited to do this, so we got it all lined up when they need them, and then just as we were ready to hang up, I asked how many we needed,” said Jones laughing. “I thought, little old Fallon, 60-80 people. When she said ‘235 I swallowed my gum.”
Jones said she hung up the phone worried, and then thought, “God would not have put this on my heart to do without giving me help.”
She realized that she knows a lot of quilters in this town so she made a list of everyone she could think of and started contacting them, thinking that if she could get ten people to help that wouldn’t really be a burden on anyone. “I did tell them if they didn’t want to do this, I would still be their friend,” said Jones.
She ended up finding 20 local quilters within two days who were just as excited about the project as she was. Over the next six weeks Jones was overwhelmed at the response.
“People kept making them and dropping them off and the stack just kept getting bigger, I figured I was going to fill in at the end, but we ended up with five extra.”
Although the quilters all thought it would have been much more fun if they could have gotten together instead of working from their individual homes, Jones said they had fun anyway just knowing they were going to make people in our community happy.
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