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Ocean Wave Quilters Community Projects Go Beyond Their Annual Quilt Show and Quilt Walk · KMUD News

• 0:00
  Speaker A: Hello, I'm Michelle Blackwell, reporting from the Mendocino Coast. Ocean Wave Quilters draws hundreds of people to its annual quilt show at the end of June each year. The variety of styles, from traditional to modern to art and everything in between, is one good reason to take a few hours to look at the exhibition. The work and thought that goes into these pieces is unimaginable to a non sewer like myself. But the Ocean Wave Quilters do so much more. I interviewed Paula Pearlstein, who chairs the quilt show committee, about the organization's community focus. We're at the Fort Bragg Quilt show with the Ocean Wave Quilters chair, Paula Pearlstein. Paula, let's first talk a little bit about Ocean Wave Quilters and some of the things that you as an organization do for the community.
• 0:43
  Speaker B: Ocean wave quilters is 501c3, and our mission statement is to educate about quilting. And we have quite a few projects that members can choose to be involved in. One is our warm welcome project where we make a quilt for each baby born in Fort Bragg, which is just really a nice thing for the parents. We do Dress a Girl, which we make some simple little sundresses for the Dress a Girl program, and it's sent to foreign countries where possibly a girl doesn't attend school because she doesn't have anything to wear. We also have community pet beds where we donate pet beds to different rescues. We also do cat curtains they found at our Humane Society when a cat comes in that to have a little curtain you can pull across the front of their cage so they feel safer. Then the cat acclimates better and becomes more adaptable. We make hundreds of pillowcases to give to Project Sanctuary for Foster Children, different agencies around town. And we make them in bright colors and a lot of juvenile prints. So it's really kind of a special gift for the children. And we also do community quilts. We do chaplain quilts that are given out at the hospital. We do quilts for the infusion center, someone who's receiving chemotherapy or another kind of infusion. They get very cold. So a warm quilt is very welcome.
• 2:17
  Speaker A: How many people are in your organization that participate in all of these programs?
• 2:22
  Speaker B: So we have about 70 guild members in Ocean Wave Quilters. Not everybody does everything. They kind of pick and choose. I can think of a few members who make two baby quilts a month. We give a lot of those out other people that do Chaplin quilts and infusion quilts, and they make one of those a month. Some people sew pillowcases, some people Their thing is to make pet beds. And the reason we got started on pet beds is I read an article about how much fabric goes into landfills, and I went, oh, we need to do something about that. So quilters now save any scraps they have, and we stuff them into pet beds that we make and sew the end up, and it lets a pet have something soft, and we don't have the fabric going into landfills.
• 3:12
  Speaker A: According to the US EPA, as of 2018, 11.3 million tons of textiles went into landfills in the United States alone, most of which was discarded clothing. When you started these projects, you just kind of keep adding new projects each year and increase the amount of work that all of you do.
• 3:30
  Speaker B: Yeah, you know, we have a large range of skills, and so we try and have enough projects that when people pick and choose, there's something that would interest pretty much everybody.
• 3:43
  Speaker A: And so your quilt show that you put on every year, how long does it take to set that up?
• 3:48
  Speaker B: Oh, my goodness. There is a lot of work involved in setting up the quilt show. We have some wonderful volunteers from the guild. It wouldn't be possible without them. It just physically setting it up takes two days, and then weeks before that, we have prep work. People turn their entries in. We put them in different categories. We have a judge come and judge the quilts, and then we have to separate them out into other categories of how they're hung. So it takes a lot of pre planning, and then we have two days, and we just do it.
• 4:24
  Speaker A: How many injuries did you have this year?
• 4:26
  Speaker B: 180.
• 4:27
  Speaker A: And is that pretty typical?
• 4:29
  Speaker B: Pretty typical. Usually between 160 and 180. Fort Bragg's a fairly small town. I am always amazed at how many people are so proficient and just make beautiful art quilts. Wow. How did we end up with so many talented quilters?
• 4:46
  Speaker A: You provide classes to quilters as well?
• 4:48
  Speaker B: We do. We do schoolhouse classes, which is within a meeting. And we have four teachers in four corners, and they're quick, little 15 minutes. And you travel around from corner to corner and learn a technique. Basically, we have a lot of knowledge within our guild. We also bring in teachers from out of town to teach a specific technique.
• 5:10
  Speaker A: What kind of equipment does someone need if they wanted to start quilting?
• 5:14
  Speaker B: You would start with a sewing machine. And there are really pretty good quality sewing machines out there now for under $200. And then the other stuff is just really nice. Like a rotary cutter will keep you quilting because you don't have to use the scissors and go try and get straight lines, you just zip with a rotary cutter. It's one of the greatest tools ever invented. It changed quilting.
• 5:40
  Speaker A: Is Ocean Wave part of a larger organization?
• 5:44
  Speaker B: No. Most guilds operate independently. You know, sometimes we help each other out.
• 5:49
  Speaker A: Ocean Wave Quilters gives hundreds of quilts each year. In addition to new baby quilts and comfort quilts for cancer patients. They respond to fire emergencies in other parts of the state and provide quilts to Californians who've lost everything and are staying in shelters. Ocean Wave Quilters just completed their 29th annual show. You can see some of the quilts at the Fort Bragg Annual Quilt Walk, which starts on Memorial Day and continues through July 4th. Quilts are hung at participating merchants throughout Fort Bragg. Or mark your calendar for the last weekend in June next year. Reporting from the Mendocino coast, I'm Michelle Blackwell.