Submitted by Karen B. Alexander
The members of Enchanted Quilters of Lopez Island have been making raffle quilts to raise funds for Senior Services, now located at historic Woodmen Hall, for 34 years. The group makes two colorful quilts every other year. This year’s quilts are “Spinning Dance,” created predominantly in the red, orange, gold range of the color wheel, and “My Lopez Home,” a delightful scrap quilt depicting representational forms of iconic Lopez images and homes. It is pretty rare to find pictorial quilts about Lopez, so this is a very special quilt.
Don’t wait too long to buy your ticket since there is a limit of 300 being sold for each quilt!
Either quilt will fit a queen-size bed and any decor! You will find EQ members selling tickets at the Farmers’ Market and the grocery store each weekend all summer until tickets are sold out.
Lopez Island has a long history of quilting. It probably began with Amelia Davis, the first European-American female settler who arrived on the island between 1869-1870. We do know Davis mentioned quilting in her diaries.
As the popularity of quilting spread in America following the 1876 centennial, many different ethnic immigrants across the country were swept up in the resurgent interest in quilt-making and deep quilting roots were formed on Lopez. According to the late Mary McLeod Harris of Lopez, one particular group of women from the south end of Lopez called themselves the “Richardson guild” or the “Richardson sewing group” depending upon whom you talk to.
Quilters on Lopez Island who loved plying a needle got an extra boost of inspiration with the opening of The Enchanted Needle needlework shop in October of 1976 following the American bicentennial. By 1981 raffle quilts began to emerge on Lopez from all the flying needles. In 1984 a small group of dedicated Lopez quilters successfully raised $2,000 with their first raffle quilt for Seniors Services. Please help us break that record this year! Remember, only 300 tickets will be sold for each quilt. Those are excellent odds for a quilt raffle.
Buy your lucky ticket at the Saturday Farmer’s Market or the grocery store throughout the summer. Tickets are $5 each, three for $10, or six for $20.
Drawing is Sept. 11, 2018. One need not be present to win. EQ will ship the quilt to you!
Questions? Contact us at our blog, enchantedquiltersoflopezisland.blogspot.com.
