CVQA’s community outreach has a long history of charitable donations. Each year, we donate hundreds of quilts, plus pillowcases, stuffed animals, and wheelchair bags to our local charities. Through our Quilts of Valor program, CVQA presents more than 100 quilts each year to veterans and active-duty service men and women to honor their service for our country. CVQA also donates a spectacular quilt to the Ronald McDonald House annual fund-raising auction. We donate handmade quilts to individuals in our communities who have suffered fires, flooding, tornadoes, illness, and personal tragedy. It is our commitment to help those who are in need.
Below are the outreach committees members can join and information about the programs that our guild partners with annually.
Cumberland Valley Quilters Association
Community Outreach
Community Care Committee
The Community Care Committee provides quilts, pillowcases, and other sewn items to various community organizations. We donate items to nursing homes, child advocacy organizations, local hospitals, domestic violence centers, foster care children, a group home for boys, and a medical facility that provides healthcare and counseling to persons on a sliding scale payment basis.
We have also participated in quilt donations during tragic events such as tornadoes, floods, and fires throughout middle Tennessee.
The committee meets twice a month on Thursdays to make quilt kits, prepare finished quilt tops to be quilted, and make kits for guild members to sew.
Quilts of Valor
The Quilts of Valor (QOV) Committee is sponsored by The Quilting Squares of Franklin and follows the guidelines set by the Quilts of Valor Foundation. Membership in the Quilts of Valor Foundation is optional, but many CVQA members enjoy the opportunity to present the quilts and have access to the QOV patterns. The guild provides the QOV Committee a budget for materials, besides receiving donations from groups and individuals.
The committee averages 100 completed quilts per year and has presented quilts to veterans of virtually every military organization at the request of family and friends. Some members present their quilts to family members; the committee provides a certificate, care instructions, and a pillowcase to transport the quilt home.
Any service member or living veteran who served in one of the military branches is eligible for a QOV quilt. A QOV quilt says, “Thank you for your service and sacrifice from a grateful nation.”
Ronald McDonald House
The mission of Ronald McDonald House Charities of Nashville is to keep families close by providing essential resources (rooms, meals, laundry, support services) and a “home-away-from-home” for families of critically ill children receiving inpatient or outpatient medical care at Nashville area hospitals. The house is full every night and rooms are allocated based on a family’s financial need. On average, only 13% of guests are able to pay 10% of the cost of the room. Therefore, the House relies mostly on fundraising and volunteers to support the daily operation.
The Ronald McDonald House Quilt Committee completes and donates a quilt each year to the Nashville Ronald McDonald House to support its annual fundraising efforts as an auction item or incentive gift. The committee may provide input to the chairperson on a pattern and fabric selection and may help prepare the fabric and instructions for distribution to guild members. Committee members may also participate in construction of the quilt top, quilting and binding.
Thistle Farms Committee
Thistle Farms is a Nashville-based program that provides women survivors with free housing, healthcare, counseling, and job readiness training for two years. The program has a high success rate of enabling the women to re-enter society as productive citizens. This group makes quilts for the women who graduate from the Thistle Farms Program.