How You Can Help the Homeless
(Published in Family Circle 11/21/95)
Flo Wheatley got her quilting group going with family members, and her idea spread across
the country. Here’s how you can start your own Ugly Quilt group:
Put an announcement in your church newsletter or free community paper that you are starting a project to make sleeping bags for the homeless and inviting interested people to call you.
Call local manufacturers and ask for donations of sewing supplies and blankets. Tell friends and family to gather up worn-out clothes, men’s neckties, unwanted fabric and used socks, hats and gloves.
Arrange to meet in a (free) community center or church (preferably one with a table about 8 feet long) or at someone’s home. Bring a good pair of scissors.
Distribute your completed Ugly Quilts with the help of local social workers and homeless shelters. But before you give away your bag, show it off at your church to recruit new volunteers.
For instructions on how to make Ugly Quilts, send a self-addressed, stamped business-size envelope to: My Brothers' Keeper Quilt Group, c/o Wheatley, Strawberry Hill Farm, RR 1 Box 1049, Hop Bottom, PA18824. [or click here]
Can’t start your own group? You can still help: Sew a flat 7 x 7-foot square from
scrap material and send it to Flo Wheatley at the address above. The quilts can be
completed by an existing quilting group in her area.
History behind Ugly Quilts and My Brothers' Keeper
Instructions on how to make an ugly quilt
Where do the sleeping bags go?
Pictures of an ugly quilt
What people are saying and How to reach My Brothers' Keeper
Links to other charity sites