Quilters help local vet's club
Photos by Nick Ianniello A quilt was made for the American Legion Ray Welch Post 13 to auction off as a fundraiser by quilter Sherrill Christensen and three of her friends from the Cabin Fever Quilt Guild.
Four Mineral County women have used their skills with a needle and thread to help out a local veteran’s organization.
Kathy Oswald, Emily Ornelas, Yolanda Ornelas, and Sherrill Christensen made a quilt for the American Legion Ray Welch Post 13 to raffle off as a fundraiser.
Post Adjutant Ellen Matz said the quilt was presented to the post at their monthly meeting April 14 at the American Legion Ray Welch Post 13 hall in St. Regis by Emily Ornelas’ husband Ernie.
“I think it’s an incredible testament to the veterans who died for our country,” Matz said.
The quilt, which has an American flag design on one side and a patriotic pattern on the other, is dedicated to Christensen’s twin brother, Capt. Derrill L. Burnside. Christensen said Burnside, 31, was killed in Vietnam in 1972.
“Ernie said, ‘Do you want to dedicate this quilt to anybody?’ and I said I’d like to dedicate it to my brother and all of those that were in the Vietnam War and all of those that are in the armed forces,” Christensen said.
Emily Ornelas said the quilt was Christensen’s brainchild, and that she got the four ladies together to work on it.
They are all members of the Cabin Fever Quilt Guild in Cabin City. Christensen said she is one of the founding members.
Each year, the guild makes a raffle quilt to raise money for a local organization. This year, the guild chose to make a quilt for the Pioneer Council. Christensen said the American Legion submitted, but was not selected. She said that since she was such close friends with the Ornelas family, she decided it would be nice to make a quilt for the American Legion on her own time.
“It was just kind of nice to do him up a quilt and the girls got in on it and we just all did it together,” Christensen said.
The six-month project began with an American flag pattern that Christensen found in a quilting book. She and Ornelas began cutting fabric that was donated by Ada Mesenbrink with the Happy Homemakers in DeBorgia to fit the pattern on one side of the quilt while Christensen found a pattern for the other side.
Christensen said that from there the project just became a fun way for them to spend Friday afternoons.
“I would get a chance to do some fancy cooking and we’d all get together and work on the quilt,” Christensen said. “It’s more fun to do it together than do it alone.”
Ornelas said that with four people working on four separate machines, the project went by pretty smoothly.
“One person doing a big quilt like that takes quite awhile if you’re doing everything yourself, but with four people working together, it goes much faster,” Ornelas said.
Christensen said the final binding work on the quilt was done by Yolanda Ornelas, Ernie’s mother, by hand.
Despite all of the work the women put into the quilt, Christensen remains humble about her part in the project.
“It’s nothing that a hundred other women in this valley couldn’t do because of the quilting community in this area,” Christensen said.
The American Legion Ray Welch Post 13 helps fund youth shooting sports in Mineral County, does honor guards for funerals, helps celebrate veteran’s holidays, and sponsors Boy’s and Girl’s Days.
Matz said American Legion Ray Welch Post 13 has been around since the mid 1940s. She said they have 43 members who have served in World War II, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, and the First Gulf War.
According to John Cochran, a member of Post 13 for 30 years, the post was named after Ray Welch, a member of the post who died in the Korean War in 1949.
Matz said Welch’s son, Kermit Welch, lives in Toledo, Wash., and has been a member of the post for 29 years.
Matz said the post is extremely grateful for the quilt and the money that it is going to raise for them.
“The American Legion doesn’t have that many ways to raise money,” Ornelas said.
Matz said tickets will be sold at the Flea Market in St. Regis on Memorial Day, Flag Day, at the county fair and any other events the post participates.
For more information, call Matz at 678-2078 or e-mail her at ecmatz@blackfoot.net.