Donations are the lifeblood of Quilts for a Cause, a special interest group within Rip ‘N’ Sew. The sub-group makes lap-sized quilts for first responders, hospices, veterans groups and more to distribute.

Sometimes, though, donations can be problems.

Terese Farrar, co-leader of Quilts for a Cause, had to decide what to do with a donated Sunbonnet Sue quilt, half of which is bleached and rotted from constant sun exposure.

“We don’t throw them away. We modify them,” Farrar said. “We often cut fabric and quilt donations down to a size we can deal with.”

Strip quilts, half-triangle squares, 5-inch squares, nine-patch and disappearing nine-patch quilt patterns all come from how donations are cut.

Sherry Doyle, a member of Sun City West’s Quilts for a Cause, had a different donation headache, despite a lot of experience working with others’ unfinished quilting projects.

“My great aunt Bee put together quilt squares that my mother inherited and then I inherited,” she said.

Making sense of the aunt’s squares and trying to put the right ones together into quilts taught Doyle about working with others’ quilt pieces.

“Someone came in (to Rip ‘N’ Sew) with a bag of material and quilt squares she hadn’t finished,” Doyle said. “She had even cut out some of the squares. And she had the instructions.”

But the instructions were difficult to follow, even for Doyle.

“It made me want to pull my hair out,” she said, but it also gave her insight into why the original quilter might have given up.

There were other issues, too.

“The triangles were cut too small. I had to do some finagling to make them work,” Doyle said. And the original quilter’s seam allowances weren’t a standard quarter-inch.

Finally, Doyle finished the quilt top.

The original was intended to be a bed-sized quilt. But Doyle had so much leftover fabric that she made a second lap quilt by adding less than a half-yard of new fabric.                                                                                                                                                     Visit ripsew.scwclubs.com/about-location for more information.