A black felt circular skirt with a pink poodle.

 

In case you have never seen a poodle skirt, this is it.  They were the rage back in the mid 50's.  I never had one, but that did not keep me from wanting one.  I think every girl in school wanted one, so I was not alone in that.  There were only a few of the more elite girls that could afford one and it sure wasn't in my momma's budget. Of course if I had gotten the black felt circular skirt with the pink poodle on the leash, I would have needed the black and white saddle oxfords to go with it.  And a nice sweater!  Sweater would have required a bra and boobs, but I did not have that or those either.

We wore brown or black shoes.  Mostly brown.  They were lace up and tie shoes and the skirt I wore was wool.  Wool was cheap and durable.  Wool had to be hand washed in cold water because if it wasn't it shrank.  Mother was always careful to not let that happen.  Now you should know, there was none of that changing of the clothes every day like goes on around here now.  I wore my brown wool skirt to school on Monday and every other day.  Sometimes I changed blouses in the middle of the week if there happened to be a clean one laying around some where.  When spring arrived we changed to our cotton clothes.  

A side note here on the shoes.  We each got a new pair in the fall and they were our "school shoes."  The fact that they were our only shoes was beside the point.  They were polished every Saturday night so we could look really good on Sunday, when we put on our "Sunday clothes."  We each got a new pair of shoes when school started in the fall and by the time spring came and the ground was no longer covered with snow, we had grown out of them or they had completely fallen apart, and we went barefooted until it was time to buy new shoes the next fall.  Barefeet were more common back when I was growing up.  Try going in some where now without your shoes.

Now it goes without saying here that Josephine was the oldest girl and I was next in line for the hand me downs.  After I was done with an item it was passed down to Donna, Mary and then Dorothy, in that order.  Any time some one showed up on our doorstep with clothes they were getting rid of was a good day.  I always prayed someone would grow out of their poodle skirt but that never seemed to happen.

I seem to recall sometime in my growing up years that stiff, lace petticoats that held the skirts out to make them full were also in style.  Seems like that was high school and I did not have one of those either.  My sister Donna did and I recall it scratching her legs  and making them red. Served her right for being so uppity!

You need to know that Saturday was the day we did "the washing."  That way we had clean clothes for church on Sunday.  We also polished our shoes every Saturday night.  Had to have them looking good for church on Sunday.  We all wore brown shoes and the shoe polish was in a bottle with a dauber that we smeared the brown liquid on the leather and let it dry.  Then we buffed them until they shined.  We were each responsible for the care of our shoes and making sure our clothes were laid out for the next day.  We wore the same clothes to school 5 days a week.  We did change into "play clothes" when we got home.

But, back to the poodle skirts.  In my mind, if I could just have a poodle skirt and a nice sweater and black and white oxfords  and bobby socks on my feet, I could have ruled the world.  There were probably only 3 girls in the whole school who actually wore those things and the fad did not last long.  Seems I was not the only girl in the world who did not have those items in my wardrobe and I did survive.

Now years later, after I have raised my kids the best I could, I know what my mother went through.  Poverty was a palpable part of our lives.  Hand me downs were a way of life.  Staring through the window of the Corrington Mercantile at the fabrics and dresses and dishes just made me sadder.  It made me want more.  My mother patched our clothes with a needle and thread.  Today we live in a disposable society.  

And who is the winner?  Believe it or not, I think it is me! I have money to buy whatever I want, but I still put little  pieces of fabric together, but now I call them a quilt!

Sneak peek into my bedroom!!

Well, yesterday Jenea and Justin came an laid the new floor in my bedroom!  Let me tell you how this came about.  3 or four years ago I babysat for their baby, Jayvan, and it was on the trade basis.  Usually when I do something like that it is a forgotten favor, but not with these people.  They are friends and friends do not shaft friends.  So a couple months back I ripped the carpet out in anticipation of replacing it with veneer.  My car had other ideas.  First it wanted new brakes, cvc joints and other stuff and then really got pissy about wanting a new transmission!  $3,000.00 later it became clear that the flooring would need to go on the back burner.  Ah, but then I found some money!

And Jenea and Justin came yesterday with saws, hammers, tape measures and a bundle of energy.  Five hours later, they plopped the bed in the middle of the room, cleaned up their mess and away they went.  I am one happy woman today!  I still need rugs, bedspread, the big dresser  and then I can bring Kenny out of the closet and my life will be back to normal.  Both dogs slept in their beds last night.  I think they like this better than the dusty old carpet.

Now I took both of the pictures above from the same spot and a few seconds apart.  For the record, the one on the left with the lavender walls is the accurate one.  I do not know how I got rosy pink in the second one, but there you have it.

Off to church this morning and when I come home I will stop at Lowes and pick up the trim work.  I know where the miter box and saw are, so should be able to make short work of that!  Think I will whip out a blue fleece bed cover.  Going to save my patchwork quilt for winter.

A big old thank you to my friends for helping me accomplish another of my goals.  Ah, yes!  Life is good!

Eleanor Burns slide show

The slide show for Eleanor Burns is located at the top left of what ever page you are reading.  Please do not ask me how I did that and I bet I could not do it again, but that is where you will find it.  And I bet when I post a new slide show Eleanor will be history.

Eleanor Burns and the Quilters Retreat here in our fair city!

 I am hoping to get a slide show up and running here, but I am not having much luck right now.  So here is the deal, Bret works for Sprinkles Sewing Center.  And so does his girlfriend, Amanda.  It is just one big happy family over there as near as I can tell.  Now Sprinkles is a very successful business and Jerry and Kathy know how to make it pay.  They put the customer first, which is always a good thing.  They have a beautiful store on Eagleridge on the North side of town.  They recently opened a store in Canon City.  Along with the machines they offer personal service and lots of classes.  I have attended the classes and they are great.  Always knowledgeable staff.

   So now they decided to put on a 3 day extravaganza and call it the "Eleanor Burns Quilt Retreat."  Three full days of Eleanor Burns and quilt classes up the wazoo.  An event like this does not throw itself together without a lot of planning.  First arrangements had to be made for the Convention Center.  And that costs a pretty penny to lease that thing for 4 days.  The Convention Center is one of Pueblo's jewels.  In the slide show you will see several shots of the wall of heroes and the statues out front.  Pueblo is the "Home of Heroes" because it has four Congressional Medal of Honor recipients in  its population. http://www.pueblomohfoundation.com/

   Back to the event.  Eleanor Burns has/had a quilting show on PBS for many years and I used to tape her shows back when I had a VCR.  She would pop in every Tuesday afternoon  at 2:00 and teach me how to make a quilt.  She made it look so easy.  And I did actually make a quilt or two from the show.  Wonderful teacher. But I did not sign up for this event because I am just not that into quilting anymore.  I weave now.  But since the kids were on me about just stopping in I thought I might as well.  They have a mini store set up there on the floor and quite a reduction in price on lots of notions, so I thought, why not.

   Well, I must say I was most impressed.  First with Bret and Amanda and the professional manner in which they conducted themselves.  See, I am used to the slobs that live here, not the well mannered, helpful couple I encountered at the event.  There were people everywhere and I took the opportunity to check out the classrooms.  Seems there were three of them.  I did not take time to count the machines, but there must have been 100 machines in those 3 rooms.  And there was some learning going on.  When Amanda asked if I would like to meet Eleanor Burns I jumped all over that!  And I must say, she was as lovely in real life as when I watched her on television.  First thing I told Amanda to take our picture and Eleanor decided to share her pink boa with me.  I just thought that was right neighbourly of her!

   Of course when I told her I was Bret's mom she was most impressed and had to tell me how much she liked him and what a fine boy he was.  And how handsome.  And how much she liked Amanda and "oh, they are a couple!  How nice."

   Well, by then I had pretty well shot my wad so I wandered on outside.  What had started off as a fairly normal day had sure turned into a bright spot for me. Little story I can share with my grand kids.  Like they will have any idea who Eleanor Burns is.  Maybe I will dig out my VCR tapes.  Can I play those on a DVD player?

   Any way, I met a lovely lady today and shared her boa.  Had lunch with my friend, Tim.  Visited briefly with my friend Andy.  Pulled a few weeds.  Watched the geese swim in the new stock tank and made a batch of soap. Touched bases with my friend back East.  And now I am ready for bed.  Kind of makes me think I might have happy dreams tonight.

  

Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt #6; Final entry.

It is a shame that my camera has decided to give me only blurry pictures.  When I get my new camera I will replace this blurry little thing!  But for now, I just want to get this finished and be done with it, and move on to other things.

This panel will start in the upper right hand corner with

Mike Darrell

7/22/57-6/26/2006

Mike was a very good friend to both myself and my husband.  He came here from Houston, Texas with a friend.  He was a handyman of sorts and a mechanic extraordinare.  He loved his motorcycle and rode it wherever he went if there was not a hurricane gale blowing.  He could fix the car or the diesel truck.  What ever needed done.  He was also an artist and a musician.  I do not know how many flutes ( and I call them that for want of a better word ) he had.  I think they were Irish pipes and that boy loved Irish music.  His head was full of  music!  He and his friend started going to my church, but soon found it was not the proper match and went across town to the Christ Chapel.  He was very active over there and fit like a glove. 

I miss Mike very much.

The blue on on the bottom left belongs to
James Smith
1957-3/29/2005
James was a good friend to my friend, Robert.  Robert helped make this panel and he knew James loved Christmas.

The one on the right belongs to
Gilbert Finn
4/18/59-1/6/07
This was Robert's very best friend.  They were together constantly and Robert is pretty much lost without Gilbert.  He also loved Christmas. Robert put a lot of thought and love into both of these panels.
Now last, but definitely not least, we come to my friend
Mark Belarde
3/28/67-12/29/06
This picture shows Mark and me on Santa Claus's lap at the AIDS Christmas party in 2002.  I am not sure that this was the real Santa. I first met Mark in 1992 (I think). He was riding a bike, walking and very active.  He was the proud possessor of 75 T Cells.  Shortly there after his mother passed from a massive heart attack.  I told Mark that I would do what I could to take her place in his life.  I made that my mission.
I registered as his Personal Care Provider through Argus Home Health. Thus began my career in the AIDS Health care Services, but that is a whole 'nuther story!

I started out working with him 6 hours a week, just doing laundry and household chores that he needed help with.  Mark had a very strong constitution, but unfortunately the meds never worked for him.  As years passed slowly by his immune system weakened and his T cells fell. the last 3 years of his life they hovered around the 2 mark.  At one time they were zilch.  I graduated to more hours and was finally doing 48 hours a week and a family member spent nights with him.

I will not bore you with details of our 15 year's together, suffice it to say, I became very attached to Mark and his family.  I became the mother he had lost and he became the son who needed me.  Through trips to the emergency room and  picnics in the mountains, long walks and dirty laundry, physical therapy and shopping trips, eating out and eating in, we formed a bond that can never be broken. 

I finally came to the realization that I could no longer take care of Mark.  I knew I could not do it and he could not do it.  It was time to let go.  The hardest part of life always seems to be the letting go part.  We can do until we are at the point where no more can be done and we realize it must be done.

So it is fitting that
Mark Belarde
be my final entry in this journey to completion of the Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt.

With a heavy heart I bid a fond farewell to all my friends who have gone before and will keep the flicker of hope alive that some where, some how I can live long enough to see a cure and a vaccine for this dreadful disease.  Until that day, I will continue to work with AIDS clients. I will add panels to my quilt and display it when called upon to do so.  I will pray ceaselessly and support the cause in whatever way I can.  Will you join me?


 

Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt #5

Well, this picture is pretty blurry, but it will just have to do until I can get another camera.  We only have this installment and then one more and we will be done with the Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt. 

In the upper left corner we have

Robert Coghill

8/21/1954-7/19/2003

As I recall Robert served in the USMC.

Martha "Marty"Rayble

8/22/1953-4/9/2005

Marty was a very good friend of mine and spent a lot of time at my house.  The coins you see on the panel are AA tokens representing 13 years of sobriety.  Each one says "To thine own self be true."  Marty was good at that! She came one day to my house and we were in the front yard.  The neighbors had an old red turkey that ranged free.  This old tom turkey decided he wanted to set on Marty's lap!  We laughed so hard that day!  But that was Marty! Rather then being afraid or offended she could find humor in most situations!  

 Her biggest mistake in her life was being a good wife.  Like so many women I meet, and men too for that matter, love is a killer.   

At the bottom on the red panel we have

 Dennis Klovstad.

3/10/1956-7/17/2003

I do not know how tall Dennis was but I am sure it was about 6'5".  When I would turn around and find myself eye level with a belt buckle I knew Dennis had arrived!  He was a pretty solitary soul and kept to himself, but if I worked it just right, I could get a smile out of him.  This part is very sad; one year he came in and handed me a small envelope right before Christmas.  I opened it and inside found a note card with a teddy bear.  Dennis had written; "Thank you for being my friend" and enclosed a $1.00 bill!  He did not have much, but he would share what he had.  That card made my Christmas that year!  I still have that card and someday when  I am no longer alive, someone will find that card and I sincerely hope it brings a tear to their eye also.

                                            

Here, among the dancing Indians, we find my friend  Shirley .

Shirley Rezendes

7/9/1983-3/?/2002

Shirley loved Indians and may actually have been part Indian.  Another case of a woman loving a man.

Brent Hanna

7/31/1968-8/7/2003

Brent was a southern gentleman in the truest sense of the words.  Very genteel and very easy to talk to.  Miss that boy a lot!

John

2004

Sometimes this is all I allowed to put on a pane, but when I see it, I remember and so does his mother.

P M

2004

Another one.  This belongs to a teacher and the first thing he had to teach me was how to pronounce his first name.  First we had to spell it so I could visualize how to pronounce it.  Whole process took almost 15 minutes and I will say this, I remember to this day and will probably never forget!  A wonderful man who loved a wonderful woman.

There you have this one!  This has stirred up a lot of memories, but they are mostly good.  Of course part of all memories is sad, but the good is there also.  So I bid this batch of my friends a good night and a fond farewell.  It was a very trying year.

AIDS Quilt #4

I hope I have all the ones on here.  This is one of the first quilts I made. I think it may actually be #2 because there are 2 panels on this one that measure 1' x 3' which tells me we were still in the planning and finalization stages. Shortly thereafter we (I) decided that for this to work they all had to be the same size.  Since the panels on the big quilt are 3' x 6',  which is the size of a grave in the cemetery, we should make these scale to 1/3.  So that works out well.

Steven Stiles

2/9/1956-1/23/1996

This is the white block up in the upper left corner.  It was made by his mother with much love. There is a family portrait and a picture of Steven with his cat. He loved Christmas so there is a beaded tree. His mother did a beautiful job on this.

Steven Kirk

6/9/1956

This is the large black and gold one on the left. He loved the theater and had a star named after him, "Aquila".  I made this at his mother's direction. She has since passed and I miss our little talks.

Gilbert Fields

1985

This was my very, very dear friend Gibby. He used to help me play Santa when I had no one but the kids. Granted, we did have a few drinks in the process, and almost cut our fingers off on a tin doll house once, but we had a great time and if I needed a brother, Gibby was there. He cooked and I waitressed at a place in Hutch called The Red Rooster.

 He moved out to California in 1984.  If you will notice, he passed early in the epidemic. He called us quite regularly until he got sick and nothing could be done. Then his friend kept in touch.  Then there was nothing. Gibby had died and his family chose not to tell anyone so we do not know the exact date of his death nor where he was (or if) he was buried. I do know this little laughing fellow had a very big part of who and where I am today and I send a big hug and kiss up to heaven where my friend Gibby is teaching the angels how to cook and my mother is giving him hell!

Gene Howery

8/18/1945-8/14/1995

This is the lower right with the howling coyote.  Another friend with no family to make a panel. We all went to Denver to the Gay Pride Parade in 1994, I believe.  The kids marched and we watched and waved. Gene and his partner walked with there dogs. Such a common ordinary thing to do in a world that was chaotic at the time.

Robert Tyree

4/25/1961-1/10/1991

This belongs to the son of the lady who started Southern Colorado AIDS Project field office in Pueblo, and I can not right now remember what year.  Shirley made this panel herself. It says Loved, Gone, Never Forgot. It also shows him setting by the Golden Gate Bridge. Another healing work of love by a mother left behind. They are together now.

Robert Martinez

4/26/1964-6/5/1991

Another one earlier in the epidemic. I did not know Robert, but I do know he loved music and sunsets. There is a picture of his that shows a beautiful sunset on this panel.

Ronnie Reagan

8/10/1956-2/18/1995

I made this for a friend of Ronnie's. It says "Sleep in peace, my little friend. Terry Atencio". Terry was a man in this town who took in anyone who needed a place to stay, sobered them up and sent them into the world a much better person.  He is also sadly missed, but has no panel as he does not belong on this quilt.

And that is it for this quilt.  You should know that all these panels are here because I first received permission from a family member to make them and add them. Since this is a public display that is shown several times a year there is no breach of confidentiality. I would never do that. When I started in this particular field I signed an affidavit that I would keep confidentiality and that is what I do.

I know sometimes I get a little long winded on these posts, especially when I am dealing with things that rip my heart out, like this series on the AIDS Memorial, but I just ask that you either bear with me, or click off and leave me here to weep alone.

Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt #3

This is the third panel that I am highlighting in this series.  Just noticed on this that 2 of our guys passed on the same day.  Probably a lot more about these panels then I noticed at the time.  Taking care of them has been a definite labor of love and I shall miss them when someone else takes over the job.

In the upper left is my friend
Wally Miller
3/15/1965-7/23/2001.
I knew Wally for 3 years before I discovered how well we were connected. I was giving him a ride home and we started talking about the University and when he attended. I told him my son attended during the same time. Who was my son? When I told him it was Sam, he said, "Oh, my God! Sam was my best friend!"  That friendship was soon revived. Wally was such a dear!

  Elsie
6/26/30-/12/03.
I did not know Elsie very well.  Only that she was our oldest client and she loved to cook as well as eat. Her husband was a lot younger than her, but took very good care of her until she passed.

Myron
12/19/72-12/21/03
I did not know Myron well, just that he liked to hunt and especially loved the Colorado Rocky Mountains.

Paul
2/22/62-4/26/03
Paul was a dear and a very lost little soul.  He had the saddest brown eyes in the whole world most of the time, but when he found something amusing they would light up the whole room. He fought alcholism his whole life and lost.

Felix
9/30/66-10-19-2000
I never met Felix, but made this panel and gave him my Mickey and Minnie Mouse because I knew he would want them just by the way he was described to me.  He loved roses and had many of them at his home.

Jenny
8/22/71-9/6/01
This panel was made by her mom and 2 young sons. It is a work of love and it shows.  Her sons are big boys now, but still reflect the gentle nature of their mother.

Dennis
2/8/54-1/19/01
Dennis loved flowers, finer things in life, his home and most of all his dogs.  He is sorely missed by friends and family and the dogs.

Dennis
8/21/50-7/23/01
Here is a guy who knew what good was!  Dennis loved Kentucky Fried Chicken and I think Colonel Sanders was his hero! He also like bright, flamboyant things, to include flowers.

And there you have this installment.  Will try not to let so much time expire next time.  This represents another 8 lives cut short to the disease we pay so little attention to nowadays. I had a guy explain to me the other day that AIDS is now a thing of the past and that there is a cure.  I told him he might want to check that one out a little closer!

Pueblo Aids Memorial Quilt Panel #1.

This is the first group of panels that were assembled for our quilt.  The blue one on the top left is for Craig.  Craig was a friend of mine. He loved Charlie Chaplin and if you look closely you will see Charlie on his panel. You will also see his little dog. He was born 6/6/60 and passed 3/12/94.

Below Craig is Shawn. Shawn was born 8/26/66 and passed 7/31/97. I did not know him very well, although I made this panel for him. He loved to cook and he loved the great outdoors and his panel reflects that.

The yellow one with the red heart belongs to David. He was born 8/25/47 and passed 8/23/89. This block was made by his sister. His sister has worked tirelessly to keep AIDS in the fore front of our minds and to always be sure there is an observance of World AIDS Day every year on December 1.

The one on the right with the eagle is for Randy.  He was a very good friend of my nephew.  He was born 5/15/63 and passed 10/1/91, which just happened to be my birthday.  He was in the Marine Corps. Seems ironic in the world before "Don't ask, don't tell" that one who held "Semper Fi" in highest esteem should die of AIDS.

Down below on the left is Frank.  He was born 6/12/62 and passed 11/13/95.  I did not know Frank, but I helped his brother make this panel.

The panel with the dove is for Steven. He was born 4/12/52 and passed 4/5/95.  I received a frantic call after there had been an article in the paper about the quilt from Steven's Aunt.  Would I please make a memorial for her nephew.  It says on the panel that he is missed by his sisters and mourned deeply by Aunt Kathy.  That is all I know about him.

The rainbow music panel belongs to Danny.  It was mde by his mother.  Below is a picture of the big panel that is in the big quilt in San Francisco.  A labor of love. He was born 5/26/60 and passed 10/12/93

The green one is for Father James.  He was born 5/6/37 and passed 10/25/89

So you see, there are young and old, gay and straight. There are brothers, fathers, nephews. The face of AIDS takes many different form, but one death is not diminished by a thousand deaths.  Each one is unique in it's own way and by the people who are left to mourn.  Please look on this post as an act of love  and watch for the next one.

Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt; Inception and Evolution.

I now know the year!  In 1996 I had given a class on building a panel for the big quilt in San Francisco.  Someone wanted to know why there was no memorial of any kind for people who had died from AIDS in this area; why it was all so far away.  So a few of us got to kicking it around. I don't remember who all was there and if I did I could not tell you anyway as that is a matter of privacy. (Did I say that out loud!)

AIDS was at that time a very misunderstood disease. We have come a long ways, but it is still misunderstood.  It is a different kind of misunderstanding now though.  People actually  think there is a cure for AIDS.  Nothing could be further from the truth. It is no longer a Gay Disease and knows no class distinction or color line. People are now living far longer, thanks to the "cocktails". But they are now dying from aging factors. The medications are so strong and the body is so toxic from them that bodies are aging very quickly. PWA's (People  With Aids) never did die from AIDS. They died from opportunistic infections contracted through a compromised immune system.

I digress! I am not here to give you a history of the disease, I am here to tell you why we have this memorial.  We thought about doing copper leaves on a brass tree. That was cost prohibitive. All kinds of ideas were kicked around and nothing fit just right. Then I had the brilliant idea, "Why improve on perfection! Duplicate the Big Quilt only do it little." That was the perfect fit! The quilt is displayed several times a year.  Always on December 1, which is World AIDS Day  and then a couple more times. 

The blocks are 12 inches by 24 inches. The big blocks are 3 feet by 6 feet. That is the size of a grave. Our blocks are miniatures of the big blocks but they are no less reverent. Each block is stitched with love and memories and represents some one that was loved by someone. Not all the blocks have names. One says just Mark. Some give the full name, birth and death and a detailed picture of that persons life.  The most moving block.... 

I think I will save that for later.  I will get my first post up on Wednesday. It will be the first section we  finished.  I have got to be honest with you on this point, I am not sure I will be able to do more than 2 posts a month on this quilt. My heart and soul is in every block that is on this quilt. Some of these people were people I was very close to at one time or another.  Some were children of friends, some were husbands, some lovers of friends. This will be very draining on me, but I fill back up rather quickly when I am doing something that I am as passionate about as this project.  See you on Wednesday!

Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt

Ok, I been promising this for quite some time, so it is time for it to actually come to fruition!  I am going to do the history of the Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt, but first I have homework for you!  I need you to familiarize yourselves with the original AIDS Quilt.  Here is your link: AIDS Quilt   Just click on that and away you will go.  I set it up that way!  This will give you all kinds of resources so when I actually start writing about our quilt, you will not feel that you are in Never, Never  Land.

By reading on this site you will be able to see the correlation, between the big quilt that lives in California and our quilt which lives in my basement! The big quilt is not displayed all together any more, because there is no place that can hold the complete work.  It is rather displayed in panels as they are requested, ie. if it is in Texas they will send mostly Texas panels, but you can request  a panel and that one will be sent.  It is definitely a work of love.  So, go do your homework and I will probably get my first installment posted Sunday or Monday.

Have a great weekend!!

The church now has a piano!!

 
The pipe organ that Randy plays every Sunday is really nice, but a piano is an added touch. For now I think Randy will be going across town and playing the organ at Christ Congregational which gives them an added touch also. Ah, if Nancy and Howard could see us now! Howard was the organist before Randy and he passed away with Cancer. Nancy was the pianist and she passed suddenly shortly after Howard. Needless to say the church was devastated. I bet they are up there looking down on us and getting a good chuckle out of this.

We are getting a new minister who will take the pulpit May 1. This is how that works; our church meets at 9:30 and she will hold our service and then jump in her car and drive to Belmont to preside over their service which starts at 11:00. Then in July we switch our meeting times, I think. It works for us and is called a shared ministry. If you are near our area I would love to have you pop in for church service. We are located at 228 West Evans. We will have coffee after and be prepared to buy tickets for the quilt raffle. We need to raise over $2,000.00 and we are doing in $1.00 at a time!

This is Randy Tryon, Organist at First Congregational United Church of Christ....

Here is Randy having a cookie.  Like every red blooded American male, he likes cookies. Randy is one in a million.  When he is not doing his job which is being a nurse, he is playing the organ at our churdh.  If that is not enough, when he is through playing for our church which meets at 9 AM at 228 West Evans here in Pueblo, Colorado, he jumps in his car and races across town to our sister church , Christ Congregational  which meets at 11:00 AM.

I do not know Randy very well, but I do know he has a lovely wife to whom he is devoted and at least one son and a daughter in law who plays the flute.  Also they have a baby who is a grand child to Randy. I am sure it is either a boy or a girl, but that is all I know.

This dark forboding picture is of the piano that Randy wants to replace.  I have never played anything in my life except the radio, so what I know about musical instruments you could put on the head of a pin.  But Randy says this archaic monster has got to go, so go it shall.  I do know it looks kind of cold and not very friendly. The piano at Christ Church is very black and very pretty.  Soon, I hope we will have one like that!

So, for the time being, we will be gearing up to raise money and the first quilt is laying on the table in Mayflower Hall and I bought the first 5 tickets, so I know there is $5.00 in the fund.  Wish us luck and I shall hopefully keep you up to date from time to time!

The first quilt we will raffle to buy the piano for the church!

This is definitely a scrap quilt!  When I am working in the sewing room I throw all the scraps of mateial in a box.  Then Linda came and got the box and took it to her sister, Elizabeth Griffith who very patiently sewed them together to make this quilt.

This is what the whole thing looks like.  The above picture is just a corner.  The four blocks in the center are parts of a nativity scene that did not measure up for quality so they went in the box.  I did tell you that Randy wants a new piano at our church , didn't I? Randy Tyron plays the pipe organ at my church, First Congregational Church, UCC here in Pueblo.  The piano we have is very old and not in very good shape,  so he thinks we should have a new one.  He is probably right!

Anyway, our church does not have a lot of money, so we thought if we could make a bunch of quilts and raffle them off, that would be a good way to raise needed funds.  So this is the first one. We figure we should raise at least a $100.00 on each quilt so we will sell tickets afte church every Sunday until we have sold 100 tickets then we will have a drawing.  Sounds good to me. I can see I better get busy working on the next quilt!

I plan on doing a little blog on Randy and his pipe organ, but this computer is very slow at loading pictures, so it will need to wait a day or two.  For now, we are starting our project and I will keep you posted on how it is progressing.  In the meantime, if you would like to pop in to our church and buy a ticket, we are located at 228 West Evans, Pueblo, Colorado  81004. Church starts every Sunday promptly at 9:30 and we always have coffee after.  Maybe I will  see you there!!