October 20, 1999

Group sews love into raffle quilt

Carol South
Herald contributing writer
       With every stitch they took, they sewed in a little love.
      When Bonnie King invited the regular members of her Thursday night quilting group to help her with a special project, the five women immediately agreed. They assembled in the basement workroom of her Garfield Township home last Thursday evening to put the finishing touches on a very special quilt.
      King had almost completed this quilt two years ago but somehow set it aside, where it languished in a box in her closet with little hope of being finished. Then her lifelong friend, Judy Goodrich, asked her for some help. Goodrich is the volunteer coordinator for the Munson Hospice Program and she was looking to continue the tradition of raffling a quilt at the fifth annual Love Light Tree, a memorial celebration for hospice family members held each year in early December.
      "I wanted her to donate a quilt to the Love Light Tree in memory of her father, Bob Round, who died five years ago," said Goodrich, whose father was a lifelong friend of Round's. "I think it was such a special relationship she had with her father that I knew I wanted to call her and ask for a quilt."
      An avid quilter and quilting teacher, King did not have time to churn out a quilt from scratch for Goodrich. Then she thought of her love quilt in the closet, a perfect match for the Love Light Tree.
      "This quilt has been waiting for the right moment to be completed," said King, who has been quilting for 20 years and currently owns Pieces of Heaven, a home-based quilting business. "I did it with my favorite colors and it is kind of a special, a piece of my home."
      King and her friends completed the final stitches on the quilt last Thursday evening and the Love Light Quilt is now ready to shine in someone's home and help the Hospice Program.
      Every year for the past five years, the Hospice program has sponsored a Love Light Tree, which drew 280 people to the celebration last year. The Love Light Tree started when a nurse who worked at Munson, Jane Leidich, wanted a way to honor her mother who had died of cancer in 1995. She suggested this program after hearing of a similar memorial program in Midland.
      This year there will be three trees with ornaments made by volunteers and staff involved in the Hospice program. While not an official fund-raiser for the Hospice, the event is more of a memorial, all funds raised through the raffle and sale of memorial ornaments will benefit patient programs, bereavement support and art therapy.
      "The quilt raffle was started last year when another family approached us with a quilt that the daughter made using her mother's fabrics," said Terry Fogle, a volunteer with Hospice since 1984 and co-coordinator of this year's Love Light Tree. "Quilts hold a lot of meaning to people and the hearts in this year's quilt signify the Hospice."
      The annual lighting of the Love Light Tree is scheduled for December 2 at 7 p.m. at Munson Medical Center Conference Rooms 1, 2 and 3. There will be a memorial ceremony and organizers will read the names in memory of the approximately 200 people who have participated in the Hospice program over the years. Each family member who attends the event will receive an ornament to take home.
      "After the ceremony, we light the three trees outside in memory of loved ones," Fogle said. "The Love Light Tree is so important to family members who have lost a loved one, especially during that time of the year, during the holiday season, it can be a tough time to grieve."
      Raffle tickets for the Love Light Quilt will go on sale on November 15 at the Munson Cafeteria. Anyone interested in purchasing tickets, or for more information on the Love Light Tree celebration can call the Munson Hospice Program at 935-6520 or 1-800-252-2065.