August 22, 2001

Quilt receives national attention

Traverse Bay Community School quilt featured in magazine

By LISA PERKINS
Herald staff writer
       When Melissa Smith suggested to her class that they make a quilt during "intensive week" at Traverse Bay Community School last March, she never thought that they would receive national attention for their efforts.
      That's just what happened, however, when a photo of the students and their quilt appeared in the Better Homes and Gardens "American Patchwork and Quilting" October issue which is currently on news stands.
      Smith's class of third, fourth and fifth-graders had no experience as quilters or seamstresses, but with the help and guidance of their teacher, they chose a pattern, selected fabric, cut all the required pieces and sewed together the squares that would eventually form the traditional Amish design of their quilt- all in five days.
      "This is just what our intensive week is supposed to be," said Smith about their week-long project. "They were totally emersed in the project, from the geometry and mathematics of laying out the pattern to learning to thread and run a sewing machine."
      Each of the ten students were responsible for making a square in a particular color. Some students made more than one to complete the design requirements.
      "It was fun and hard," said 10-year-old Tyler Sylvester. "The hardest part was the cutting, my hands got sore from doing all that cutting."
      The batting, or fiber lining for the quilt came from yet another school project. Students in the fiber art class collected wool from the school's resident sheep, Jacob, determined how much wool would be required to make a queen-size bat and sent the wool to Frankenmuth to be milled.
      "The students had to use math to figure how much wool would be needed, the size and weight of the finished product and the cost of shipping it," Smith noted.
      Once all of the components were completed, a classroom parent, Laura Bremer, took on the task of sewing all the squares together, adding a border and attaching the quilt top to the bat and backing to form the queen-size quilt.
      When Bremer saw the finished product she suggested Smith send a photo of the students with their quilt to American Patchwork and Quilting magazine.
      "I never thought they would use it," Smith said. "They must get hundreds of pictures. I am so pleased that they chose to use ours."
      Students in Smith's class are pleased to see their handiwork in the national publication.
      "I think it's pretty cool," said 10-year-old Reece Karbowski, "mostly for the school, rather than for me."
      Raffle tickets for the quilt will go on sale at Traverse Bay Community School in September. For more information, call 947-7474.