The Read Me a Quilt Program

The Los Angeles Family Court system includes an organization called Court-Appointed Special Advocates (CASA), volunteer adults who look after the interests of children, in the court system, who have been removed from their families because of abuse or neglect. Julie started the Read Me a Quilt program, a program within the South Bay Quilt Guild, to give those children a child-size quilt and an associated book. Volunteers in the Guild make a quilt and donate a book; the book and quilt's theme are the related. The quilts are organized and sent to Julie's contact in the court system, and finally distributed to the children by CASA volunteers.

Julie started the program in 2004. She usually collects 6-12 quilts per month; sometime quite a few more. Julie has made a number of the quilts, herself. Before Parkinson's Disease took over her life, she collected the quilts, organized and tagged them, and put each into a fabric bag with its book; now, much of this work is done by Guild volunteers. We estimate that almost 2000 quilts have been collected and given to children, as of late 2019, since the beginning of the program.

Notes on the Pictures:

  1. A Quilt and a related book.
  2. One month's donations. It was a relatively good month!
  3. Julie sews a label onto each quilt.
  4. Quilts ready for pickup. As well as the quilt, there is a book in each bag.
  5. Blocks and monkeys!
  6. Car quilt.
  7. Puzzle pieces.
  8. Two Dr. Seuss quilts. (Bet you can't guess what type of book went with these!)