Quilters can make a difference.
I watched with interest this week's installment of an online broadcast of "The Quilt Show", featuring Ami Simms.
http://www.thequiltshow.com/os/shows.php
Ami's mother died of Alzheimers, and for her, quilting is coping. For the past five years, she has used quilting as a way to promote awareness and raise money for research to cure Alzheimer's disease. She collects "Priority Quilts", little 9" x 12" quilts made by quilters around the globe, and sells them either by auction on her website or at the International Quilt Market in Houston every year. She has helped to raise over $412,000 for this cause.
Right now, there is also a traveling quilt show of 180 quilts with the names of people who have suffered this disease. I was privileged to be able to quilt one of these special 6" x 80" quilts, and to add a few names to it as well. At the end of today's Quilt Show episode they showed one of my blocks that contains the name of my husband's three uncles, Elden, Ben and Laural, who died with Alzheimer's. Of course it makes me concerned that someday it may affect my husband. I also included the name of my father-in-law's wife who has just been diagnosed.
The other names are loved ones of a few of my friends, including a classmate from high school.
What can you do? Make a quilt, buy a quilt, support this cause. Ami's website gives a list of 35 ways that you can help to raise awareness and fight this disease.
http://www.alzquilts.org