While we are organizing and even afterwards
 

A couple of years ago, I answered an ad on Kijiji (want ads). It was a young mother of 3 girls who lost her home due to fire. Their insurance coverage was not enough to cover her sewing goodies and she was looking for donations from fellow sew-ers who could spare anything...patterns, notions, fabric, anything at all. So, I went through my closet(s) of fabrics and such and ended up giving her 5 large trash bags filled to the brim of fabric and patterns and notions...She was so surprised and so grateful, ....Her girls rifled through picking out fabrics they liked and wanted mom to sew for them. So excited indeed.

It felt so good to know how much she appreciated it all. But, it made me take inventory and put a value on my goodies...I was shocked when I added it all up. Especially all the notions and patterns...My advice to everyone is to do a rough calculation and make sure you have enough coverage. I would be absolutely devastated to lose my collection.

That's awesome to help a fellow quilter in need...
Yes, it is Very important to take pics and try and calculate the value of our hobby...

Oh I know. When I put riders on my home ins. for tools and sewing I thought $10,000 each would be enough. The agent said I was way off. My machines alone are at $15,000 and fabric and notions are at $20,000 and the tools went to $20,000 - His mother is a quilter and she also collects Vintage Beauties so he knows a wee bit. And I can increase it as I accumulate more goodies-Yeah Right if I do that I will need a much bigger house.I already take up 2 rooms and it is spilling out into the dining room Its a good thing I live alone.I hate looking for lost -crushed people-Takes to much time away from creating LOL

That is an excellent idea to have this stuff covered on your insurance. Must do this.

When I sort/clean/reorganize, I select fabric that I no longer want or like and give it to a Mennonite Church in a near-by community. They have a mission in two Eastern European countries that teaches women to sew. The local ladies have so much fun going through the things I donate. I just feel great knowing that I have a small part in letting women who have so little get a chance to improve their lives.

Between dfs garage, gun collection and other expensive items we have an insurance policy that covers everything. We pay out the wazoo but when your talking 30k in small tools, and over 500k in large tools and classic cars and parts, a couple grand in guns and ammo (don't worry all locked up in a fire proof safe in the basement) and then all my sewing stuff and electronics we have a huge policy. We needed to make sure if anything happened we could rebuild and replace everything.

You have to be careful helping out people saying how they lost everything in a fire and asking for donations.
There have been several on here asking for donations. I think the people in charge has tightened that up and I haven't seen anymore for a while. I donate what I don't want to goodwill or salvation army.

We lost our home, all of its contents, our RV and car in the PG&E San Bruno gas explosion of 2010. We thought we had done a good job of documenting our belongings by taking videos of them all. Unfortunately we stored them in our RV which was also lost in the blast. I strongly recommend that you take loads of pictures, but that you transfer them to DVD's and give copies to family and friends not in the area. Our insurance company, Hartford, by contract still owes us over $200,000 which they will never pay. They signed us off. Insurance is not all you think it will be plus the hours listing all of the items plus where, when they were purchased and their replacement cost.

This was something we discussed with our agent back in the summer. Also ladies check on the values of your jewelry and guns. I didn't like the idea that the Ins. company wanted all the serial numbers on our guns. Will be shocked how many things you don't inventory or have enough ins. on. We had replacement on the house and thought we had enough on other things, WRONG! Our security system and safe helped out alot.
Glad you could help her, I remember a while back when we sent stuff to a quilter on the forum who lost her goodies. The lady sent the nicest card, I think it is great how everyone on here is so good hearted!...
We used to donate to Goodwill until we found out about the employees wages! We now give to local church thrift stores that keeps the money in the community.
Ins. is like everything thing else Document, document, document!!!!!!

I was thinking the same thing. We heard of a student at our college who had all her money stolen at WalMart and had nothing for her kids for Christmas. The staff went out a bought her a car load of things for the kids (some very expensive) and when we delivered them to her house the living was filled with presents. At first we thought someone else had donated but she explained that they were all from her family and she had even bought all 3 kids bikes. Its too bad something like this makes a person a little cautious and cynical.

For those of you that donate to Goodwill....do a little research on their business practices. Since finding out that 0% of their proceeds go to charity and so little goes to employee salaries, we no longer donate to them. Salvation Army is an excellent place to donate since close to 100% of their proceeds goes to charity.

we take a quarterly inventory of the house, garage and shop contents. We place it on two discs, one for us and one is sent to our insurance agent.

The vast majority of our donated items go to the local homeless shelter, battered women's shelter and to the local
children's safe house. We also donate our aluminum cans to the local homeless shelter, those type of donations go for utility bills they have.

This is good advice on checking to be sure you have enough insurance coverage! I did this on my jewelry and the few antique furniture pieces I own but never thought to do it on my fabric, notions, books, patterns, machines, etc.

Thanks for the heads up on it!

It is definitely nice when the recipient acknowledges a gift. I sent lots of fabric 2-3 years ago to someone on this board who indicated she needed materials because of her financial situation. Not one word of thanks did I ever receive!

my experience too. I donate to local charity quilters and I hear......nothing. Rethinking my practice of bagging up my unwanteds. I "hear" that they are thrilled to receive but I guess a quick note, text, Facebook post, etc is too much to expect. Hey, I spend hours purging.

I suggest that we store the records in a safe deposit box as back up too.

Sandy

I belong to a group that accepts donations to make items for less fortunate community residents. If there is no name of the person attached to the donation , then could you suggest a way to contact that person.Our group is always thankful for the donation,but without a name, it seems impossible to send a thank you.

What a generous heart you have...God always repays ten fold...Bless You....

My ladies club often want to donate to a charitable cause, we have found local groups who work with and for our mountain community, we donate clothing to a local group who checks, cleans and organizes them, we also give them fabric, household goods, yard tools, anything we think can be used by someone else, also a church in our area collects many things for our neighbors and friends, as for insurance, we are also insured to the hilt, we do so many different things that its hard to keep track, we have replacement value on our house and furnishings, as for my crafts and woodworking hobbies, we provide pictures, and scanned receipts put on a DVD to our insurance company plus we keep a copy at my parents hose, we update the info regularly

That was so nice of you! My only problem with figuring out the value of my stash for insurance would be that dh would find out. LOL.

I have a friend that has a goal of making 100 quilts for kids this year so I'm donating some of my fabric to her for that.

Our home was leveled and cars totaled in the November 17 tornado in Washington, Illinois. I agree that somehow all of your possessions need to be documented. I had all of our recipes and pictures on a flash drive, but it was in the desk drawer, which is also gone. Should have had it in a safe deposit box or copies with someone else. When we get back home, I will have pictures of everything on a flash drive and will store that somewhere other than home, because while the insurance co has been good at reimbursing what we reported lost, I know we don't remember everything we accumulated over the last 30 years.

We have a niece who sews/quilts (learning). Just recently found out our oldest DGD has taken up sewing. She likes "Cosplay" and making her own costumes. Not exactly sure what Cosplay is but she says it's dressing up as a favorite video game character, like Trekkies stuff. ANyway have given some things to them. DGD just recently purchased her first sewing machine. Will be happy helping her with that. We have renters insurance and I keep all receipts as far as anything in regards to sewing/quilting. Machines and notions are not cheap.

When you-all helped me out last year...I spent weeks sending out thank you notes. That's the way I was brought up. Appreciate what people can do for you.

To get free stuff. It happens a LOT on the internet. I remember several stories (not on this board but other boards) where people faked cancer or faked that their kids had cancer in order to get sympathy, attention and in some cases, lots of donations. I know of people who have claimed to try to commit suicide, claimed they were in a car accident, claimed to have been flooded, etc and they got a lot of attention and some got donations before they were outed.

I think there are some people on here that do ask when they do not need, they are not to be confused with you who really did lose things. One does have to be careful. Look at how long some one has been a member and how often they are on. Take me for example, sometimes I am here a lot and some times not. What if today I said I lost everything and needed help. If I were reading it I would wonder if it were sketchy.

Hadn't thought of it that way. I understand. In my case..I was in the burn unit at Akron Children's Hospital for 2 weeks. At one point, I discovered they had a computer for others to use. I asked to be taken to it. It was quite a painful journey. I went to the QB just to let people know why I wasn't online recently. It went viral...and people really responded. To my disbelief. Twinkie...who has since become my good friend...saw it and spread the word. I was totally in awe the responses I rec'd. The local Fox tv channel even did a story on my home coming to a new apartment. Complete with all "new" furnishings. I would never wish my experiences on anyone. The long term effects of being in a burning house for too long...are devastating. Not to mention the PTSD. I would like to add...had it not been for that fact...I would not have made the special friendships I have now...with members here on this board. Love you ALL.

I am glad you are well and because something horrible really happened to you there was an outpouring of support. I hope you continue to get better and I hope all of us who can will still help those in need. I also hope we will not be duped by those who are fakes, because that hurts us all.