Conversations Around the Quilting Frame
Words by Anna Lee Vaughn | Images by Ryan McGill
In 1992, the ladies of Prospect Independent Methodist Church began gathering once a week to visit, chat, and quilt. Bringing their children and a potluck lunch, original members Betty Gober, Barbara Keeton, Frances Myers, Ivey Burk, and Janelle Baughn created a legacy that would continue to bring women together over quilting, sewing, and serving the church.
Baughn, the last remaining member of the original group before her passing in 2023, shone a light on traditional quilting and sewing techniques, which encouraged the group's current members Becky Dockery, Stephanie Fleming, Yvonne Gann, Cecilia McCollough, Lori McKellar, Maretta Moore, Janice Keeton, Judi Ward, and Carolyn Lamar to continue the legacy.
Today, these ladies gather each Tuesday and Thursday, taking quilt tops and quilting them with filler and lining. All proceeds earned from these efforts go toward the church, now Prospect Independent Church.
"People will find a quilt top in their mother or grandmother's attic and don't know what to do with it. So, they bring it here, and we quilt it so they have a treasure to pass down to their children. It helps the church, and it helps us too, because we learn from each other and fellowship," says McKellar.
Every year, the ladies fully design, build, and sew one quilt for the church bazaar fundraiser. The quilt is then raffled to raise funds for the church's needs and activities. To date, $1,800 is the record earning for these special pieces.
Though quilting used to be less about design and more about practicality - with families using old shirts, blouses, dresses, or scrap fabric to make them - the ladies thoughtfully design the church bazaar quilt every year and utilize much attention to detail when hand-stitching it.
"We come here and do this because quilting is an art that is dying out. What's neat about looking at a hand-stitched quilt when you've got a group of women quilting it is that everybody's stitches are different. You look at it, and you can see where one quilter is sitting in one corner and one quilter in another," says Dockery.
Sitting around the quilting frame, the ladies pass other bits of knowledge to each other, such as how to can jams and vegetables or remove glass from the skin with an Irish potato. Through their weekly conversation around the quilting frame, these ladies fellowship, learn, serve the church, and observe the importance of preserving a dying art. 78