Bendigo is a regional city in Victoria
which enjoyed a boom during the gold rush and its past is reflected in its magnificent
heritage buildings, beautiful architecture, wide streets, quaint shops and a
treasure trove of the arts and culture.
It’s also home to one of our own Aussie
Heroes Quilts and Laundry Bags golden treasures – Rhonda R! An injured shoulder and many surgeries has
left Rhonda unable to sew any more, but that hasn’t stopped her. She is now one of the embroiderers who helps
to make our quilts and bags look so professional and whose work adds that
special personal touch for our deployed personnel. Many of the beautiful
defence force patches, regimental badges, Australian imagery such as animals,
iconic buildings, and maps that we use are made from her embroidery machine at
home. She also produces many, many other
embroideries for special projects (for example, Rhonda spent over 200 hours on
Invictus Games embroideries!).
Caroline L is currently making 18
laundry bags for one such special project.
Each bag required the relevant service crest, which Rhonda is
producing. Under the guise of saving
money on postage, but really just wanting any excuse for an excursion, the
Thelma and Louise of road trips (with a happier ending) decided to go to the
source, travelling to Gisborne on Friday to catch up again with the delightful
Rhonda over lunch.
Rhonda is the most
amazing, kind, fun and warmly generous woman.
She worked her family cattle property in Bendigo for many years, cared
for her family, and kept so many balls in the air doing myriad other things, that
we struggled to keep up with her just telling us about it. How she finds the time to actually DO it all
is a mystery! It’s not surprising then
that she barely batts an eye over our last-minute, weird and wonderful requests
(well, maybe there’s a twitch, but she’s so nice about it!).
We picked up the
service embroideries, but she’d also made up some gorgeous embroideries of
Australian icons – animals, maps, etc for us to use on future projects, she gave
us metres of fabric, and to top it all off, a dozen eggs from her chooks!
We just want to say a HUGE thank
you to Rhonda R, for thousands of embroideries she’s produced for us all, and
for being the most beautiful and accomplished woman, not to mention a
life-saver for last-minute rising suns!
And to all you embroiderers out there, who toil away for us, but who
don’t always have your names under the photo, we say THANK YOU and we
appreciate everything you do.
Nicole W & Caroline L
As do we all appreciate all those who contribute to our fabulous finished products... especially this time... our embroiderers!
Till next time... keep spreading the word and happy stitching!
Jan-Maree xx
May I say the same for Keryn M, who does the same for me and quilts my creations to send for those who request them as well. She's brilliant and I appreciate her work. She and Rhonda R are two very special ladies.
ReplyDeleteI think every Lady /Gent deserves a pat on the back for their love and dedication to being an Aussie Hero Volunteer :)
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