Grati-tuesday. :-)

Well, I had the most lovely surprise last night  - a phone call from Afghanistan!   Carol sent a quilt and a laundry bag to a young lady and when it was received I received an email telling me that she loved the contents of her parcel and that the fellows around here were quite jealous.  Would it be possible for me to send another 4-5 laundry bags!  Hello!!   But of course!  Well, last night's call was from someone who, as usual, will remain nameless and he just rang to say thank you, they really appreciate the laundry bags.  I have had a few phone calls from Afghanistan or Dubai now and i can tell you that each one of them sticks in my mind and they just make my day!

It was a nice finish to a day with a some particularly lovely emails of gratitude.  

Hi Jan-Maree,

 I thought you would like to know that I received a special little surprise in the mail yesterday :)

 It was the Quilt. And oh my, it is amazing. Cat has done a fabulous job. I cannot stop showing everyone. 

She even managed to add in a laundry bag. Trust me, I will never loose my laundry again.

And her Mum threw in an extra few goodies to top it all off :)

I have added a photo in case Cat had not shown you. And you can see how amazing it looks.

Thanks so much for creating this organisation. I can tell you the massive smile I had on my face when receiving this special gift and I can imagine all

the other smiles of all the other troops out there when receiving theirs too.

 I have also given your website to my Aunty who is a quilter who was taking it into her next meeting with her local quilter team.

 Thanks Again

And when I asked for permission to publish the above photos this is the gorgeous response I received.

I am more than happy for you to publish the photos. Then everyone can see how amazing the quilt is :)When I get back home I'm def going to visit my Aunt and get her to help me make a special quilt for another solider here.
I have been studying the quilt closely and I can see that it is def something I would be interested in trying.
 I thank you again for making my day and bed very happy :)


Dear Liz (J),

I'm sure that you will be happy to know that your box with five laundry bags arrived safely here in Tarin Kowt today. I hope you don't mind that I asked Jan-Maree for an email address: although I would be very happy to write a letter, it would take at least a couple of weeks to get to you. Thank you very much for the bags. They are very welcome and I've handed them to our clerks to distribute to those who don't already have one. We are all really grateful for everyone back in Australia who uses such a lot of their spare time to do something for us. Our laundry service here is probably one of the busiest places on the camp and every time I go in there, I see more and more home made bags replacing the white nets that we get issued. 

Thank you also for your postcard. We've been watching the news over the past few weeks as Australian states and territories suffer their annual flood and fire disasters. Although we are based in Adelaide, we have soldiers from all over the country, and even further afield but I haven't heard of anyone who has been directly affected. 

Again, thank you for your efforts to make our lives a little more colourful and best wishes for the future.

Regards,

Hi Jan-Maree,

Thank you so much to you and your team for the quilt and laundry bag, It was a nice surprise and I started using it almost immediately, now every member in my room has a quilt and a laundry bag!

It gives me a sense of pride and warms my heart to know there is so much support out there for us and what we are doing here!

The quilt could not have come at a more perfect time with a sudden cold snap, it has been very cold over the last couple of months and then we started to see some warmer weather come through, and yet the last couple of weeks there is now snow on the mountains again and hence a cold breeze has been coming through early morning and of an evening. 

I best get back to it thanks again and please pass on my regards to your team for providing such a kind and thoughtful service to our troops!!

kindest regards

Hi Jan-Maree,

I would very much appreciate it if you would pass on my profound thanks to Mary and Tess for the wonderful quilt plus other goodies they kindly sent me.  I must have shown the quilt to others onboard at least 10 times, including the Commanding Officer!  Others onboard are now excitedly anticipating their quilts being made by Aussie Volunteers for us here on deployment in the Middle East.

I also used it last night instead of the drab military bedding - brightened up my cabin enormously!

Once again, many thanks to Mary and Tess, to you, and to all the volunteers at Aussie Hero Quilts.

Kind Regards,

Hi Jan-Maree

I have received Dorothy’s quilt and it is absolutely awesome.

It is definitely going into the Pool Room!

My sincere thanks to Dorothy and to your team.

Regards

We are doing really well in the requests department at the moment.  Whilst I always need more quilts and more quilters I am feeling more comfortable with the balance of requests versus quilts.  Caroline and I spent a few hours yesterday boxing up the 20 quilts that Stephanie T quilted and had bound for us.  and then we boxed up several boxes of laundry bags.  My job is to get stuck into writing the accompanying letters for each quilt.  I always like to tell the recipient who had a hand in his quilt.  I think it is important for them to know who pieced the top, quilted it, bound it and so on.  It is part of the story behind their quilt and shows that more people care about them that they perhaps know.

I am thinking it is time for a bit of an Aussie Heroes 101 series again now that we have lots of new followers and sewers. I have had emails from at least four or five new quilters that I had heard from in the last 48 hours telling me that they have quilts ready to go - what a bonus that always is.  Stay tuned for a bit of a refresher starting on Thursday night.

If you are wanting to make a quilt and would like to personalize one please check with me.  Lots of those requesting are learning to tell me a little about themselves so that I can better select the quilt that goes to them.  For example I had a snow boarding top that Lynn made and it will be going to a a snow boarding fan - and I can say that here without spoiling the surprise as he has know idea a quilt has been requested for him!

By the same token, all those that make the requests also usually say they would just be delighted with whatever a quilter is happy to make for them.  They just appreciate what we are doing.

I had a brief note from the Chaplain on Toowoomba yesterday and he said

We have received a fair bit of mail, and quite a few quilts have arrived.  Those who I have spoken to have been very impressed.

And when I emailed a sailor to tell her that her quilt was on its way she said

Thank you so much, I'm looking fwd to it greatly, I have seen a couple of the other quilts on board and the crew are loving the ones they have so far.  Thank you again.

I am off to label and tape boxes.

Till next time................keep spreading the word and happy stitching!