Domestic violence, homelessness and the troubles of the wider world can feel too big for any one person to touch. Spring has arrived in Galston, though, and with it a quieter kind of hope, the sort that gets sewn together one seam at a time. It is the hope the Arcadian Quilters Group has been stitching into brightly coloured fabric bags for those who have less than the rest of us.
The bags go to homeless families and to women escaping violence at home. They reach these people through the charity shop at Galston Helping Hearts Survive, which handles distribution and has named them Dignity for Women Bags. Before they leave the sewing room, the patchwork and quilting ladies fill them with personal toiletry items, each one wrapped in love and hope for someone’s future.
It is a busy group. Besides the bags, the members donate quilts for beds, as well as smaller quilts that work as knee rugs for wheelchair patients who live at the Warrah Special School in Dural. The fabric comes from the generosity of others, and donations of wonderful material end up as bags for families who need them. It is a living example of the saying that what goes around comes around.
If that sounds like a room you would like to spend a Wednesday morning in, the Arcadian Quilters meet at the Community Health Centre, on the corner of The Glade and Arcadia Rd, Galston. They gather on the 1st, 3rd and 5th Wednesday of every month at 9.30 am. For further information, call Philomena on 0414 971 106.
