Loss of a dedicated blanketeer

Good morning everyone-

This is a sad entry as I found out yesterday one of our blanket makers, Ruthie Kohlenberger, passed away yesterday.

Ruthie heard about Project Linus from one of the news stories. She quickly called and offered to help. She was an avid crocheter and over the last several years made many baby and kid blankets for us. I expect that no one else in our group knows Ruthie through Project Linus; she didn't get around easily and mostly stayed home. I offered to pick her up and bring her to some of our Helena blanket days, but she declined. She was just very happy to help even if it was only in the comfort of her home. She would call or email when she had some ready, and I would go by and visit for a while. She had an amazing life, and one of the things I will remember about her is that she built the grandfather clock in her living room - I've always wanted to try that. She called me about a week ago. She was worried as the emails she was sending were being 'returned' and she wondered if something had happened to me. As it turned out, she had recently changed her email as well and my notice of changing my email went to her old address.  We made plans for me to visit again this month...it was going to be tomorrow. Ruthie had a very generous heart and always wanted to bring a bit of beauty into the world. If you visit St Pete's, particularly the mammogram department, you may notice some decorated tissue box covers - Ruthie made those for them-she hated the look of an uncovered tissue box.

Ruthie suffered a massive stroke last week with other complications. Her kids said she would not likely be returning to her home. I still had hoped to visit with her Monday...but received the note yesterday that she had been called home to be with the Lord.

Please keep Ruthie's family in your thoughts and prayers as they deal with their loss.
gina

Good Heavens, it's spring already!

Well, I opened this up and see that I haven't updated the blog since December!!! Wow.

As you might guess, things are busy with Great Falls' Blanket Days. I had a Sunday open in early April when I had hoped to have a Helena Blanket Day... turns out it was open because it was Easter. And then, after realizing that, I almost scheduled something else for that day. I'm not used to having open days on the weekends apparently.  I'm shooting for May now.

I am in the beginning/middle of the Community Day Coupon Book sales but I'm getting a really late start. About the time I usually start Clint sprained his knee so I had to be around to do all his and my chores. Then I had a trip to visit my family - it'd been a couple of years and my folks both hit 75 this year. I'm finally getting into the selling groove, but I am really worried about making the cut for the sale days...those who sell the most before the sale get the best spots on sale days...and sale days are when you can really make the money.

The books are still $5 with a coupon for $10 off almost any item, a 30% off an item before 10 Saturday morning (it's a Friday/Saturday sale - April 27/28) and then the 10%-20% shopping pass... other coupons etc.  If you even think you might be interested, please consider purchasing one of these books from me.  Project Linus gets the entire $5 and it will help me get a better position on sale day. This is one of our primary sources of funds for fleece and other materials...and we'll probably have to purchase some batting in another year or so...please help if you can.

We had some great donations from Holy Spirit Catholic School and from Bethel Lutheran LOGOs. These were some busy kids!!! It is so heart warming to see the enthusiasm they all had wanting to help! Between the two groups we received almost 100 double fleece blankets!!!! Many thanks to them!