Volunteer quilters assemble comfort and care for patients

Vivian Dugan has quilted for charity for as long as she can remember. Then during the illness and death of her husband, Bill, in 2011, she began making lap quilts at her home in Coulee Dam as an outlet for her concern and her grief.

In the beginning, she sent them all to Sacred Heart Hospital of Spokane, where Bill was being treated. When his doctor recommended hospice to them, Vivian began to channel some quilts through to the hospice program in Omak - which is now Frontier Home Health and Hospice - as thanks for the care he was receiving. After his death, she began giving the quilts exclusively to Frontier, where they are offered to all new patients going on to hospice care.

Word of what Vivian was doing got out, and her solitary work soon expanded into an operation that they call "Comfort Care Quilters." She now has five people helping her. Anna Couture, of Connell, Washington, makes most of the tops, which are primarily patchwork quilts. She and Vivian meet up in Moses Lake, Washington, where she gives Vivian the finished tops, and Vivian gives her more material.

Then on Thursdays from 9 a.m. to early afternoon, two women join Vivian in her basement, which is set up as a fully-equipped quilt operation. One room is lined with open shelves filled with fabrics of all colors. At the back of the basement, a small room houses dozens of spools of thread, skeins of yarn, and batting. The main room has two large tables and a sewing machine for cutting the batting, attaching tops to the backing, tying, and binding the edges. The group gets most of the batting and material through donations and garage-sale finds. They are always open to more donations of materials.

The volunteers who gather on Thursdays each specialize in a part of the quilt construction: Vivian adds the batting and backing to the tops; Mary Lou Reilly, of Coulee Dam, does the tying; Jeanine Fifield, also of Coulee Dam, binds the edges.

Shirley Pytlak from the Tunk Valley works on her own to produce intricate, machine-quilted designs on a treadle sewing machine. Each woman, in her own way, is working to turn a passion for quilting into gifts of comfort for hospice patients.

The hospice patients treasure these hand-made gifts that reflect so much love and effort. One elderly patient stroked her cheek with a corner of the quilt and said, "I just LOVE this. It is so homey and shows such love and care." She expressed what many others have said in various ways. These gifts of quilts truly are comfort care.

Marcia Butchart is a chaplain at Frontier Home Health and Hospice in Omak.