Community Service Projects
May 2026
Sew and Sew Forth NG made 25 Blankets for Jill's Blankets, a non-profit that spreads love and warmth to adult and pediatric patients undergoing chemotherapy treatments.
April 2026
On April 8, 2026 our community sewing committee from ASG Richmond met to work on our most recent project. The committee was approached by the DAR ( Daughters of the American Revolution) to make dignity bibs for veterans. If you are unfamiliar with dignity bibs, they are shirts cut and sewn to alter them into bibs by cutting off the sleeves and back, then finishing off the raw edges. The final product still looks like a shirt, but can easily slip over the head of the adult.
In the past the community sew committee has helped several organizations by making placemats, blankets, burp cloths, fiddle mats and even doing repairs of prom dresses for underprivileged girls.
All Things New was our very gracious host, and allowed us to use their facility, sewing machines, and ironing stations. They do wonderful repair work and also refurbish machines. We couldn’t do these projects so easily without their support.
We were fortunate to have 16 volunteers from all sections of ASG help with this project and we were able to finish 18 bibs. This was the second community sew we have had this year and we are planning to have a third this fall.
Summer 2023
This year I was asked if members of Sew Much Fun, Mechanicsville NG could make curtains for the buildings at Holiday Lake 4H Education Center. We jumped to the opportunity to help. The 4 H Center is a non-profit organization.
We made 61 curtains. They were used in the pods, girl's and boy's bunkhouses.
-Dianne and Stephanie
July 22, 2023 Sewing for SARA- Hosted by The Blue Ridge Stitchers in Charlottesville
We had an enjoyable and productive day sewing for SARA (Sexual Assault Resource Center). The Blue Ridge Stitchers Ann-Marie, Ann N, Carolyn, Laurene, Liz and Susan B were joined by Laura S., the co-leader from Fashion Focus in Richmond and chair of the Community Service Committee. We also had a surprise guest, Donna, who saw our event posted on the Richmond Chapter’s website and came to help. Thank you all for coming. And, a very heartfelt thank you to the ladies in Richmond who donated bags and prepared fabric. We will be working on bags for SARA for quite some time.
Thank you, Katie Aplis, Crisis Service Coordinator at SARA for visiting our sewing day. Katie told us about the valuable services they provide for individuals and families in Charlottesville, Albemarle, and surrounding counties. We were able to give Katie 21 finished drawstring bags to get their program started thanks to Richmond ASG members. We completed 16 bags during the event and will be taking them to SARA.
Thank you for participating and for your generous spirit.
Ann Marie and Carolyn.
Co-Leaders, Blue Ridge Stitchers
2023 Richmond Chapter Spring Fling - Community Sew
at St. Matthew's Episcopal Church
We held our annual Spring Fling last Saturday, April 29th and it was a great success.
We had two charities we worked with this year. The first charity was Little Hands Virginia, which provides essentials to disadvantaged children in the first years of life. We chose to make flannel burp cloths as our project. This item, as you can imagine, is used up quickly, so this year we were able to make over 281 burp cloths for Little Hands. Wow!
The second charity was My Princess Project, which provides disadvantaged teenagers prom dresses, who would otherwise not be able to attend prom because of the lack of a dress. All the dresses are donated and many need some TLC. We were able to repair 23 prom dresses.
Kudos to all the lovely women who took the time to make this charity project such a success. We couldn’t do it without you! (Names and photos are included in the Members Only section).