"For the quilters of Crescent Hall, Fridays aren’t just special — they’re sacred.

“I work 10-hour days so I can be off on Fridays,” said Ruth Williams, who lives on Dice Street in Charlottesville. “It’s our day.”

Every Friday for six years at Crescent Hall, sewing machines have whirred for hours in a room as quilts are created. When the group started at the public housing site, founder Del Horan said, “there were very few activities.”

“Quilting was a good excuse to get together for fellowship,” she said.

Starting this year, the quilters are giving some of their patchwork products to two area shelters — the Red Cross emergency shelter and the Shelter for Help in Emergency — for victims of domestic violence. In the coming weeks, 13 quilts will be delivered to the two shelters.

Francine Payne, one of the quilters who lives in Goochland but works in Charlottesville, said she came up with the donation idea because she wanted to help the homeless.

“Can you imagine, being without a home out in the cold?” Payne asked. “Especially with the economy. We’re fortunate to have jobs.”

Jenny Patterson, administrative office manager for the Shelter for Help in Emergency’s Community Outreach Center, said Payne contacted her in the spring about giving quilts. Patterson said the facility can house up to 25 women and children. The domestic violence shelter gets quilts every winter from other area groups, but this is the first batch from Crescent Hall.

“Many of the women come to us just with the clothes that they’re wearing,” Patterson said. As a result, she said, “Sometimes the ladies get very attached to the quilts.”

Molly Shrieves moved into Crescent Hall two months ago, and has been quilting with the group for a month. During the group’s July 18 gathering, Shrieves was working on her first project — a lighter scrap quilt with every kind of fabric, matching or not.

“It’s just something different to do,” she said.

City Council member Holly Edwards said the idea for quilting came about when she asked Crescent Hall residents what kinds of activities they would like to have. Edwards said former resident Theresa Stinnie mentioned quilting, and the idea took off.

“I wanted something that was generated from the residents,” Edwards said. Since resources are often scarce in low-income neighborhoods, Edwards said it’s important to provide residents with activities.

“I just think that life is basic. It all boils down to having something to do, someone to do it with and something to look forward to,” she said.

Horan said when the group first started, all the members were Crescent Hall residents. Now the group has expanded, bringing people from other sites and outside of town.

It almost seemed destined for their meeting room to be used for quilting. Horan said ever since they started, a quilt called “The High Life” documenting daily life — birds flying in trees and people gathered around a table eating burgers are some of the scenes — has been on the wall. No one knows where it came from.

Crescent Hall resident Sylvia Taylor was the group’s first quilter.

“I had nothing else to do during the day,” Taylor said. On this particular Friday, she was creating a quilt for her stepson in the Secret Service.

“Everyone needs a little comfort,” Horan said.

The most quilters they’ve had at once numbered about 12, and even some male regulars, but Horan said it varies week to week. Though they sew together safari animals, polka dots, tie-dye fabric and My Little Pony patches — seemingly with little effort — several of them hadn’t sewn since high school, or made a quilt at all.

“I sewed when I was in high school. That was the last time,” Williams said.

However, that is not the case for everyone. Barbara Terry, a Crescent Hall resident, said, “I started quilting when I was a little thing.”

Soon after arriving July 18, Margaret Crawford began sifting fabric to make a red and green quilt for her granddaughter. Crawford said she has been with the group for more than three years, but was not able to come for the past six months.

Green is her color.

“I could just have a green room with a quilt,” she said.

Horan said the group gets most of its fabric from outside donors, no matter how small the scrap is, and they are sorted into boxes and kept in a storage room. But they also make the occasional visit to the fabric store.

“When we get to the fabric store we just love it, love it, love it,” Williams said.

To make a king-sized bed quilt, nine yards of fabric are needed just for the bottom layer — quilts are like sandwiches, Horan said, composed of three layers. The same amount of fabric is needed for the top layer, but usually that’s in tiny bits before being sewn together.

“The word is kind of out that we’ll take fabric scraps,” Horan said. She added that whether the scraps match or not isn’t of huge concern.

“You have to have some uglies in there,” she said.

The final products are far from ugly. They sit folded on a table, their vibrant colors and patterns perking up the white-tiled room of plastic chairs and foldout tables. And in the winter, Horan said the quilters will start their charity quilts all over again.

“The ladies love to do show and tell,” Horan said. “We have a lot of fun together.”" (Rachana Dixit, The Daily Progress, July 27, 2008)