Drive-Thru Quilting at McDonald's on Roosevelt and Kedzie

NEIGHBOR MESSAGEWard 24

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Lawndale Community Builder and Policy Analyst

Save the Date: February 25, 2012-Drive Thru Quilting at McDonald's on Roosevelt and Kedzie

by Valerie F. Leonard

The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project will host Drive-Thru Quilting in honor of Black History Month, on February 25, 2012 at McDonald's on Roosevelt and Kedzie, from 10:00 am.-3:00 p.m. We ask that you give us an hour or less of your time to prepare a quilt block.

You can

1. work with one of our experts to pull together a traditional block

2. draw a picture or symbol and color it with fabric paint or markers

3. bring a poem, paragraph, Bible verse, picture(s) of your family, friends, block club members, church, organization, etc so we can print copies onto fabric

4. bring fabric of your choice or use some of our fabrics

5. invite others to participate

Participants will be eligible for special discounts reserved for participants only.

I will provide flyers once they come back from the printer. In the meantime, please spread the word.

We thank Lofton & Lofton Management for their generous support of this event. The project partners include Better Boys Foundation, K-Town Historic District, Prevention Partnership Family Center and Urban Art Retreat. If you have any questions or would like to participate, let me know.

Project Update December 5, 2011

Thanks!!!! 

 Thanks to everyone for the roles you played in completing our first quilt. We appreciate the donations of fabric and material donations and use of sewing machines from Karen Bailey and Shirley Wilson, Lisa Wilcoxen, Reneau Diallo and Jacqueline Gipson. We thank Lisa Wilcoxen, Karen Bailey, Shirley Wilson, Jacqueline Gipson and Chris Malawy for providing leadership and/or technical assistance in pulling the quilt pieces together. We appreciate the donation of fabric blocks by the quilters, Historic K-Town and Kameryn Leonard. We thank BBF for in-kind donations of space, staff time, copies and use of computers.

We thank Dianna Long, of the Urban Art Retreat, for conducting quilting workshops for children and adults at her program site. She has 4 quilts underway, and has invited us to drop in and see the work in progress. Dianna may be contacted at

The URBAN ART RETREAT
1957 S. Spaulding Ave.
Chicago, Il. 60623
contact@urbanartretreat.com
www.urbanartretreat.com
(773) 542-9126
 http://www.urbanartretreat.com/

Status 

We are almost done with our first quilt. Constructing this quilt is giving us an opportunity to learn skills for developing what will be our cloth museum. We have pieced together the 9-patch blocks that the class made for practice a few weeks ago, and have pieced together the top and backing, inserted the batting, and have started knotting the 3 layers. Valerie Leonard will finish knotting the 3 outstanding 9-patches tonight, so that we can focus our efforts on binding tomorrow. When we're done binding, Karen will take the quilt and work with her apprentices later this week to crochet a decorative border.

Jacqueline Gipson has started a quilt honoring her father and other significant people and events in North Lawndale. Reneau Diallo has indicated that it is difficult for her to make it over to the West Side in the evenings, and has offered to work with a group of quilters who grew up in North Lawndale to produce a quilt.

Ashunti Community Services, Inc. has offered to assist in the development of a quilt and to host the celebration on their premises. We will explore this opportunity further. We will be scheduling one-on-one meetings with individuals and organizations that have expressed an interest in participating, but find Tuesday evenings inconvenient.

Next Steps

We should be done with the quilt tomorrow. Next week's meeting will be spent planning activities for the remainder of the project. We will select themes for individual rooms in our cloth museum. Each room will have its own theme, ie, journalists, schools, athletes, etc. We are asking each person to be responsible for completing at least one wall size quilt, of at least 24" x 24" by January 15th. Some people will be able to get their quilts done sooner. Those of us who have quilting experience will be on hand to help those of us who don't.

We hope to have a date set for our drive through quilting by the end of the week. We are looking at January 7th and/OR January 14th. Reneau Diallo has indicated that she would be willing to take the lead on this, sharing her experiences from the Quilt Pavilion at the African Festival of the Arts. If you have any questions, please e-mail Valerie F. Leonard, Project Manager, at consulting@valeriefleonard.com

Thanks for Coming Out Tonight

Thanks to those of you who were able to make it out tonight. The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project held its 6th session on October 25, 2011 at Better Boys Foundation. Individual group members pulled together 12.5" blocks which will be stitched together to create the top of the first quilt next week. We thank Shirley Wilson and Karen Bailey for facilitating tonight's session and assembling the pieces for the quilt blocks. Here's the Flickr stream from tonight. http://www.flickr.com/photos/67816795@N04/sets/72157627855483705/show/

Thanks for Coming Out to Last Night's Workshop

I would like to thank those of you who came out to tonight's quilting workshop with the North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project. I did a presentation on message quilting, while Reneau Diallo debunked the myth of the Underground Railroad quilts, shared some of her own quilts and provided history of some common African textiles. We will start our first quilt on Tuesday, October 25, 2011.
Workshop 5 Message Quilts

Flickr Stream From Workshop 3

Back in School Event

We participated in the Back In the Youth Ready Community Council-Region 3's Back in School Event on October 7, 2011. Here is a picture of our table, with a work in progress by Valerie F. Leonard, Project Manager.

Support the Solidarity Market

We urge you to come out and support this year's Solidarity Market at Old St. Pat's. Download a flyer below. Solidarity Market Electronic Flyer

Thanks for Coming Out on Tuesday

Thanks everyone who came out Tuesday night to participate in the workshop. My mom finished up the workshop on embroidery, and Lisa Wilcoxen facilitated a workshop on basic quilting. I didn't do a sign in sheet, but I'm guessing that we had between 20 and 25 people come through over the course of the evening. We thank Lisa Wilcoxen, Essie Leonard, Chris Malawy and Reneau Diallo for their workshops and for supporting the facilitators. The teamwork is phenomenal! Here are pics from last night's session. The quality of the pics is not good, but you get a sense for what happened.

 

Here is a link to pics from Valerie Leonard's mobile uploads. These include pics from 2 weeks ago and earlier. http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150261607643024.351765.587348023&type=1

Remember Jacquelyn Gipson, one of our lead quilters, in our prayers. Her dad is very ill, and she finds herself visiting him in the hospital twice a day. In spite of this, she is always looking for ways to help us out. We have set up a separate Facebook page for the project. Please suggest that your friends "like" the North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project. http://www.facebook.com/pages/North-Lawndale-African-American-Heritage-Quilting-Project/261167610588983

We are considering preparing residents to participate in next year's Solidarity Market, so they can make their own crafts and sell them to the public. In the meantime, I have attached a copy of the flyer for this year's event, which takes place on October 23. http://www.scribd.com/doc/68498249/Solidarity-Market-Electronic-Flyer There is a potential for us to work with Marshall High School Alumni Association and CPS/Service Learning to document local community history and the lives of prominent CPS alumni from the area.

We Made This Week's Austin Weekly News

We are deeply honored to know that the North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project made the Austin Weekly News this week. http://www.austinweeklynews.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1&ArticleID=3439&TM=85720.88

Please Distribute This Project Flyer

Full Page Flyer

Reminder-3rd Quilting Workshop-Tuesday, October 4, 2011

I just wanted to remind you that we will be having our second quilting workshop on Tuesday, October 4, 2011 at 6:00 pm at BBF. BBF is located on the corner of Pulaski and15th Street. We will show you how to do 7 basic embroidery stitches that can be used for your next quilting block. Workshop 3 Basic Embroidery

Front Page News

We made the front page of today's North Lawndale Community News NLCNSep22Pub11

Update September 21, 2011

I'd like to thank Mary Visconti and Billy Brooks for inviting me to participate with BBF's Parent Advisory Council, and for allowing me to share our project updates with the group. The project was well received. We are appreciative of the resources BBF is bringing to the project, including staff time and in-kind donations. We are excited that Karen Reyes, one of the instructors, will use the project as an option for a student(s)'s project, if they so choose. She has also agreed to donate fabric swatches. I'd like to welcome Reneau Diallo to the project team. Reneau is a nurse midwife who grew up in the North Lawndale community, and graduated from Farragut High School. Her grandmother was the first African American woman to graduate from Austin High School. Reneau is a highly skilled quilter who has in years past coordinated the Quilting Pavilion at the African Festival of the Arts. She has experience with traditional quilting techniques, as well as with art quilts and precision quilts. She has agreed to assist us with making the quilts, and she will facilitate the workshop on Underground Railroad quilting. Valerie F. Leonard

Thanks for Turning Out Last Night

We just wanted to take the time to say thanks for showing up to our first workshop last night. We had an awesome opportunity to hear the history of North Lawndale, and see sample quilts put together by Lisa Wilcoxen and Reneau Diallo. Valerie Leonard is learning howto quilt, and shared a project in progress. The next workshop will be Tuesday, September 27, and we will show participants how to navigate the blog and begin to develop quilts. Workshop 1 North Lawndale Stories

Tawanna Calvin, Co-Chairperson of the Historic K-Town Committee, shares the history of North Lawndale.

Mary Visconti, CEO of Better Boys Foundation, observes the story telling.

Reneau Diallo shares a picture of her mother's graduating class from Nash  School.

Lisa Wilcoxen shares one of her quilting samples.

Reneau Diallo, and her daughter Nicole, show a quilt depicting  African  Flags.

Let's Hear Your Story

Everyone Has a Story. We Want to Hear Yours on September 20th I don't know about you, but I get tired of reading about the history of North Lawndale, how it was once a lively community; how African Americans came here in the 1950's; the white flight and jobs leaving, and how the community was basically destroyed by the riots after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. Almost every written history you read about the community seems to give the impression that our history stops after the Riots. Almost every newspaper account of the community is about the negatives—the crime, the poverty, the drugs, poor performing schools, etc. The truth of the matter is, North Lawndale is so much greater than that. African Americans have contributed so much--whether they are seemingly immortal figures like Martin Luther King, Jr., or they worked quietly in the shadows, in our churches, block clubs, families and community organizations. The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project is combining research, documentation, workshops and quilting to document the rich African American Experience here in North Lawndale. The lead organizations are Art Forward, Better Boys Foundation, Historic K-Town, Lawndale Historical and Cultural Society, Prevention Force Family Center, Sankofa Safe Child Initiative and Urban Art Retreat. I am the project manager. We will host a series of workshops to share our stories and learn embroidery and quilting skills. At the end of the process, we will create a beautiful community quilt(s) that includes our stories and helps us to build community and strengthen our social fabric. Our first workshop will be Tuesday, September 20, 2011 from 6:00 pm-8:00 pm at Better Boys Foundation (BBF), on the corner of 15th and Pulaski. We will get an overview of North Lawndale history from an African American perspective, and share our own stories of family and neighborhood traditions. You will have the chance to start your first quilting block, using fabric markers to write a message or draw a picture to tell a story. These blocks will be used for the community quilt. We have included brochures and flyers with more information about the project. Please, print out the flyers and pass them on to your neighbors and encourage them to come out. Also, forward this e-mail to everyone you know who might be interested. It is so important that we begin to focus on the little things that make this community great. We look forward to seeing you tonight. In the meantime, if you have any questions, let me know. Brochure 2 Poster 2 One Fourth Page Flyer Quilting

Project Status September 2, 2011

The project is gaining momentum. We hope you can participate.
North Lawndale African Heritage Quilting Project Status 9-2-11

Back to the Drawing Board

The design for our first poster didn't work so well for a poster. Here's a second shot.
Poster 2

Check Out Our First Quilt

We just finished the artwork for the sign we will be using for the African Festival of the Arts on Labor Day. Check it out.

Poster 1

Help Us Keep North Lawndale in Stitches

If you, or someone you know has a sewing machine that you would like to lend or donate to the North Lawndale African American Heritage Project, please let me know. The machine will be used to help us document the African American experience in North Lawndale through the quilting process. You may read more about the project and our progress by reviewing this blog. Thank you in advance for your consideration.

Meet Us at the African Festival of the Arts Green Pavilion!!!

The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project has been invited to participate in the African Festival of the Arts Green Pavilion. We will provide a workshop on community building through gardening, storytelling and quilting. We will participate between 11:00 am and 1:00 pm on one of the three days of the festival. We will confirm the exact date shortly. We hope you can make the Festival and stop by the Pavilion. We have provided information on the Pavilion below.


African Festival of the Arts Green Pavilion

GREEN PAVILION FACT SHEET

African American Heritage Quilting Project Keeps North Lawndale in Stitches

A group of North Lawndale organizations and community residents are combining time honored traditions of storytelling and quilting to strengthen the community’s social fabric. The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project is inviting North Lawndale residents to share their stories and participate in the research of the history and culture of African American residents and express their findings in a community quilt. Depending on what community participants decide, the quilts could celebrate family traditions, famous people from North Lawndale, the relationships between African American and Jewish experiences in North Lawndale; the Civil Rights Movement; the  African influence in Mexico; the Migration of African Americans from the South, etc.  The partners include Art Forward, the Better Boys Foundation (BBF), Historic K-Town, the Lawndale Historic and Cultural Society, Sankofa Safe Child Initiative and the Urban Art Retreat. Valerie F. Leonard, a local resident and community development consultant, is the project manager.  The project planning committee includes Billy Brooks, Jacquelyn Gipson, Dianna Long, Blanche Suggs, Lisa Wilcoxen, Ife Williams Martel Williams and Annetta Wilson.

“We don’t care whether or not participants have experience with quilting, or how long they have lived or worked in North Lawndale. All are welcome to participate”, Ms. Leonard said. “We are very fortunate to have local artists and quilters serve as lead facilitators to guide us through the process.” The project includes a series of resident led workshops covering the history of the African American experience in North Lawndale; opportunities for residents to tell their own stories; demonstrations of quilting and embroidery techniques and lessons learned from community quilting projects across the country.  

Martel Williams participates in After School Matters with BBF, and serves one of the youth facilitators of the project. “Whenever people talk about North Lawndale, they talk about crime, drugs and gangs”, Williams said. “They don’t think about the good things like our community gardens or our positive role models”.  Jazz impresario Ramsey Lewis, filmmaker Robert Townsend and news CLTV news anchor Tanya Francisco all have North Lawndale roots. Other notables include former Congressman Gus Savage who published the Lawndale Booster Newspaper; Brenetta Howell Barrett, the first African American woman from the community to run for Congress; former Bulls players Mickey Johnson, Linton Johnson and Randy Brown; blues singers Otis Clay and Dinah Washington, and actor Andre Brougher.  The community’s most famous former resident is Martin Luther King Jr., who moved his family to the 1500 block of Hamlin to protest deplorable living conditions in the 1960’s.

The project is being documented online at http://northlawndalequilting.blogspot.com.  Visitors will find project updates, brochures, meeting notes, biographies of prominent African Americans from North Lawndale, and quilting resources  and videos of quilting demonstrations and performances from North Lawndale performers.  Even though the blog is a work in progress, arts and crafts organizations from all over the country are beginning to promote the blog as a resource on their own websites.

The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting project is open to local schools, churches, block clubs, community based organizations, residents and anyone else who wants to participate. Finished products will be displayed during a community gathering for Black History Month 2012. For further information about the project and how you may get involved, contact                    Valerie F. Leonard at 773-521-3137 or valeriefleonard@msn.com.

You Are More Than Welcome to Participate

Participation Letter Community

We Are Looking for Project Participants and Supporters

We are looking for people from the community to participate. Please download the brochure for further details.

Brochure 2

Urban Art Retreat to Conduct Ongoing Workshops

N. Lawndale residents who would like to participate in creating a quilt about the history of N. Lawndale African American people are welcome to register with URBAN ART RETREAT for a group workshop to create a very artistic quilt along with others in a group setting.

We will share African American History of N. Lawndale and you are welcome to bring info. about the neighborhood. Together we will create some artistic 6"X6" squares to become part of a larger quilt endeavor. Family trees, civil rights scenes, famous people who lived here, and familiar scenes from the neighborhood will be just some of the subject matter for the quilt pieces created at UAR for this community-wide historical project!

We will be working in mixed media. Adults can participate on Saturdays from 11-2p.m. 

and youth can participate as part of our Sat. youth program from 1-4 on Saturdays. No experience is needed. It is free to participate. And you can do something worthwhile and participate in your own community!  

If you have a group of youth or adults who would like to schedule a day/time at UAR just 

for your group to create quilt squares under the direction of an artist, please send your info. to our email address. 

To RSVP, please send an email to contact@urbanartretreat with your name & number, 

plus what day you plan to attend.

thank you, Dianna

Dianna C. Long

The URBAN ART RETREAT

1957 S. Spaulding Ave. 

Chicago, Il. 60623

Dianna@urbanartretreat.com

www.urbanartretreat.com

(773) 542-9126

Gathering Intel for the African American Heritage of North Lawndale

Thanks to everyone who was able to participate in our online discussion to gather information on the African American heritage in North Lawndale. Please note that it's not too late to participate. As we think about sharing our experiences in North Lawndale, I'd like to ask a few questions. Feel free to answer as many as you'd like.

1. What are your strongest memories of North Lawndale?
2. What are some of your family traditions?
3. What activities do you remember from your block club?
4. What did you like about the parties?
5. Are there people who stand out in your mind that should be honored? If so, who? (they don't need to be famous)
6. When I mention North Lawndale, what images do you see (don't hold back)
7. Are you willing to share pictures, poems, websites, or anything that we can post onto the blog?

Check out http://northlawndalequilting.blogspot.com and provide feedback as to what you would add or improve.  You may post comments or send e-mails to valeriefleonard@msn.com.

Partners: Art Forward, Better Boys Foundation (BBF), Historic K-Town, North Lawndale Historical and Cultural Society, Urban Art Retreat

Help Us Preserve the African American History of North Lawndale

Help us to capture the African American heritage of North Lawndale. Please suggest links to websites featuring African Americans from North Lawndale, videos, articles, pictures, poems, oral histories etc. Feel free to submit your own material by e-mailing Valerie F. Leonard at valeriefleonard@msn.com.Not only will you help preserve history, but your stories can inspire the development of quilts depicting the African American culture in North Lawndale.

Pictures From Planning Meeting July 13, 2011

Notes From Planning Meeting July 13, 2011

Quilting Project Meeting Notes 7-13-11

Join the Project Planning Team!

Dear Friend of North Lawndale:

You are invited to participate in the North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project as a member of the project planning team.  If you have quilting experience, this would entail providing technical assistance in the development of workshops on quilting techniques and the heritage of North Lawndale.  If you don’t have quilting experience, this would entail assisting with overall project coordination and planning, community outreach and marketing and logistics planning.

The North Lawndale African American Heritage Quilting Project will engage North Lawndale residents in the research of the history and culture of African American residents and express their findings in a community quilt. Subject matter can include family trees, family traditions, poems, stories, famous quotes, neighborhood traditions, church  or organization traditions, famous people from North Lawndale, North Lawndale icons, the relationship between  African American and Jewish experiences in North Lawndale; the Civil Rights Movement; the  African influence in Mexico; the Migration of African Americans from the South, etc.  We will involve residents, block clubs, schools, senior buildings, churches and nonprofit organizations in the project. The number of quilts we produce is dependent on the number of people we get to participate in the project.  Lead organizations include the Better Boys Foundation (BBF), Historic K-Town (prospect), Lawndale Historic and Cultural Society and the Urban Art Retreat.  We are fortunate to have connected with local professional quilt artists and visual artists from the West Side and Quilters from the the Fernwood United Methodist Church, and Oakdale Church to lend their expertise as well.

Our first work group meeting will be on Wednesday, July 13, 2011 at 6:00, at the Better Boys Foundation (BBF) on the corner of 15^th Street and Pulaski in Chicago.  We will discuss project structure and division of labor moving forward. I have attached a copy of the project structure for your convenience.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me at valeriefleonard@msn.com or  773-521-3137.  We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday.

               

Sincerely,

Valerie F. Leonard

Project Manager

Participation Letter-Project Planning Team

North Lawndale Quilting Project Structure