(COLORADO SPRINGS) — At a special ceremony on Veterans Day, Monday, Nov. 11, “Quilts of Valor” gifted handmade quilts to veterans nominated by family and friends.
The first Quilt of Valor was awarded at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in November 2003, after founder Katherine Roberts dreamed of quilts providing comfort to a deployed soldier struggling with despair, while her son was deployed to Iraq.
Since then, chapters have sprung up across the country. The Mount Carmel Quilters, the group that makes and awards quilts to veterans living in El Paso County, Pueblo, and south-central Colorado, was started by a former Mount Carmel Center employee.
“Each stitch that holds the layers together represents love, gratitude, and sometimes the tears of the maker, probably mine,” said Mandi Elder, group coordinator for Mt. Carmel Quilts of Valor. “We believe that as we sew love, caring and gratitude flows from our hearts as quilters through our hands into the quilts that we make. And all of us as quilters want you to know that through our quilts, you are forever in our hearts. Thank you for your service to our nation.”