Koi Quilt, Paying It Forward

The woman who was going to buy my Kio Quilt was buying it for her father.  Kimberly emailed me last week letting me know that her father, who is 90 and knows what he wants and what he doesn’t, told her he liked the quilt he already had and didn’t want another.

Then she wrote that instead of buying my quilt she would donate the money to my blog and asked if I could find a person or family to give it to.

My first reaction was to write back to her and tell her that she didn’t have to do that. But I stopped and thought about it before responding to her email.  I could see that she really wanted to do this very generous thing.

And it didn’t take me long to think about Sue Silverstein as being the perfect person to receive the quilt.

Sue is the teacher at Bishop Maginn where Jon and the Army of Good have done so much good helping the kids who go there and their families.  She has worked there for years and has done so much for so many children in need from making sure they have something to eat for breakfast to helping them get into college.

Sue does not make much money, but she loves her work and the kids.  She opens her art room up in the summers for kids who have no place to go and keeps the garden behind the school going to help feed some of the families and donate to the local food bank.

Sue is also an artist, so I knew she’d appreciate the quilt on that level too.

But the thing that really made me think that this quilt, in particular, belongs to Sue is the story of the Koi swimming upstream.  Sue, like the Koi, has been swimming upstream for years.  Unlike the Koi in the story who has one great victory, Sue has many victories, big and small every time she helps another kid.

I’ll put the Koi Quilt in the mail to Sue on Monday.  And when I tell her Kimberly’s story, I know it will mean so much to her.

Thank you again Kimberly.