SEQUIM — Carol Clevenger grew up in the shadow of Mount Rainier in a house without blankets.
Even now, she has little use for them.
Clevenger is a quilter — still in love with her work after some six decades doing it. The Sequim resident is also the featured artist in the 25th annual Sunbonnet Sue Quilt Club show, a celebration of more than 200 quilts.
The silver anniversary show is open from 10 a.m. till 5 p.m. today, Saturday and Sunday in the Sequim Middle School gym, 301 W. Hendrickson Road, and admission is a $5 donation.
Quilt fans are invited to vote for the People’s Choice award winner, added club spokeswoman Gail Mabbutt. Voting will be open today through 3 p.m. Sunday.
Like each of the 150 club members who take part in the show, Clevenger adds her own touches to her quilts. Her signature is a bird of a different color on each quilt she makes.
Clevenger’s handiwork is part of the exhibition that also includes demonstrations, heirloom and art quilts, and a vendors’ mall and country store. And then there’s the members’ challenge, in which more than 100 quilters created quilts with a silver-anniversary theme.
Clevenger, for her part, started quilting because she had to. She had to work on a school project when she was a teenager in Buckley — but ever since then, she says, she has quilted for the joy of it.
To others who might take up quilting, Clevenger says: “Don’t be afraid of it. Be bold. When you’re done, you get a feeling you don’t get from most things.”
Each year, the Sunbonnet Sue show is held during the Sequim Lavender Festival, adding yet another attraction to the events taking place in and around Sequim.
Also every year, art dolls and other gifts are made to be given as awards to the best in show, best large and small quilts, and other outstanding entries.
“For the first time ever, we will be announcing the winners and hanging the ribbons on the winning quilts on Sunday,” said Mabbutt. The winners will be named at 4:15 p.m., right after the winner of the drawing for a quilt is announced.
To learn more about the local quilters, visit www.SunbonnetSueQuiltClub.org.
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Features Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-417-3550 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
