By Cecily Harrison

When LFCSA parent Sherrell Cuneo saw a quilt being auctioned at Wagon Wheel, the preschool her daughter, Apple, attended, she though, “I could do that.” So when Apple was accepted to LFCSA, Cuneo proposed to create a quilt for the next fundraiser. “It made sense for a new school,” she said. With a mere three-month deadline to get the quilt finished by the time of the upcoming auction fundraiser, she focused on what would make the quilt unique and what would motivate a parent to want to own it.

Cuneo by trade is a costumer, and she gained inspiration for the quilt project from the women of Gee’s Bend, whose distinctive quilting style is based on traditional American and African-American patterns. This gave her the idea of a quilt made up of the handprints of each student with their names embroidered and sewn together. Cuneo also enlisted other parents of the School’s community to work on the collaboration.

Cuneo created a grid—approximately 120 student hands worked out to an eleven by eleven grid pattern. She sought out fellow costumers and LFCSA moms Candice Cain and Nikii Henry to help devise a color scheme. She and Maggie Goldman, a neighbor and LFCSA founding parent, journeyed downtown for fabrics. Jenny Werndorf traced her son Oliver’s impressive hand to provide a template, from which the 11″ x 11″ square patch measurement was derived. The individual patches would then be sewn together to make the quilt.

Elise Brebes hosted the first quilt meeting at her home. “We were looking for whoever showed up,” said Cuneo, noting that embroiderers were hard to find. Goldman asked the Room Mothers (the teacher-to-parent liaisons in each class) to help obtain children’s handprints and signatures, and Reg Jones provided invaluable organization. The group arranged to have finished patches dropped off at a designated area at the School.
Quilting groups gathered in homes, over twenty quilters in all. Cuneo said that watching the busy mothers (and one dad, David Buik) quietly working together on a quilt reminded her of a Shakespeare Festival, where actors living otherwise gypsy lives from theatre-to-theatre, comfortably utilized traditional skills of sewing and embroidery. “Handwork gives a sense of peace,” said Cuneo, adding, “except, of course, when thread gets snarled.”

With the fundraiser deadline fast approaching, Cuneo said, “The quilt was all over the place, it took on a life of its own.” She took to calling herself the “Quilt Wrangler,” since completing the quilt required a multitude of logistics. Patches were coming in at intervals—at one point, there were too many red squares and the configuration had to be reworked. But everything eventually got coordinated, and the quilt was finished on schedule.

Once the quilt was in the pipeline and slated to be auctioned off at the fundraiser, though, Cuneo & Co. realized that perhaps this was not the time to auction off an item that represents in so emotional a way the beginning of LFCSA. As Marta Alcumbrac put it, “The quilt symbolizes each child’s first year, and their parents’ trust and faith in our school.” Instead of being auctioned off, they proposed that the handprint quilt be displayed in the School’s entry, as an ongoing fundraiser. The proposal was widely accepted. Squares are available for sponsorship purchase of $10 or more, and Cuneo believes that one day the quilt will indeed be auctioned for the benefit of the School. But just as a quilt is a collaborative work, so is LFCSA. The handprint quilt proudly displayed near Principal Karen Newlin’s office serves as a testament to the community’s creativity and commitment and a symbol of how parents, children, and staff join together to make LFCSA happen, every day.