April Kidd came from Tell City, Ind., with her friend Cindy Kaufman to her first Quilting Friends event at Maple Mount on March 9, 2025. It didn’t take her long to testify to the unifying power of quilting with a group of women.

“I’m happy to meet new people,” Kidd said. “I didn’t know a soul here, now I feel like they are family.”

The Quilting Friends are a group of women who either bring quilt tops they are working on, or use the ample amount of donated fabric on hand to make new tops. The quilt tops will either be hand quilted for the Mount Quilt Club, or machine quilted to use for Quilt Bingo on Sept. 14, both of which serve to support the mission of the Ursuline Sisters. A total of 21 women attended the Quilting Friends this year.

Sister Amelia Stenger began the Quilting Friends in 2002, and once again coordinated the event this year, which lasts from March 9-12. She sent personal invitations to many of the women, and filled Maple Hall with donated fabric for the quilters to choose their own patterns.

“It’s amazing how much fabric she has,” Kidd said. “I hope to do one (quilt top) a day.”

Linda Powell and Joyce George came from Evansville, Ind., and were also impressed by the amount of fabric that was available.

“Most women are fabric hoarders, they don’t want to share,” Powell said with a laugh. It was her first time at Maple Mount, but George came with the Runaway Quilters group that once used the former Mount Saint Joseph Conference and Retreat Center.

Powell took her first quilting class in 1990 and has never looked back. “You’re making something, you can see how you spent your time,” she said.

George considers quilting an escape.

“It’s like playing. If you want to be healthy, you do it every day.”

Cindy Murphy lives in Owensboro, and came for the first time with Karen McCarty, a 1974 graduate of Mount Saint Joseph Academy.

“I quilt every day if I can,” Murphy said. “I’m part of the St. Martin quilt group with Karen. It’s fun quilting with all these people. You get to share patterns and ideas.”

Kay Clark, of Owensboro, came last year, and brought Joni Hayden for the first time. Although Hayden had never attended a Quilting Friends event, she has a strong connection with the Ursuline Sisters and quilting.

“When I went through RCIA 30 years ago at Our Lady of Lourdes, Sister Rosanne (Spalding) took me to the quilting room,” Hayden said. “I’ve been quilting ever since.”

Clark’s mom began the quilting group at Lourdes with 15 people probably 40 years ago. Now Clark and Hayden are among the few quilters remaining, but Clark isn’t giving up any time soon.

“I feel like if I don’t sew something every day, it’s not right,” she said. “I like how pretty it is.”

She also enjoys quilting with a larger group of women at the Mount.

“I like the camaraderie here.”

Sally Fitzgerald, of Bowling Green, Ky., was one of the few veterans of the Quilting Friends. This was her seventh or eighth year to attend, and she also works on quilts for the Mount Quilt Club.

“I enjoy supporting the Sisters,” Fitzgerald said. On March 10, she completed a blue and yellow quilt top featuring Vincent Van Gogh’s painting “Starry Night.”

“And I didn’t have to cut my ear off,” she said with a laugh.