We were so fortunate to have beautiful sunshine for a glorious turn out at the end of the Hug exhibition. The media were present including Anglia TV (watch from 22 minutes in),
BBC Radio Norfolk (listen from 1:38:40), on the BBC News website and several local press in attendance.
The Friends of St Andrew’s Church Little Massingham (FOSALM) and Quilts 4 Care Leavers (q4cl.org.uk) have joined forces to organise the stitching together of a Giant HUG that will be large enough to wrap around St. Andrew’s Church in Lt. Massingham.
The “Let’s Give a Giant Hug” project was launched in November 2023 with lots of local interest.
The Friends of St. Andrew’s Charity has been successfully raising vital funds to help restore the church roof after thieves stole the lead from the roof back in 2017. We’ve managed to raise around £20,000 so far, but our overall target is £150,000!
The church, a Grade 1 Listed building on Heritage England at Risk Register, is in desperate need of a HUG, but so too are the young adults who have had a hard start in life being brought up in care.
- With so many fantastic quilters from around the UK coming forward to help us it is looking as if we might make the target of over 50 quilts!
- Each quilt is 72″ (6 ft) long and we’d need 50 plus of them end to end to go around the circumference of the church.
- After the hugs have been exhibited, Quits 4 Care Leavers will attach the backing, wadding and topstitching. The quilts will return to the church once more before being handed over to the local authorities to distribute to care leavers in the East Anglia region.
Quilts 4 Care Leavers provide quilted hugs for young adults who have been in care and are making their first steps into independent living. Once discharged from the local authority care system, these 16-25 year old young adults are effectively on their own, often with very limited resources.