Quilting remains a popular hobby nationwide, with an estimated 9 to 11 million active participants over the past decade, according to a craft industry survey. In Manteca, local quilters are part of that growing community.
Sunday marked the 46th annual Manteca Quilters Guild Quilt and Fiber Arts Show. The event featured bed turning, quilting demonstrations, vendors, quilted clothing and dolls, as well as a "Life in the Garden" exhibit.
Each stitch can take time, but after a year-or-so, a masterpiece in the form of a handmade quilt is complete.
"Sometimes with this fast-paced world that we live in, it's all about production and getting things done, and just getting it out the door," Sara Hardy-Wilcox, Manteca Quilters president, said. "Some of these quilts, you actually have to take time to slow down, enjoy the process, enjoy what you're doing."
Members say quilting allows them to slow down and draw inspiration from nature.
Hardy-Wilcox said the guild has more than 100 members, and about 350 people attended the show Saturday, with a smaller crowd expected Sunday.
"I started a guild in Colorado; I moved here, didn't know anybody, so I just went online, and I knew if I found a group here, I would not feel so alone," Hardy-Wilcox said.
An Oxford academic study found creative craft hobbies like quilting can "be a meaningful vehicle for enhancing wellbeing".
"Quilting lets me forget about my stress," Gwendolyn Grace, Manteca Quilters vice president, said. "It's very relaxing. And being able to look at something you created is very rewarding. So, it's a creative outlet."
Carla Daugherty-Bicomong said she learned off of YouTube and started quilting during the COVID-19 pandemic. She enjoys that quilting can be a family heirloom you can pass on to your loved ones.
"They always say quilts outlive you," Daugherty-Bicomong said. "So, make beautiful things that you can hand down to your family and pass on, and that becomes that family heirloom that you share ... I love [that] because I know that I'm passing things down."
Quilting can also be mobile, as Daugherty-Bicomong takes her quilting to-go -- including at church.
There's also some healthy competition. People got to vote on their favorite quilts. Daugherty-Bicomong's quilt representing the four seasons finished first for wool, and Hardy-Wilcox's "Sewing Basket by Laundry Basket Quilts" got second in traditional.
The Quilts of Valor Foundation's mission is to cover veterans and military men and women touched by war with comforting Quilts of Valor - with more than 436,400 quilts being awarded nationally to date, according to the Manteca Quilters Guild, who've joined the cause.
The guild is always looking for new members, from young to old, inexperienced to experienced. Their meetings are on the fourth Thursday of each month, January through October at 6 p.m. in the Manteca Senior Center.