With Love From Friends

I met the lovely Eve Elzenga at the 2011 Fiber Art show at the Memorial Art Gallery last April. She told me about the With Love From Friends project she founded in 2008. Its purpose is to make and distribute Valentine’s Day cards for elders in our community who are without families. (The project now makes Veterans Day remembrances too.)

Eve was honored to win a 2011 Jefferson Award for her public service!

The name comes from the words inside each card, “With Love, from Friends”.

Actually, the project’s goals are three-fold:

• To make unique/beautiful homemade Valentines that are distributed to elderly people without families in the Rochester region. This “remembrance” is a symbol of both love and respect for elders.

• To introduce creative, compassionate adults to one another to build/strengthen community ties and goodwill.

• To have fun while being creative.

As Eve explained the project to me, I told her she had me at “making cards”! When I got home that night, I looked through all the photos from 2011.

Here’s how to get involved:

1. Volunteer to Make Cards: call or email for information.
585 733-2579
Email Eve Elzenga

2. Organize your card/scrapbooking/artist group to make cards.

3. Make a Cash Gift for supplies/materials.

4. Donate Craft Store Gift Cards or New/Vintage Craft Materials.

I think Rochester Artisans are perfectly suited to to help with this project! I would be so proud if we could count ourselves among the 70+ artists expected to participate, to help Eve reach her 2012 goal of creating 1500 Valentine’s Day cards.

Eve emailed me the following schedule for card-making:

With Love From Friends
415 Mt. Vernon Avenue
Rochester, NY 14620

Thur, Jan 19: 1 – 8 pm
Fri, Jan 20:  11 – 8 pm
Sun, Jan 22: 11 – 6 pm
Mon, Jan 23: 1 – 8 pm
Tues, Jan 24: 1 – 8 pm
Wed, Jan 25: 2 – 7 pm
Fri, Jan 27:    2 – 8 pm
Sat, Jan 28: 10 – 6 pm
Mon, Jan 30: 11 – 5 pm finish up day
Tues, Jan 31 1 – 4 pm final day

I’m going this Sunday, January 22 at 11:00 – and invite you to join me there!

Whenever you decide to go, be sure to shoot Eve an email so she knows how many people to expect at each session.

For further information:
585 733-2579
Email Eve Elzenga or visit With Love from Friends.