Photos and story by
Mary Pannabecker Steiner
Wanda Stopher loves a big project, so the concept of sewing 60 comforters in 2½ years – as a way to mark her 60th birthday – didn’t feel overly daunting. With more than adequate sewing skills and a background in project management, she knew how to make a plan.

More photos at bottom of story -

Stopher first contemplated her 60/60 project when a friend told her about Karen Kreider Yoder, who had completed a similar project in honor of her own 60th birthday.

Like Kreider Yoder, Stopher planned to donate her 60 comforters to Mennonite Central Committee, which distributes comforters and blankets to individuals in Jordan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), Ukraine, Iraq, Zambia, Syria, Somalia, Lebanon, Haiti, Burkina Faso, Canada, and the U.S.

Stopher, who is pastor of spiritual formation at Bluffton First Mennonite Church, knew she’d take on the project when she “couldn’t think about anything else.” But before starting, she asked the Mennonite Women’s group at First Mennonite if they were willing to collaborate with her to complete the knotting of each comforter.

She also estimated the costs of fabric and batting to see if the project was economically feasible. Even after she’d begun, she wasn’t convinced she’d be able to complete the project until she’d completed the first comforter in November 2016.

Stopher remembers that first comforter clearly. She began with a fat quarter of fabric of navy blue, pink, green, yellow and some red print – purchased at the Bluffton Senior Center. A longtime seamstress and quilter, Stopher let the fabric tell her what to do with each comforter design.

“I designed each separately even though a number of them are made up of five inch squares,” said Stopher. Using fabrics from such diverse fields required careful thought in how to use them. She combined her sewing skills and project management knowledge with childhood hours spent at her engineer father’s drafting table. It was there that she learned how to reduce/enlarge on a proportional scale.

As a child, her first sewing project was making pockets, which were actually tiny bags in which she carried small items. From there, she progressed to clothing and made her first quilt when her oldest daughter, Erin, was born.

During the past 2½ years, she hit a wall just briefly when her daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren moved back to Ohio, locating just two hours away instead of the previous five hours. She wished she’d already finished the project so she could spend more time with them.

“That’s when I started using larger pieces of fabric, making more contemporary designs,” she said, knowing she was committed to finish the project before her 60th birthday– June 10, 2019.  

By the end – April 2019 – she’d completed 64, with an additional comforter donated by Karen Kreider Yoder, one from a niece, and two from her mom, Sharon Lantz (who also bound at least 50 of the comforters.)

On Sunday, April 28, First Mennonite celebrated worship in with the sanctuary blanketed by 68 comforters, and held a blessing of the comforters.

For Stopher, having a project is simply a way of life.

“I always have a project. I hate that time when I don’t have a new project. I feel lost,” said Stopher, who intends to continue making comforters for MCC although not in such large quantity.

At the moment, she has no project underway and admits “I’m lost.” Contributing to that feeling is the fact that Stopher has just begun a three-month sabbatical from her job at FMC.

First up is participation in a Mennonite Central Committee learning tour of the south Texas borderlands, before returning home to rest, spend time with her family, visit some other churches, and likely  do some sewing and gardening before returning to FMC in August.

During the blessing of the comforters, Stopher shared the following statistics from the project:
• 9 yards of fabric 44/45” wide per comforter=612 total yards
• 16 friends and family contributed fabric
• 75 or so people age 5-95 helped knot
• 11,220 total handtied knots
• Total of 19,040” binding
• Sarah Basinger and other Mennonite Women were tireless organizers and encouragers
• 1 Mom who bound at least 50 of the comforters herself!
• 2,265 square feet of batting
• Estimated 20 hours per comforter = 1,360 hours = 34 40-hour workweeks!