Calico Geese Quilting Guild

On September 15, 2026, the Calico Geese Quilting Guild will be 40 years old. As a Cornell Cooperative Extension Home Economics unit, it integrates a community-based, Sullivan County county-wide membership of quilters into a thriving and productive organization. Members seek to foster, preserve, teach, and promote the art of quilt making and the caring and sharing of members’ efforts with each other, their families, and their community.

The Calico Geese Quilting Guild welcomes anyone interested in quilt-making or other sewing crafts to participate. The group meets every Thursday from 10:00 am to noon at the Cornell Cooperative Extension building in Liberty for a “Sewcial,” where members chat while they quilt, knit, embroider, and create other sewing projects. Saturdays find the group expanding their skills with a workshop on new techniques as well as a “Block-of-the-Month” seminar in which attendees each sew a piece for an original quilt. This allows all members to try a new quilting technique while making a block. These blocks are then assembled into quilts and donated.

The first major project completed by the Geese was the Quilt Banner for The Empire State Carousel. The first quilt exhibit by the Calico Geese was held during the month of November, 1987, at the Cultural Arts Center in Hurleyville, NY. When the Cornell Cooperative Extension building was completed and dedicated on December 15 1987, The Calico Geese were one of the first groups to move their meetings to the new facility. These fine ladies also were able to take a large portion of the proceeds from their raffle quilt of that year and donate these funds for the furnishing of the new Extension building. In addition, Sally Abrams created a beautiful quilt of the United States and donated it to the new building. This flag quilt still hangs in the lobby of the Cornell Cooperative Extension building.

The Calico Geese of Sullivan County continues its tradition of quilting combined with community outreach. The guild is still a part of Cornell Cooperative Extension. The talents of the members combine to make a raffle quilt each year -- a portion of the proceeds is given to a charitable cause in the local community. Members also make quilts and donate them to area nursing homes, homeless shelters, veterans' homes, women’s shelters and more. A highly successful community service effort, ongoing since May 1991, is the creation of baby quilts for donation to needy moms and their babies. Thousands of baby quilts have found their way to babies in need in Sullivan County.

To further the art of quilting, the Calico Geese hold workshops, drawing on the extensive talent pool of its members or bringing in well-known teachers. Conversation, quilting tips and techniques are demonstrated at the monthly business meetings which are held on the second

Tuesday of each month, the weekly Thursday “sewcials” and the Saturday Workshops held on the fourth Saturday of each month.

The guild is affiliated with the National Quilting Association (NQA), the American Quilting Society (AQS), and the Catskill Mountain Quilters Hall of Fame, located in Hunter, NY. The Hall of Fame brings together quilters from Schoharie, Greene, Delaware, Ulster, and Sullivan Counties. Sharing their art and caring for others is a natural part of their philosophy. The Calico Geese are fortunate to be well represented in the Hall of Fame.

To join the group, contact president Adrienne Hloderwski by calling 315-439-8144 or emailing Adrienne.hloderwski@gmail.com.

Last updated April 27, 2026