The Travels of the Dream Quilt

November 8, 2006

In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the discovery of REM sleep in 2003, the first Dream Quilt was created by many dedicated people in the sleep community. It made its debut and was proudly displayed at the National Sleep Foundation's Gala “A Night of a Thousand Dreams” in Washington, D.C. With the growing interest and participation of many individuals, the Dream Quilt has been an annual and ongoing sleep awareness effort. Funding is made possible through donations and an entry fee required with each quilt square submission. We are currently in the midst of collecting squares for quilt number five!

The quilts are made to be traveling exhibits to bring sleep awareness to communities during National Sleep Awareness Week, and throughout the year. Each new quilt is assembled in a little quilt shop in Massachusetts, and begins its journey with National Sleep Awareness Week. They have been on display on primary and secondary school campuses in Indiana, Montana and Massachusetts; hospital lobbies; a counseling center for children in Birmingham, Alabama; and on the walls of the quilt shop in Massachusetts where the finishing touches have been made on each of the quilts. The Dream Quilt was included in a segment about sleep disorders for an American Family series, produced by GoodLife Television, a cable company affiliated with Washington Times Newspaper Corp. Fatal Fatigue, a group of people dedicated to promoting awareness about drowsy driving due to the loss of loved ones in drowsy driving accidents, utilized the Dream Quilt at their booth at a state fair in Washington. In Canada, the Ontario Provincial Police have used the Dream Quilt in conjunction with their roadside drowsy driving awareness “Driver Reviver” stations. The awesome quilts are continually making their way into communities across the country and in Canada bringing sleep awareness in less than likely places.

Sleepy Seeds, a greeting card company with a mission to “plant awareness” about narcolepsy and the importance of sleep education and advocacy, produced note cards with the image of the 2003 Dream Quilt on the front and an awareness message on the back. The image continues to be popular, and a second printing is nearly out of stock.

The quilts have traveled to several sleep related conferences and events, including those of the Narcolepsy Network, the National Sleep Foundation, the Association of Polysomnographic Technologists, and the meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies. The Dream Quilt has had audiences in the cities of Seattle, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago.

Looking at the finished work of art, the purpose of the quilt becomes apparent. As each square portrays an individual's experience and expression, such as breakthroughs in sleep science, unbounded creativity, burdens of exhaustion, and fortitude of hope, it inherently compliments adjacent portraits, and is predictably bound together by threads of community. Greater awareness and continued progress is its message of inspiration.

Submission guidelines and quilt squares are always available upon request. Do you have an exhibition opportunity for a Dream Quilt to travel to your community? Less than likely places for sleep awareness might be at your local library, a quilt show, health fair, a county or state fair. You are invited to join in and leave your mark on the Dream Quilt. For further information, please contact Michelle Hemingway, 46 Arnold Rd., Fiskdale, MA 01518. Phone: (508) 347-5473 Email: sleepyseeds@charter.net

If you would like to receive a quilt square to decorate, please email bkane@talkaboutsleep.com and we will be happy to send one or more to you.

You can also download the submission form here (requires Microsoft Word to view).