When the first money came in for the Ukrainian Relief, the local fire station told me about some medical kits that first responders needed in Ukraine. They asked us to consider paying for some of them.

Our contact here in Poland, Pawel, told me about this need. At the time, I promised to pay for five. A couple of days later he called and asked us if we would consider sponsoring another five as they had actually ordered 20 and another organization (a tv station) had paid for 5, another person from the states, had sponsored 5 and we had sponsored 5. That left 5 more. I told him that we could take care of the last 5 as well.

But between then and now we’ve been waiting for them to come in. We knew that the company had been hit hard with orders from all over Europe as countries were ordering them for Ukraine. The local fire stations need them as do rescue work after bombs hit. (I’m sorry - I know it’s not a pleasant thought!) Anyway…originally we were told they would come in “right away”, so I got the money over here to Poland and have been waiting.

Until the other day. Tuesday.

Pawel called me and told me 8 of the bags were in - did I want to wait for the other two, or go ahead and get these on their way to Ukraine now? I told him I thought it would be wise to have these go on to Ukraine and we can deal with the last two when they get here. He thought that was a good idea.

So when others were out shopping for goods to head to Ukraine, Mike and I went to a local fire station where the bags were and saw their unveiling.

We had to take pictures and receive the bill (to pay for them) and see them ‘on their way’ to a convoy which left the day I am writing this to head to a town in central Ukraine.

Here’s a very short video showing the bags.

Here is the entire collection. It’s pretty impressive! We will have two more coming - whenever the manufacturer finishes them.

We received 5 bags and 3 backpacks. Sometimes the firemen have to carry everything on their backs as they go inside a burning or bombed out building. These bags contain everything they need to do the rescue work they are trained to do - including simple operations on the field.

Thank you, all of you for providing for these. They cost just about $1000 each.

I thought that was a good use of the money we’ve been given. I told the firemen to tell the Ukrainians that a “bunch of older ladies bought these for them”. :)

LOL

I know not everyone is an older woman, but the vast majority of people who are quilters are seniors - or at least over 50 and to a 25 year-old - that’s an “old woman”. I hoped you would smile at that. If you are man, well, just forgive me. I told them that it wasn’t “only” older women - but the majority of the donors of this money is older women (but I know that for most of you who are married - it is a joint donation.)

After unpacking them all, and the firemen looking at them and checking them out, they took the 8 bags to the fire truck where they were then going to transport them to Warsaw and get them on a convoy in the early morning.

They asked us if we wanted to go but we really didn’t want to go as it would pretty much have taken the rest of the evening - at was already about 7 pm. Both of us have been tired and going in all directions for a while now.

Since we’ve been waiting for these to arrive for quite some time now (considering), I am relieved that so far we’ve gotten 8 of them. It feels like one thing we can check off.

We know that the firemen in Ukraine are incredibly grateful.

Thank you once again for your concern for those who need help at this time.

Be sure to check out what my sis has for you in the store here!

Here’s one of the beauties we have!