Janet Storton reaches out to
“Sisters of the Heart”
By Jim Cornelius

A Sisters woman’s love for quilting has changed the lives of the women of a small village in Uganda.

Janet Storton first visited Kapchorwa, a village in the eastern Uganda highlands, in 2007, as part of a medical team organized through All Nations Ministry, whose director Mike Parker attends Sisters Community Church.

The trip was a fulfillment of a long-deferred dream Janet had nurtured since she was 9 or 10 years old.

“From that age, I thought ‘one of these days, I’m going to travel the world,’” she recalled.

That day had to wait a few decades. She married, became a mother, raised children in San Diego, then moved to Sisters with her husband Peter in 1994, where he became a Realtor and she opened a successful interior design business. After selling the business and retiring, Storton decided to fulfill that dream.

“I thought, ‘well, maybe it’s my time,’” she said. “I thought it would be a one-trip deal. I had no idea this was going to take over my life — in a good way.”

Storton brought along two fateful items — quilts she had made for children she and Peter sponsor through the church. Mercy was 7 when the Stortons began their sponsorship; she is now 10. Job, now 14, was also 7 when the sponsorship began.

“I decided to make them each a quilt,” Storton said.

When she unveiled the quilts to give them to the children, they created a sensation among the women of Kapchorwa.

“They kept calling them ‘the Blankets of Color,’” Storton said. “They had just never seen anything like this.”

The women of the village begged Storton to return and show them how to make the Blankets of Color.

Three months later, she did.

“When I got there, out of 20 women, two knew how to sew a straight line — and barely that,” she said.

Storton taught the women the basics — and experienced tremendous joy.

“It was the most fun I’d ever had in my whole life, those two weeks,” she said.

But that was far from the end of the endeavor. The village only had four sewing machines. They needed more.

Storton raised funds to purchase them, returned to Uganda yet again and bought a truckful of sewing machines and drove them up to Kapchorwa. It was something of a minor miracle that the machines were not hijacked by police who tend to confiscate useful, salable items.

“The women couldn’t believe it when they saw that truckful of sewing machines,” Storton recalled with a smile.

Storton and the leaders of Christ Glorious Church in Kapchorwa are conscious of her security at all times and she is careful about where, when and with whom she travels. Fortunately, there are others from the Sisters area who are engaged in development projects in Uganda, including helping Ugandans bring their coffee products to market.

“If it wasn’t for John Hornbeck and Paul Rawlins (of Sisters Community Church), I couldn’t go,” she said. “They’ve become my travel buddies.”

Uganda remains a relatively dangerous place, but that does not deter the Sisters quilter.

“You have health issues and hygiene issues and some safety concerns from time to time, but it is so worth it,” Storton said.

The project has grown into a formal program called Sisters of the Heart — because that’s how Storton views the women of Kapchorwa. Sisters of the Heart has developed a micro-loan program to aid villagers in developing small businesses that can sustain them.

Storton’s work has drawn the approving attention of Uganda’s President, Yoweri Museveni, and Sisters of the Heart was awarded a $25,000 U.S. Embassy Grant to construct a vocational school.
“That was beyond anything I’d ever dreamed,” Storton said.

While at home in Sisters, Storton has written a book titled “Mercy’s Quilt,” telling the story of her sponsor child. Some 20 readers have inquired about child sponsorship after reading the book.

Storton is also selling Ugandan quilts in the U.S., especially at the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show, with the proceeds funding Sisters of the Heart’s work in Kapchorwa.

She also finds time to enjoy her granddaughter, Vaughn.

Sometimes Storton feels like she’s caught up in a powerful current that is sweeping her along to unexpected destinations. She’s been to Uganda eight times in the past three years and will return again to monitor the progress of the program.

“Everything keeps happening and I just show up,” she said.

The people of Uganda are ever thankful that she does. For more information visit www.sistersoftheheartfoundation.org.

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