Our Story
“They say every quilt tells a story and that every story has two sides.”
The first side of our story began over 100 years ago in this little church where families and friends gathered to worship and share their stories. The second side started over a decade ago and continues today in this Meeting House where families and friends gather to tell their stories and quilt in peace.
The stories remain tucked away, like an old quilt, and continue to radiate peace and comfort to all that enter. The peace one feels on the first visit lingers, like the tales bound by the stitches of an old handmade quilt.
– Sheila Mae Chabot
Meet the Owner, Sheila Chabot
I found my love for quilting many years ago, at my grandmother’s farm. She was a humble woman, with eighteen children. She taught me to sew on her treadle machine, and though the machine has lost most of its parts, I cherish it to this day.
Having a large family during the Great Depression made for a utilitarian way of life. While my grandmother’s quilts were made for use, they are quite beautiful as well. She found pleasure in handwork, and her quilts are evidence of the love she had for the craft.
Today, I try to live by my grandmother’s example. Quilts are heirlooms, memories, stories, and needful things. I hope you find my website and shop useful. May your quilts be crafted with heart in hand.
Meet the Team
Sheila Chabot
Shopkeeper, Designer Coordinator
Katherine Bodzioch
FB Group Leader
(Meeting House Links You)
SewAway and Retreat Coordinator
LisaMarie Mikkola
Beginner Instructor
Leslie Addicks
Intermediate–Advanced
Quilting Instructor
Patti Flannery
Special Sales Events Coordinator
Lucie Satkowski
Longarm Quilting and Binding Services LakeView Quilting
Tara Taglieri
Instructor and Open Sew Hosting
Sylvia Moriarty
Shop Hostess spreading the love
Janet McDonald
Project Kit Specialist
History of St. Monica’s
1901 – 2007
Set back in the quiet little town of Wales, Massachusetts, this little church holds such honorable memories for so many. Each day we are blessed to hear the stories of this special place. It warms our hearts when a couple enters the shop and reflects on the day they were married here, or where they sat as children growing up attending church here. We feel blessed when someone expresses how “peaceful” they feel when they enter. The spirit of this little church shall last forever.
Father Thomas O’Keefe, a Catholic priest, acquired the land on March 6, 1901 from Edward and Sarah Loudon for $1. Built in 1901 by Timothy J. Hynes of Wales, both Protestants and Catholics worked to fund the building of the church. (In fact, more than half the money to build the church came from non-Catholics.) Donors’ names remain proudly displayed on the building’s beautiful stained glass windows today.
In 1931, a second parcel of land, the Shawville Mill site, was bought by Father O’Keefe for $60. That same year, Father O’Keefe purchased and dismantled the Madonna Chapel in Monson, Massachusetts, and moved it to Wales, where it was reassembled to become the south wing of St. Monica’s.
This little church was the center of religious activity for Catholics from Brimfield, Holland, and Wales for nearly 108 years. Baptisms, first communions and marriages were celebrated here, as well as catechism classes. Legend has it that the first woman baptized in St. Monica’s was also the first person buried here, having died in childbirth.
On September 7, 2008 the formal closing of St. Monica’s Mission Church was held. The service was celebrated by Father Jeddie Brooks and co-celebrated by Father Eugene Plasse and Father Roy Duquette. Fr. Brooks emphasized the “faith of the people” and individual and collective “memory boxes” whereby St. Monica’s will not be lost in time, but remain in our collective memories.