Sue Dengler is a frequent shopper at the Kunkletown Thrift Store. She buys fabric, sheets and many other items to feed her craft habit.

Little did she know when she stumbled upon a jelly roll pack for $5 that she would turn it into a Best of Show piece for the West End Fair.

A jelly roll pack is 40 precut strips in matching fabric for projects. This one was Christmas themed with silver metallic highlights.

She made blocks and added a sheet for backing — from the thrift store, of course.

“I was shocked that I got Best of Show,” the longtime Kunkletown quilter said. She stops at the thrift store at least once a week.

“If she miss one week she comes in twice the next,” thrift volunteer Helen Dorshimer chimed in.

Dorshimer is responsible for the wonderful choice of craft items. When sheets are donated that can’t be used on beds, she takes them home and makes them into fabric pieces. Same with denim and other fabric.

Dengler made a stadium blanket out of denim patches that she entered into the Over 65 category at the fair.

“I walked into the thrift store and there were perfectly cut blocks,” Dengler said. She sewed them together, added backing and now has a heavy blanket that can be used to save a place in the stands.

Dorshimer said, “You never know what you’re going to get in donations.”

She has an eye for crafts, though. There might be a dress that is worn, but if has a beautiful pattern, she’ll make blocks.

“You can go a week or two without donations and then get bags and bags of yarn,” Dorshimer said.

Dengler also made a rag doll from a mop head, complete with a blue dress made from thrift fabric, of course.

She entered 60 items in all, including a lunch bag made from dollar store items, a purse, potholders from thrift fabric and baked goods and candies.

Not bad for someone who graduated from high school without being able to sew at all. She started working at the former Scotty’s Fashions, and five years later sewed her own wedding dress based on a Simplicity pattern.

“I didn’t sew and everything scared me to death,” she said. But she made her first quilt for her nephew when he was born in 1979.

It was a simple patchwork. She estimates she’d made 300 since that time.

“Right now I have 50 at home,” Dengler said. “I’m obsessed, I really am.”