GRANBY — As Gloria Carver gently unfolds the quilt top onto the table, the glimpses of red, white and blue slowly reveal an Americana-checkerboard of stars and stripes.

Carver and Sue Keegan turn the quilt for the other quilters in the room to appreciate. Their exclamations of delight were nearly as bright and shining as the colorful quilt itself.

Over the past few months, members of the Granby Council on Aging Quilting Group collectively designed and sewed the quilt to raise funds for Friends of Granby’s Elderly. The quilt, inspired by the 250th anniversary of the United States, will be raffled at the Friends of Granby’s Elderly annual senior picnic on Sept. 17.

This particular quilt has been carefully curated by crafters ages 67 to 91. It takes hours of labor and precision to create the quilt, Keegan said, but the craftmanship ensures whichever family takes home this quilt will have it for generations to come.

Residents can see the quilt on display around Granby throughout the summer and purchase $10 raffle tickets for a chance to win the blanket. All proceeds go to the Friends of Granby’s Elderly, an organization that supports the local Council on Aging.

The Granby Council on Aging Quilting Group meets twice a month from 1 to 3 p.m. The 14 members from across the Pioneer Valley bring their latest craft, share recent creations and chat about their lives.

Granby Council on Aging Quilting Group leader Elinor White has been quilting since she turned 75. Now 91, White finds her favorite part of quilting is not the craft itself, but the socialization. Members leave their grandkids or health concerns outside, and instead “share the good times,” she said.

Donna Mugnier of Friends of Granby’s Elderly approached White about creating a raffle prize for the organization’s fundraiser. When White brought the idea to the group, they immediately decided the winner would receive a quilt.

White, Carver and Keegan perused quilt design books to narrow their pattern choices, since the patriotic color scheme and star shapes could make hundreds of combinations. Eventually, they opted to go with a design from “Quick-Method Liberty Quilts.”

Each of the women dipped into their fabric stash, carefully cut the shapes into a sawtooth star and stitched together six unique quilt squares.

“The points need to be very exact,” Keegan said. “Cutting or sewing off the corner even a little bit will show up.”

While all the members chipped in, Carver headed the quilt assembly. She sewed the 56 quilt squares together to create the top. Her longarm machine will also take care of the quilting part, sewing the top, batting and backing of the quilt together with a pattern of the group’s choosing.

Each quilt square took an estimated two hours. Keegan, who is adept in piece quilting, finished in about half the time.

Most of the members are experienced quilters with at least 10 years under their belt. Several of the women belong to Hands Across the Valley, an Amherst quilting guild. Mary Herman has won two awards at the Hands Across the Valley Quilt Guild shows. Her appliqué designs intricately layer smaller pieces of fabric and embroidery to create the illusion of brush strokes.

But despite working with advanced techniques, Herman found the quilt squares took longer than expected.

“This is not my forte,” she said.

Quilting for a cause is not new to most of the Granby Council on Aging Quilting Group. Laura Kline sews geometric quilt tops by hand for shelters. Brenda Knight creates hundreds of baby quilts from 4-inch squares of unique patterns and characters for Shriners Children’s New England. Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, when no one could give fabric goods, Knight would meet Shriners staff on the loading dock, giving them 114 quilts.

Now, the group can add the Friends of Granby’s Elderly quilt raffle to their list.