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KNIT pickers
Rogue River Elementary School first-graders Jacob Evans, front, David Thornhill, top, and Dakota Stout model their knitting-topped noggins at the Civic Club Friday. About two dozen women from Rogue River and Grants Pass knit and crochet all year long to provide children with hats for the winter. Two dozen women from Rogue River spend the year making hats to give to kids. On Friday, the children chose their favorites By BUFFY POLLOCK ROGUE RIVER - There were big hats, little hats, fuzzy hats, striped hats, hats of all colors and sizes - each one perfect for one certain youngster who came to find it Friday. "Sometimes they pick the ugliest ones," said Bonita Spencer, known for her granny squares and her fat, green frog hats with the big, red tongues. "Usually, a teacher or a mom will pick a prettier one out and say, 'How 'bout this one instead? This one's pretty.' But they aren't having it," she added, laughing. "They pull that ugly one down a little tighter on their head because that's the one and there's no changing their mind." Spencer is one of two dozen women who spend all year crocheting and knitting hats to give to children when the weather turns cold. Excited preschoolers and first- and second-graders from Rogue River and Evans Valley elementary schools, Christian Life School and Head Start spent Friday morning rummaging through the hats of every shape and color at the Civic Club on Oak Street. Coordinator Karen Thornton said the project began in 1992 with 20 hats and two hat makers. "It's evolved over the last decade to two dozen women and what looks like maybe 500 hats this year," she said. The idea, explained Thornton, came from a sewing shop in Jacksonville that collected homemade hats for charities to give out during winter. The owner even gave free yarn to anyone willing to make a few. "I did that for about three years, but every time I'd make a hat, I'd wonder which kid was going to wear it. Then I thought to myself, wouldn't it be neat if the kids could pick out their own?" Thornton said. In addition to civic club members and "just locals who knit or crochet," Thornton said, a weekly club called the Yarnovers of Grants Pass contributes to the project. The Yarnovers also make hats for charities, nursing homes and fire and police officials who work with children. Yarnovers member Sharon Keeth-Regan said seeing kids wearing the homemade hats proved to be the biggest incentive in making them. "The greatest thrill is doing it for these kids," she said, laughing as a redheaded girl strapped a pink pig to her head. "Sometimes I'll be out and see a kid wearing a cute hat and the mom will say they got it from Head Start and I know our group made it," she said. Among the more unusual Friday were brown bears with beady eyes, a striped jester cap with multiple puffballs on top, and a 4-foot-long blue-and-white striped stocking for just that right head - which turned out to be second-grader Kaitlin Gray's. "This one's long enough to keep my neck warm, too," giggled the 8-year-old as she pulled it on. And second-grader Katelyn Henkle, who had a tough time choosing her small pink bonnet, was amazed at the selection. "How could they have the patience to make all these cool hats?" wondered the 6-year-old. For information on the project or to donate yarn or hats, call Thornton at 541-660-7264; for the Grants Pass Yarnovers, call Donna Knowles at 541-474-0669. Buffy Pollock is a free-lance writer living in Medford. E-mail her at dob522@mindspring.com. |
