Omahan Robyn Devine has finally put down her knitting needles. For nearly a year, she wove yards of yarn into 100 fuzzy hats, all in different patterns.
Her purpose: To donate them to needy children in countries such as Russia and Kazakhstan.
It’s a project she started last September. She finished No. 100 last Saturday.
“I don’t know what to do now,” Devine, 33, joked. “It’s become a regular part of my day. I got home from work, cooked, cleaned and knit.”
She’d knit on the go, everywhere from coffeehouses to local pubs and the movie theater. She’d knit while eating breakfast, during lunch breaks and at home while watching TV.
Devine plans to mail the hats to Warm Woolies, a Colorado-based organization that accepts knitted items from people around the world and gives them to poor children in cold climates.
Devine learned to knit at age 19 when a colleague showed her. She grew up in the Chicago suburbs and moved to Omaha nearly 10 years ago.
She started close to home, donating sweaters, infant caps, gloves, blankets, socks, hats and scarves to homeless shelters and hospitals. She’s been making caps for premature babies at Creighton University Medical Center for a couple of years.
Then she read about Warm Woolies on a knitting blog. She couldn’t resist. She had to help. And so the project began.
Although she doesn’t have any “war wounds” per se, she did mention that she took breaks between hats because her hands would hurt.
“I would have to pause for a few days because I would get arthritis pains,” she said.
You can read about her journey at onehundredhats.typepad.com.
Devine hopes to educate others about the benefits of knitting and attract donors to her Warm Woolies project.
Contact the writer:
444-1075, j.loza@owh.com
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