A New Year Bag of Blankets

January 2021, what a month!  As the days went by in this new year, somehow Happy New Year did not seem to fit with what was actually happening.

A deadly riot in our nation’s Capitol, an Inauguration surrounded by National Guard Troops and fences with barbed wire on top, a Covid vaccine rollout with numerous shortages, reports of mutant Covid virus strains globally and the news that this is one of the driest winters in California in twenty years. The latter certainly does not bode well for fire season.

Getting back to normal seems like a moving target which makes having patience for that even harder. I think many of us feel less depressed when we can do something to make things better, but right now so much is out of our control. I was feeling pretty helpless until I got a blanket request from a social worker:  7 children, ages 5-17, had lost their father due to health issues.  She asked if I had a Project Linus blanket for each of them.

Thanks to our creative Blanketeers, I could fill that blanket request.  I started with the oldest and pulled out blankets from my blanket inventory for each child down to the 5 year old. When I finished, I could barely pick up the large plastic bag I use for blanket deliveries.

I can’t control the virus or make vaccines.  I cannot control the political divide our country finds itself in or the violence that stems from that divide.  And I know I cannot make to rain, which it is doing now, but not because of me.  But I could fill a bag  with beautiful, warm, handmade blankets to, hopefully, provide some comfort to 7 children who lost their father.

In spite of January’s challenges, 31 blankets were made this month and I delivered 25 to local agencies. With the help of our Blanketeers, I will keep filling blanket bags, making blanket deliveries knowing we are doing what we can to make the lives of a few children a little bit better.