She gives the gift of warmth

It’s not often that you get someone on a charity aspect that’s willing to put this much into it and keep it going for so many years. And it’s gotten stronger and stronger to where we’re getting over 3,000 items a year.”

Steven Berg

Audio

She gives the gift of warmth_Allie Johnson.mp3

When temperatures fell below zero one Sunday morning this past winter, Barb Melom had a thought. Her husband, a former social worker, had told her that many patients at Hennepin County Medical Center arrive at the emergency room with no warm clothing and are discharged back out into the cold at all hours of the night.
So Melom called HCMC and left a message for the social worker on duty, asking if the hospital could use any winter hats to give out to patients.
“The phone rang like two minutes later and [the social worker] said to me, ‘How many hats do you have, and how soon can you be here?’” she said.
Melom, 84, and a friend loaded up the trunk of her car with dozens of knit hats. The two of them drove downtown to HCMC.
“Two nurses came out and took the hats,” she said. “I felt so good about doing that because I knew they were really going to need hats – and need them right away.”
This was far from a one-off instance for Melom. For the past 17 years, the retired speech therapist has been the driving force behind a knitting movement to make hats for those in need.
It all began in 2009, when Melom had the idea to bring 60 hats as gifts for the residents at Simpson Housing Services, where she and her mother-in-law were volunteering on Christmas Eve. She put a call out to members of her church, and word spread quickly.
She ended up with 300 hats. That’s when she realized this could be something bigger.
Over the years, Melom has built a large network of like-minded knitters across the Twin Cities with a mission to make and distribute hats to members of the community who could use some extra warmth during the colder months. These days, she estimates they probably get about 3,000 hats per year.
Melom first approached knitting groups from other churches in the area to start making hats. Knitters from First Universalist Church, St. Thomas the Apostle Church, and Lake Harriet Methodist Church are still listed as some of the project’s main “collaborators.”
“I like to use the phrase ‘give the gift of warmth,’” said Melom. “When people ask, is it OK if I knit a scarf instead of a hat, I tell them ‘give the gift of warmth.’ You just do a better job knitting things that you like.”
She also visited local yarn shops to recruit more knitters. These businesses, including Dandelion Fiber Company, Harriet & Alice, Ingebretsen’s Scandinavian Gifts and Foods, and StevenBe, currently serve as drop-off sites for donations.
StevenBe’s owner, Steven Berg, said he and Melom have developed a close relationship since the first day she walked into his shop all those years ago. He describes her as a “good friend.”
“She’s got a real drive to make this succeed,” said Berg. “It’s not often that you get someone on a charity aspect that’s willing to put this much into it and keep it going for so many years. And it’s gotten stronger and stronger to where we’re getting over 3,000 items a year.”
Thanks to Ravelry, a community site for knitters and crocheters, the movement has expanded beyond Minnesota. People have mailed in hats from places like Florida, Illinois, and Maine.
Donations are accepted year round, Melom said, although they typically do not start distributing hats until November.
Organizations that have received the hats include shelters like that of Simpson Housing Services and Sharing and Caring Hands, as well as food shelves and schools. During that same cold spell earlier this year, Melom said she also stopped by The Aliveness Project on Nicollet Avenue and gave some hats to some people there.
Despite her age, Melon is still the primary person delivering the hats, although she’s often accompanied by other members of the group, including Berg.
Berg said he particularly enjoys going with Melom to bring hats to kids at the Head Start McKnight Early Childhood Family Development Center in southwest Minneapolis.
“I love to put [the hats] out on the table and watch people pick out what they like and get something they’re proud to wear,” he said.
As for how they find places or people that could use the hats and other warm items, Melom said: “The core group of us, we just know about these places. I mean, you’ve been in the community for a long time. Many of us are retired social workers or teachers or librarians so we’re people who have had jobs in the community.”
Melom recalled one drop-off she did at Tubman, a shelter in south Minneapolis. The staff member shared with her that she had previously lived at Tubman herself, and how the shelter had helped her make a better life.
Melom left the shelter and returned with more hats and scarves.
“I said, ‘I want you to pick out a hat and scarf for yourself. You’ve been through a lot.’ And she did,” said Melom.
Melom returned to the shelter the following year, and the staff member asked whether she remembered her.
“I said yes and she went over to the coat closet and she got out the hat and scarf. Those are the stories that I remember,” she said.
For years, knitters would drop off completed hats at Melom’s southwest Minneapolis home, prompting her husband, Gary, to start referring to their front porch as “the hat depot.”
Melom and her husband have since moved to Walker Place, a senior living community in the Kingfield neighborhood, where she still knits and collects donated hats, although she no longer has room to store them in her own apartment.
While she says most of her fellow Walker Place residents do not knit anymore, many of them enjoy helping her sort and organize all the donations. Some even accompany her to help deliver the hats.
Anyone is invited to participate in the project by knitting and donating a hat – or really any warm item they want to make – and bring it to one of the drop off locations any time of the year. Why hats?
“We love mittens and socks but we don’t get a lot of them because you have to make two so it’s always a little bit of a hurdle,” said Berg. “Hats are easy.”
Berg’s store also regularly hosts a “Charitable Day of Making” event with Melom at his shop where anyone is invited to come and knit a hat. His store offers discounts on yarn to those making hats to support Melom’s mission.
And every third Saturday of the month, a group including Melom, gets together at Butter Bakery to knit.
“New knitters are always welcome,” she said.
https://hats4thehomeless.blogspot.com/