Twice a year, Project Linus holds Make-A-Blanket day at Academy of the Canyons. The Santa Clarita chapter is one of the branches of the nationwide nonprofit organization. On Oct. 28th the organization held their annual event in the east gym at College of the Canyons. Volunteers of all ages, including students from all schools and children, participated in the event. Throughout the event, volunteers followed an online tutorial to create a blanket from sheets of fleece fabric.
Chelsey Suh from the Academy of the Canyons, and a key officer in overseeing events for Project Linus explained, “Make-A-Blanket Day is biannual in the spring and the fall. Everyone comes to make blankets for this community, and you can get service hours for it.” Every state in the United States has at least one chapter Project Linus donates to; and from there, blankets “go to ill and traumatized children. [They give] it out to various places, like hospitals, wellness centers and when there’s a need for the blankets,” Suh explained.
When volunteers arrive, they must sign in and collect the necessary tools to get started. Important materials to make the blanket include a seam ripper, sharp scissors, paper guides and tape. Throughout the event, music played in the background, creating a lively atmosphere, and food trucks were available for attendees working on the blankets. In addition to Project Linus, various organizations such as the Girl Scouts of the USA came to volunteer.
“[Our main goal] was to make as many blankets as we could for my girls and it’s an easy community service project for them to participate in,” explained Kiera Grossi, the supervisor for Troop 172 Girl Scouts. “I believe [we found out about Project Linus] through my Girl Scouts of Los Angeles Facebook page.” Using different ways to announce the blanket-making event, Project Linus managed to gather many volunteers using various platforms.
One way West Ranch students are able to get involved with this project is through the Project Linus Club at school. With over 100 students in the club, the message spread to members like Mindy Hong.
“This was my first event with Project Linus, but I’ve previously [made] blankets during the meetings at lunch,” Hong shared.
On Make-A-Blanket Day, Hong and her friends made approximately ten blankets after arriving at the event at noon. Hong described her experience as “a fun and a good chance to get out and help the community.” She continued, “I appreciated the many staff who walked around and helped all the volunteers, and it was fun to just listen to music and work on simple tasks.” The event was relaxing, but also gave volunteers satisfaction in knowing that the community was healing thanks to the volunteers’ hard work.
Planning the Make-A-Blanket event proved to be a challenging process for the staff of Project Linus. Jodie Macandili, a student leader from the Academy of the Canyons explained, “It was a whole month-long process. We had to book the food trucks, and we needed to book this whole gym. We have staff from Project Linus actually, and they’re each in different committees.” Gathering all of the necessities required time and significant effort.
As an entirely student-run organization, students from the Academy of the Canyons took on the responsibility of ensuring everything was in order. The students helped the volunteers sign in to the event, making sure they had the volunteer’s names, the amount of blankets that they planned to make and tracking the amount of time the volunteers worked for. The students in the nonprofit organization helped by assisting those who struggled to make the blankets, providing supplies and helping the blanket makers sign into the event and check out. Sharon Garvar, the supervisor of the students, explained that the event taught “business skills and a chance to get into that in high school.”
Garvar described how she started the project: “It started when my son was born with pneumonia and he got a blanket, and I loved how that [felt]: having someone who he was never going to meet, make something for someone else. And that’s just the most giving, remarkable thing I’ve ever heard of.”
After receiving the blanket from the Los Angeles Chapter, Garvar, now inspired, spoke with her students about making blankets during their lunchtime. They donated approximately 100 blankets that quarter and sent them to the Los Angeles Chapter. Eventually, Project Linus evolved into a semester project.
This year, the volunteers at Make-A-Blanket Day made 756 blankets and donated them to chapters in Los Angeles. What started as a small lunch project, ended up as a way for the community to donate their time and effort for the benefit of others. In the end, the students received a certificate of appreciation from the Project Linus team, congratulating them on their hard work.
Cats, if you missed out on this event and still want to support Project Linus, you can give monetary donations at www.projectlinus.org and donate to the Santa Clarita Chapter, or you can make a blanket at home using the patterns on the website, and drop them off at Joanns.
