More From The States...

I have family visiting, and my mother brought the hats sent to Maryland out with her. We have 71!!

Additionally sent were some blankets, included here in the pile. I am not entirely certain my mother remembered to bring all the tags with addresses for thank-yous, so if you do not get a card in the mail, PLEASE let me know and I'll see about remedying that!

I am bringing these in to the hospital today. With this, LCH is set on hats through early January!

I am not certain when the next pickup from the USA will be: staff from Woodstock may be returning stateside in December/January and I will be asking if any are willing to be a designated mailing location for future hats... Until then, a big

THANK YOU!

from myself on behalf of all of the babies you've so generously helped out with.

Long-Overdue Update!

Thank you to everyone for your patience! I have a long-overdue update, but will try to keep it short.

#1: Thank you to everyone who has sent in hats, particularly a large collection of Ravely remembers. We received appx. 100 hats from Rav alone to the Denver, CO pickup spot: the doctor at LCH is virtually over the moon. This has let her take some time to focus on other things (namely, trying to upgrade the L&D section to an actual unit, with a barrier in place so women can walk around, rather than be stuck in rooms, as well as raising some money to get breastfeeding-friendly hospital gowns made).

#2: We need only *45* more hats to see the hospital through the end of December - yippee! Of course, I will continue to keep soliciting hat donations until I'm told they don't have space for them. This makes me stupendously excited, because it means we might even be able to get a head start on the 2016 needs, rather than working to play catch-up.

#3: To everyone who sent hats in: the doctor at LCH has written cards and had someone volunteer to mail them (I believe someone going back to the USA), so I hope you'll be receiving your thank-yous soon. This outpouring of generosity has been something amazing to see, and be a part of, and the cards and posts like this don't do our gratitude justice.


I hope to have someone coming out in October, as well as arranging another US-side pickup (maybe TX this time?) over the Dec-Jan break, so if you want to knit... keep knitting! I will be happy to get addresses out to those that want them.

A Photo Update

Yesterday, a handful of girls from the Sewing Club at Woodstock School went to LCH to drop off some hats they made this quarter. It was a new project for the club, but the girls put together some fleece hats (which will be extremely useful in the winter).

We were lucky that a new baby was in the hospital - we missed two discharged earlier that day. According to Dr Roopa, the mothers often leave at 2pm at the latest so that they can catch a shared taxi back to their village (many are 4-6 hours away). Still - there was a new baby girl, born at 3:00am in the morning on the 20th, and the mother allowed us to take a picture!

As you can see, despite it being May (and summer here!), the baby is bundled up in fleece, as is the mama. The hat is one crocheted by one of the Woodstock staff members, the Divine Hat (Ravelry link, free pattern). The sleeper and blanket were made by other members in the community, and may be this baby's only clothes for a few weeks (or months) depending on the family's income and what they can purchase over the monsoon.

April Tally

In April, we received approximately 180 hats! The vast majority of them came from a church with a relationship to some Woodstock staff members, but we also received contributions from some Woodstock staffers directly. Additionally, a student group of knitters donated hats to LCH and brought them in directly - I wasn't able to be there to take pictures, and I'm waiting on the final numbers to update - they may get linked into May.

I've been told by someone that their daughter wants to knit hats and send them out directly (yay!), and staff members continue to drop hats off on my desk to weave in ends, so I know that while May might not see the numbers that April did, we should be able to see the hospital through summer (April-June, here) and into monsoon (July-September). June & July are summer holiday for us at the school, so I would love to see LCH settled with hats to last them through the middle of August -- so that means 102 hats, as soon as possible! Right now, they're "set" for hats in May and June, but without new additions, will be -42 hats in July.

Thank You Cards Ordered

Rather than use "normal" thank-you stationary, we want to do something special for those who are donating hats to LCH.

I'm very excited to report we were able to get the thank-you cards ordered that we wanted to order. A Woodstock student who will be pursuing a nursing/medical career drew a breathtaking piece of art while visiting Duncan Hospital in Raxaul, Bihar, during the winter.

I won't share it here, but it's been described as "amazing" and "powerful", and will be the image on the thank-you cards! We're very grateful that she is allowing us to use this piece for our cards.

Thank You, Jonesboro Heights Baptist Church!

Some staff members here at Woodstock have had their church involved in making hats for some time now, but it was only recently (I think just before midterm break) that the most recent box arrived, and it was chock full of beautiful knitted hats! I counted 142 - I'm fairly certain I miscounted somewhere, and it's more like 145.

I'd like to take a moment to thank the church for their continued support and effort in helping provide hats to the families of those who use Landour Community Hospital. Your very generous donations of time in making and sending the hats really do help make a difference to a project of this size.

When I brought these to Dr Roopa, she was so relieved - this will help get them through the summer months. She and the nurse when I dropped them off spent a lot of time feeling them, and especially liked how these were nice and stretchy and were in so many different colours.

Thank you again!

March Tally

As impromptu a start as it was, we managed to make/collect 18 hats for March (with the 16 that were needed).

April is moving slowly but steadily - I found some hats that I'd put somewhere in the past and uncovered them, and we had someone crochet 10 over the midterm break. I've been told there's a box that has come from a church in the USA, full of hats for LCH: hopefully I will be able to check them out and count them tomorrow, when I head over to the hospital!