107 PURPLE BABY HATS

A while back I heard about November being Shaken Baby Month, and specifically about a hospital that sent every November Baby home in a Purple Baby Hat – to remind parents to NOT shake their babies.

This really touched my heart – and I decided that I wanted to become involved in this cause. So I set a goal to make 100 Purple Baby Hats to donate to the local hospital. A few days ago I finished up the last of them. It was a great feeling! I had a big basket full of hats, so I dumped them out, snapped a quick photo, and counted – just to make sure that I had 100. I counted 107 Purple Baby Hats.

Yesterday I called Trudy, the Charge Nurse in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at UVRMC in Provo, and we had a great hat chat. Apparently this hospital hasn’t done purple hats in November before, but she was thrilled to know that I already had them done – and said that if I brought them by that they would definitely use them. So this afternoon I stopped by Utah Valley Regional Medical Center and dropped the hats off in the Hospital Nursery.

It’s a great sense of accomplishment to achieve a goal, and even more rewarding when it’s something that is for such a good cause. I’ve never had any children of my own, but I know that there will be 107 babies running around Utah County in something that I made for them. And hopefully it acts as the intended reminder to protect our Little Ones by not shaking them.

These aren’t my first baby hats either. To date, I’ve made over 2000 baby hats. Simple little crocheted baby hats – and I’ve given them all away. Friends, neighbors, strangers – pretty much anyone I knew with a baby got a hat. And I'm happy to give them to anyone who wants them. A few years ago I even received a phone call from the retired Director of Humanitarian Services for the LDS Church who asked if I had any hats that he and his wife could take to Honduras – the next week! I rushed 150 hats to them, and they sent me these cute pics of the kids wearing the hats. And these adorable kids are definitely inspiration to keep making more and more hats.

This all started because of my mom. Making baby hats is something I inherited from her. For as long as I can remember, Mom used a handmade wooden loom to make baby hats as gifts. Her hats were beautiful and perfect. Unfortunately, despite many attempts, I just can’t use her loom correctly. When Mom passed away, we found a dishwasher-box-size Yarn Stash – which my sister insisted that I take home: “You’re the only one Mom taught to crochet.” So I brought home all the yarn, tried and failed with the loom, and felt guilty every time I walked by that huge box of yarn. Eventually I figured out that I could crochet baby hats, so I decided that I would crochet while watching movies. (It helps me feel less guilty about just sitting there, and it keeps that part of my mom's legacy moving forward.) Apparently I’ve watched a lot of movies over the years, because I’ve certainly made a lot of baby hats over the past 10 years.

And these definitely won’t be my last baby hats. It feels good to do something for someone else – even if you’ll never know that someone, and they’ll never thank you. Maybe that’s why I like baby hats so much – it’s simply giving with no expectation of anything in return. Because true charity is its own reward. Besides, I like watching movies – and it’s even better to watch them guilt-free. I'm pretty sure my mom would be proud that I used up all her yarn for a good cause.

Oh, and yes – I did stop at Redbox on my way home tonight too!

As we lose ourselves in the service of others, 

we discover our own lives and our own happiness. 

-- Dieter F. Uchtdorf