"Know Your Org" is an informational series designed to spotlight some of the wonderful organizations in our community. This month we are highlighting Fleece & Thank You.
A child’s stay in the hospital can be a scary and uncomfortable thing. Fleece & Thank You is an organization that wants to make it less so.
Their mission is to provide comfort, hope and connection to children in the hospital. Their goal is to provide a comforting blanket and video message of hope to every child admitted to the hospital for an inpatient stay. It is their hope to provide one of their fleece-topped blankets to any child aged zero to 18 who has an overnight hospital stay.
So far this fiscal year, volunteers have made nearly 20,000 blankets, with over 11,000 already delivered to children in the hospital. Since they started, Fleece & Thank You has made over 130,000 blankets.
“Hospitals are a very sterile environment. It’s very scary, especially for kids. There are a lot of things you can’t have in a hospital,” says Fleece & Thank You’s Blanket Support Specialist Nancy Richards. “But a blanket is one thing you can have and everybody likes to snuggle up to a blanket. It’s something you can cuddle with, it’s something that has color—and then, our blanket has a patch that has a video message of personalized support. It’s something that you can have, and it’s almost guaranteed to brighten up a little bit of darkness.”
Anyone can order a blanket-making kit directly from their website. The kit is very simple to put together; in fact, most kids can do it. Once the blanket is made, you record a video message of hope and encouragement, upload it and put the video's number on the blanket’s tag.
Why is the video important? Nancy says, “Research shows how beneficial comfort and support is in healing and in getting well. The blankets provide comfort, and the videos show support. These kids have the support of their families, but the video takes it a step further to say there are complete strangers out there rooting for you. Just having that support, I think, helps tremendously.”
Some Blanket Statements
Nancy described one of the more unique videos they’ve received. “One year, there was a man who made his video and used his blanket as a superhero cape. He dressed up, ran through the woods wearing it, and built a fire out in the woods. It was one of the more unique and thoughtful videos. He then presented the child with his superhero cape for his journey.”
When it comes to reactions from the kids, “most of the reactions we get are very good,” says Nancy, “but there was one that was so funny, you could tell the little boy was feeling a lot better than whenever he’d gone into the hospital. He sent his thank you message back to us. His mom was recording, and he was holding up the blanket. He laughed and said, ‘Do you see this? When my mom and I saw this, we thought it was just nonsense!’ But he loved it. His mom finally rushed in and said, 'Okay, say thank you.”
How You Can Help
Fleece & Thank You always need people to make the blankets and create the videos, but there are other ways you can get involved.
“We have a lot of different volunteer opportunities,” says Nancy. “One of the most common ways people volunteer is to work with us in our warehouse. You can help prepare the blanket kits that go out to the blanket makers. Also, we wash and dry the blankets we receive before they are given out. Once they are washed and dried, they get wrapped up and packaged to be ready for delivery to the hospital. Also, there are the blanket deliveries.”
If you’d like to help, head to the Get Involved page on their website.
Add a comment to: Know Your Org: Fleece and Thank You