How a dedicated group of friends helps cure the coronavirus blues is sew unique

After giving my husband his first haircut and giving a television news interview in my basement from 6 feet away, not much has happened in my stale COVID-19 life. The haircut went better than my husband or girls expected. I on the other hand, was quite sure of my abilities from my previous salon experiences cutting my Barbies’ hair and trimming the fur around my dog’s face.

Life is good.

Typically, if ordered to be quarantined with my very loud and wonderful family, I would protest or at least be irritated; but I’ve found the cure. No, not for coronavirus, but for that inner feeling of impending doom that many are experiencing. I’ve been sewing. Facemasks. Hundreds of them actually and donating to Kansas City’s front-line workers.

Now I need to make it clear, I’m not doing this to get notoriety or compliments. That actually defeats the purpose of helping. It’s not about me. It’s about doing something about a situation that makes most people feel helpless. I’ve never been a fan of feeling helpless. I will do about anything to move on, and that is basically what happened five weeks ago.

You might remember that I was a pediatric nurse over a decade ago. That career helped with my gnawing desire to cure children’s cancer. But the thing is that many of my friends are nurses. I’m still in contact with them and I tend to meet and enjoy all the nurses in every environment. I guess I’m drawn to them.

So, what happens when a nurse is no longer a nurse and she can’t join the frontline? She comes up with the next best thing to protect her dear friends – homemade surgeon style facemasks. I spent about one week making them and remaking them. At first, I struggled with finding the best pattern. Then one night as I was covered in bits of white thread and fabric scraps, I realized I wasn’t going to make a big enough difference. My sewing speed was a tad embarrassing.

Then the imagination went running. What if I could get someone to cut the fabric squares for me? What if the elastic was cut into the right size lengths? What if I then had someone to deliver them to the hospitals so I could not be interrupted and keep on sewing? Boy, that’d be nice…

Then it dawned me, I bet I’m not the only one of my friends who feels helpless during this pandemic. I’m going to hit up my Facebook pals and see if a couple of gals who lived nearby would be able to assist me. And that’s how it started, but by 11 p.m. that night, I had such a positive response from people wanting to help, I had to amp up my game.

That night I stayed up most of the night getting back with all of the requests to join forces. So I created a “business” model that would be divided into seamstresses, cutting team and delivery drivers.

In the morning, all of the interested parties saw my post asking what part of the team they were interested in. Now I had what I thought was a complete list of about 20 women who had the same desire to do something for our medical workers.

Over that first week, those numbers doubled and now I have more than 50 dedicated KC gals who are cutting and sewing like the wind, which was great because the requests also followed. Orders of 75, 100, 300 masks were requested. I was afraid 11 seamstresses couldn’t make it happen, but with a wish and prayer, we are up to 700 completed and delivered masks!

I’ve asked the driver gals, who operate each Friday, to get photos of their mission delivering protection in a bag. With every picture, I know that what we are doing is important. Whether or not we are protecting our front line from getting sick, I know from the stories I hear that our prayers and love for each mask is giving those workers hope. A hope that they are being cared for and greatly appreciated.

To all of the police departments, EMTs, hospital workers, medical offices, foster care programs, Cancer Centers and urgent care offices, if you have a need, please reach out to us. We won’t stop until Kansas City stops asking.

Stacey Hatton can be reached at laughingwithkids@yahoo.com and on her Facebook group, JoCo Moms Mask Army.

This story was originally published May 1, 2020 at 7:00 AM with the headline "How a dedicated group of friends helps cure the coronavirus blues is sew unique."