News
Local woman is knitting with a mission
Scott Wagar
03/26/2013
When it comes to knitting Avonne Gessner enjoys the hobby, but in the past year she has taken her leisure pursuit and made it into a mission project, which has assisted close to two hundred new born babies.
In February of 2012, Gessner began knitting baby hats for Trinity Hospital after discovering a lady who was knitting them in Bismarck.
“About a year ago, I ran into a lady that was telling me she was making preemie baby hats for the Bismarck hospital,” Gessner said Tuesday afternoon in her home as she was knitting a baby hat. “I said that I always wanted to make baby hats and donate them to the hospital, but I never had a pattern. So, she gave me her pattern and I have knitted 196 hats to date.”
It normally takes Gessner nine to ten hours, or, two days, to knit a baby hat, which comes in all types of baby colors.
She stated that she started out with square knitting needles, but turned to a circular needle because it makes it easier in completing the hat.
“You don’t have to sew off a seam with a round needle,” she said. “Unlike a square needle.”
Gessner starts out by knitting the brim first, and then knits the body and ends by tying off the top of the hat.
When she creates around 35 hats, she packages them and takes them down to Trinity where each baby in the delivery ward receives one of the hats.
Her knitting hasn’t gone unnoticed. When the first 12-12-12 baby was born in Minot this past year, one of Gessner’s hats was placed on the baby and was seen in the Minot’s newspaper. The first New Year’s baby for 2013 also wore one of her hats and was seen on a television news segment in Minot.
And, in recent months, Gessner was given the Cenex’s Tank Award, which is a $50 gift certificate given out to community members who do good deeds.
Gessner has knitted for 35 years and is self-taught. Over the years she has knitted afghans, scarves and now the baby hats, which she enjoys with all her heart.
“It is a relaxing thing for me to do. I can watch tv and still knit, and it is something I can take in the car with me,” she said, who also stated that it has become a vocation for her. “And, it is a gift for a baby and in some instances for families who maybe cannot afford to buy one.”
Whether it is a gift, mission or a pleasant hobby, one thing is for certain about Gessner’s baby hats, each new born or premature baby at Trinity sleeps in comfort due to her love for knitting and others.