Winter warmth in Nazareth
YEOVILLE - Residents of Nazareth House in Yeoville got a warm surprise on 8 June as 67 Blankets for Mandela Day popped in to drop off a massive pile of handmade blankets at the old age home and orphanage.
Carolyn Steyn, an actress turned philanthropist, founded the initiative in December 2013 after a challenge to make 67 blankets for Mandela day from Zelda la Grange, long-time personal assistant to the late former President Nelson Mandela. Since then, the project has grown into an international movement for warmth supported by people both young and old.
For Steyn, the handover at Nazareth house was extremely emotional as her mother grew up there, having arrived at the age of three and staying on into her early 20s as a volunteer teacher.
“Walking the same corridors she walked and seeing the little children arriving from creche earlier, I was beside myself. I was a bit of a basket case.”
Carlene Teklenburg and Sharon Bakhuizen shared in their sister’s emotion at handing blankets over to an institution which was so central to their family’s history.
“Throughout our lives, Nazareth House has played a role in our home. To walk into a place where our mother was has been quite surreal,” they said.
“We were among the first three or four knitwits. It has been a chance for us to enrich people’s lives, not only through the blankets, but also through the connections that people have made, thanks to the initiative.”
Steyn experienced a moment which she described as a highlight of the journey that her initiative has taken her on. “We were all bringing blankets out of the various cars, and… when I walked into the room… and saw the mountain of blankets here I was quite taken aback. I see mountains every day, but coming into Nazareth House and seeing this mountain was a wow moment for me… I’m still recovering from that.”
