Registered Charity Number: 846324168RR0001
Courage Capes
It’s a bird,
It’s a plane,
It’s a SUPERHERO!
In every sick or injured child, is the heart of a hero, full of strength and bravery. They need a cape to showcase their heroism and courage!
Courage Capes are donated to the Ronald McDonald House (RMH) in Hamilton. RMH then gives them out to children and siblings (and stuffy friends too!) that stay at RMH.
Courage Capes is a home-grown project started by a group of cancer mamas and their supporters in the Niagara Region around 2015. Courage Capes are handmade cotton capes that are lovingly sewn and donated by volunteers. All the volunteers donate their time and lots of fabric to the project.
These groups of volunteers meet approximately twice a year and make a huge batch of capes to last until the next get-together. It is a full day of sewing, ironing, cutting, decal making, pinning, and ironing some more - it's definitely a labour of love!
How Can You Help?
We are in need of:
-
Cotton fabric (quilting, cotton broad cloth, etc.). We use bright plain colours or patterns!
-
Sewing thread of all colours
-
Felt and webbing for decals
-
Volunteers!
Would You Like to Join Us?
No experience necessary! Roles needed:
-
Cutters: Cut out patterns of capes or decals
-
Iron Ladies: Iron finished capes or iron-on decals
-
Sewers: Sew the day away!
-
Pinners: Pin cape fronts and backs together to be ready for sewing
-
You can join us on our next Courage Capes Day!
-
You can also cut/sew at home and donate to RMH on your own
How Did We Start?
Co-founder Emily’s son, Griffin, was fighting Rhabdomyosarcoma (cancer) in 2011 at the age of 2. A friend of the family made Griffin a Batman cape and gave it to him. He was very sick and was having trouble walking, and never wore the cape. When he was done his final chemo treatment, he sat up, put on his cape, and walked out of the ward! He waved at all the other patients and his favourite nurses as he walked by. There wasn’t a dry eye in the place. Emily thought to herself: Every sick child needs a cape…and so the Courage Capes Project was born (with lots of amazing help from Lynn Middleton, who is the brains and muscle behind the scenes)!
Courage Capes would like to thank its dedicated volunteers who make this project amazing. We would also like to welcome newcomers - please join us, we would love your help!
Contact
Please contact OPACC at info@OPACC.org and they can get your updated Courage Capes contact info.
We also have a private Facebook group for our volunteers here.
