PRAIRIE CITY – Babies born at Blue Mountain Hospital in John Day are benefiting from the efforts of some youthful volunteers.

Members of the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America and the family and consumer studies class at Prairie City School recently donated 52 newborn-size knit hats to the hospital.

Amazingly, none of the students knew how to knit before they started the project. But with the help of the FCCLA leader and FACS teacher Melody Field and school board member Margie Walton the students persevered. Each made at least one hat.

To learn the process, the teens began by knitting three squares apiece which Walton then crocheted into a blanket. This was donated along with the hats.

After students presented the gifts to nurse Nancy Crisler on Jan. 30, Crisler offered to donate a couple of the hats to Operation Hope. She will be traveling to Zimbabwe this year to participate in the humanitarian work that takes plastic surgeons and nurses to various parts of the world to repair babies’ cleft lips.

Fields deemed the project a success.

“The kids really like it,” Field said. “I think it’s really important to get them to help other people – it develops their character and self confidence.”

The service projects, at the heart of FCCLA, also teach the students to be leaders in their community and how to make a difference, she said.

The students volunteered their time in other ways in the past year. Among their projects: they ran a program called Cookies for Families, exchanging one cookie for each canned good donated – 402 cans of food were given to the local food bank; assisted with the Prairie City Christmas baskets; Caitlin Patten, Sherree Wright and Skylar Fast hand delivered Christmas Cards for veterans in Portland and interviewed some of the veterans; the group also made 50 baby bags for the county health department to give to new parents.

FCCLA members will share these service experiences as they compete at their organization’s national conference in July.