Photo: Members of the Byram Sewing Club gather weekly in the basement of St. Paul Lutheran Church to sew lap robes for veterans - including left to right, Antoinette Trartaglia, Rosemarie Nasr, Emma Tattar, and Mary Zalman. Photo by Anne W. Semmes / Heart Newspapers - Greenwich Citizen and Greenwich Time
Blanket Statement - Greenwich Time
Published: 12:30 p.m., Tuesday, November 23, 2010
On a recent Tuesday afternoon, 97-year-old Emma Tattar was leaning over a sewing machine and pushing a swatch of calico beneath the pulsating needle. Taking shape as her hands worked steadily was a lap robe, destined for a veteran, confined somewhere to a wheelchair.
Tattar is one of four women who make up The Byram Sewing Group, which meets every Tuesday afternoon in the basement of St. Paul Lutheran Church. The women make lap robes for veterans in wheelchairs to keep them warm. Tattar, the group's senior member, has been with the group almost from its inception, which dates back to World War II. "I've been doing it for 60 years at least," she said.
She figures the women have sewn more than 1,000 lap robes during that time.
"We're only here one-half day a week," said Tattar. "If it snows, we don't come. We don't sew in summer -- it's too hot. We start after Labor Day."
Tattar explained how the group addresses the needs of veterans through their handiwork. "We send them to different veteran hospitals," she said. The lap robes find their way to hospitals in Connecticut, New York and Rhode Island. "We used to send them to local nursing homes, too. When we had four or five people running the (sewing) machines, we made more. We try to get them to the veterans by Christmas."
On an adjacent sewing machine was Antoinette Tartaglia, 90, who comes to Byram each week from her home in New York. "I learned to sew in grammar school," she said. "I made my daughter's marriage gown, (my children's) prom dresses. I had five children. I keep busy all the time. That's what you have to do. Before I come here, I do Tai Chi."
"Last spring, we had made 20 lap robes," added Rosemarie Nasr, who is considerably younger than Tattar and who joined the group five years ago. "Since September, we've made 12 or so," she said. "It's not difficult. You just have to put things together. People donate the material, or we get the fabric from the church (St. Paul Lutheran Church) -- they donate the money, and we buy the material. We've made beautiful ones."
"The men enjoy them," said Mary Zalman, 83, who was busy working thread through a needle. She says the robes are warm, look great and that the veterans love them.
Tattar agreed and said some of the veterans send thank you notes, which makes it all worthwhile.
"You just feel so good doing this for them, you know," said Tattar.
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