Sometimes a trip to a hospital brings smiles: the birth of a baby, surgery that saves a life or mends a limb, treatment that cures an illness. Other times, the trip may bring tears.
At Good Shepherd Hospital in Barrington, many smiles are a little bigger than they otherwise would be. And the tears, well, they’re dried a little more tenderly, thanks to a group of about 30 women who call themselves the Luv Ewes.
Most Good Shepherd patients never meet the Luv Ewes–the group’s name plays off the image the hospital’s name evokes–but they see and get to keep the group’s handiwork: little print pillows, stuffed animals for children, headwarmers for newborns, dinner tray favors to brighten hospital meals.
“We feel good, knowing that these things are helping people feel better,” said Mable Pearson, 90, of Barrington. “And we enjoy each other’s company. We chat, then we’re quiet, then we chat some more. We look forward to coming each week.”
A Wednesday group makes the tray favors, usually with a seasonal or holiday theme. During December, tongue depressors done up as snowmen showed up on trays. The larger Thursday group makes the sewn and knitted items.
Pearson, who meets with the Thursday group, is legally blind and cannot see well enough to sew or make the tray favors. So other women partly sew pillows or children’s playthings and hand them off to Pearson, who stuffs them with polyester fiber before they are finished.
“If people are trying to pin me down to what day of the week to do something, I always tell them, `Not Thursday. Don’t bother me on Thursdays,’ ” Pearson said. “I feel bad if I miss a Thursday.”
The Luv Ewes’ brightly colored pillows, which measure about 10 by 12 inches, are probably the most popular items. The Luv Ewes make about 100 of them each week for surgery patients and others who could use a little extra comfort.
Some patients who are recovering from surgery hold the pillows against their chest as they cough; the pillows help ease the strain coughing sometimes causes.
Other patients use them for an added touch of comfort, including patients with IVs who like to rest their arms on the pillows. When the great-grandson of 69-year-old Luv Ewe member May Dienethal of Lake Zurich was born two years ago at Good Shepherd, doctors placed the baby tummy down over one of the pillows she helped make, to make it a little easier for him to breathe.
“They find so many uses for these pillows,” Dienethal said. “People love them. We get lots of notes from patients who appreciate them.”
The group even knows of one former patient who liked his pillow so much that when he died, his wife had him buried with it.
Other popular items include headwarmers for each baby born at Good Shepherd–about 2,000 each year. The group also makes toe-warmers for patients with leg casts that leave the toes exposed; stuffed animals for children; and, during the holidays, oversized red flannel stockings that look perfect for hanging over a fireplace. But these stockings are for the parents of newborns to bundle up their babies for the trip home.
“Many of these ladies were raising money for the hospital long before it was built, and this is their way to continue making a contribution,” said Debbie Strout, Good Shepherd’s manager of volunteer services. “They love doing it, and we love them for doing it,”
One of those volunteers is 80-year-old Val Jiracek of Fox River Grove. In the 1960s, she joined a Cary-Fox River Grove auxiliary that held bake sales, rummage sales and other fundraisers in the hopes of one day building Good Shepherd.
The hospital opened in 1979, and some of the women from the auxiliary, including Jiracek, formed the Luv Ewes to be there at the beginning.
“I think the main thing that keeps us coming back is the appreciation of the patients,” she said. “They send us little notes telling us how much they like these things.”
Pearson added: “Everyone probably has a different reason for starting with the group. In my case, I was alone and the doctor said I needed to get out and do things, so that’s what I did.”
For Dienethal, becoming a Luv Ewe gave her a respite from caring for an invalid aunt who was living with her.
“I had to get out and away, and this was my out and away,” she said. “I would get a baby-sitter for her and come here, and I’ve enjoyed it ever since.”
For 85-year-old Evelyn Larson of Barrington, who joined the group about six months ago, being a Luv Ewe gives her an activity to look forward to each week.
“I’m retired and was at a loss what to do,” she said. “A friend told me about the group. So I joined, and I couldn’t be with nicer people. And it’s so nice to be doing something worthwhile.”
