National Night Out

National Night Out is an event I just recently became aware of. I probably would have never even become familiar with it if my sister Corinne hadn’t been involved at her work. She was the Manager of a senior complex at the time. On the first Tuesday of August every year this event takes place. According to their website, https://natw.org/about/ this event is growing yearly!

National Night Out is an annual community-building campaign that promotes police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie.

National Night Out is an annual community-building campaign that promotes police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie to make our neighborhoods safer, more caring places to live. National Night Out enhances the relationship between neighbors and law enforcement while bringing back a true sense of community. Furthermore, it provides a great opportunity to bring police and neighbors together under positive circumstances.

Millions of neighbors take part in National Night Out across thousands of communities from all fifty states, U.S. territories and military bases worldwide on the first Tuesday in August (Texas and select areas celebrate on the first Tuesday in October). Neighborhoods host block parties, festivals, parades, cookouts and various other community events with safety demonstrations, seminars, youth events, visits from emergency personnel, exhibits and much, much more.

It is a great time for all the residents! They had a band come in and perform, there was a raffle for prizes that were donated, and dessert was provided to list a few items on the program for the big night! It is a chance to gather and socialize that these seniors look forward to. 

Corinne was telling me all about it in June of 2023, while we were having a crafting day. She was telling me how she and her team were struggling to find business who would donate to their event. Their pleas were falling on deaf ears. Her residents had been so generous to me, they had given me a large bin of yarn from a Knitting Group that had disbanded during Co-vid and never gotten back together. Their generosity of spirit was amazing and I was so sad to hear of this lack of support by their community. Corinne asked me if I would make an afghan with their yarn for the raffle. Of course, I was all in! She asked if I could make it a coffee cup theme and I used their yarn to create the afghan!

I felt that this was really only the tip of the iceberg, there should be more fun and functional things that we could come up with! It was on one of our trips into the fabric store (on a day of 1.99 pattern sale), that we found some wheel chair and walker patterns that we could make also!

On one of the wheel chair/walker caddies we used some jean pockets to make it a little more masculine. Having a huge supply of old jeans for future projects, this jean idea turned into little jean pocket pouches that could be snapped onto their chair/walkers and hold their eyeglasses, phone, etc. We had a super time gabbing and designing. The big day was just around the corner. Unfortunately, I was house sitting for our daughter and couldn’t attend. Corinne said it was so very successful and a super fun evening for all! Those who won the pockets, caddies, and the afghan were even approached by other residents to see if they would sell or trade them. Lol. 

Well, with that much feedback and a few thank you notes, I decided to keep making them through out the year and make sure that they have a bumper crop to raffle off this upcoming August! If you know of a “National Night Out” event at a seniors complex, please think about what you could do to make their event awesome! The deep appreciation and swell of gratitude is truly humbling!……..Cyn