What was in the giant boxes, data, and ....

E1 and I met at our dad's for Thanksgiving dinner. E1 brought the Thank Yous she received from the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma Head Start program. Oh my, I was flabbergasted!

The blanket was amazing all by itself. It has to be 5 feet on each side, WOVEN, super-soft, and absolutely stunning in its color and intricacy! In the picture, E1 is holding it up; her hands are over her head. A full-size adult is behind that blanket so you can see how large it is. Gosh, it's amazingly beautiful. I told her I think it's the kind of blanket they give to Heads of State who visit. See the blanket.

E1 gave me the big packet of all the written Thank You notes. It will take me a while to photograph all of them and share them with you. They literally show gorgeous little angels wearing the hats, with notes from the children. Every hat is shown. It's fun to pick up one of the pictures and look at each little cherubic face and say "I made this one, that one, that one..." I have photographed one of the cards as best I could. It merely gives you the tiniest glimpse of the magnificent beautiful Thank You card. You can see from the hand, a full-size adult hand, how large the card is! Then the inside, with signatures from precious 3-, 4-, and 5-year old children. A keepsake.

I will photograph and share the other Thank You cards as time permits. It'll be a tricky process, as they are very large. One of them, I think it's from Antlers Head Start, has a little paper doll to represent each child... boy paper dolls and girl paper dolls... and each paper doll is wearing a yarn hat! I hope to do it justice by photographing it. Or I may resort to video clips so I can read to you what the cards say and narrate what you'd be seeing if you were close to the card in person. We'll see. I won't get to it today but I will get to it as soon as I can.

Also included in the packet where newspaper stories about Hat Day at Head Start. One newspaper had the story of the hats on the front page. It took up a huge amount of space! It is an astonishing amount of press space. I think in Boston there would only be that kind of press real estate (1/4 of a front page) for criminals, disasters, or amazing rescues in life-or-death situations.

Now for some important news. E1 got her answer about how many hats the Choctaw Nation needs on a yearly basis. The answer: 310.

So, who's game for "Three Hundred Ten Hats: Year Two"???  I'm in. Are you?