Glen Scrimshaw’s knitting group weaves warmth for Sask. charities

Glen Scrimshaw is a name familiar to many in Saskatchewan.

A celebrated artist, his work has found its way into homes across Canada and around the world. For 38 years, Scrimshaw’s paintings of nature and wildlife scenes have captured the essence of life on the prairies.

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Though he’s best known for his striking depictions of lightning bolts illuminating the skies and the ethereal glow of the northern lights, it’s the humble craft his mother Ruby practised that sparked an unexpected journey for Scrimshaw.

“I remember years ago, I went to a bingo with her. She’s playing 16 cards, watching the people on each side of her, and knitting scrubbies,” he recalls. “You know, the things you scrub your dishes with.”

He smiled at the memory, marveling at how his mother managed to keep track of not only her own cards, but everyone else’s, all while continuing to knit.

Listen to Scrimshaw on Behind the Headlines:

“She’d say, ‘Oh, you missed one,’ and keep on visiting with everyone.” He laughed, shaking his head. “I don’t know how she did it.”

But as time went on, things began to change. “She slowed down,” Scrimshaw recalled. “She liked to knit mitts and socks and stuff, and she was in a care home so my sisters, brother and I decided, ‘Well, we’ll buy Mom yarn, and whatever she makes we’ll donate to charity.’ We probably gave five, six hundred items through my mom. She did a lot.”

Scrimshaw said his mother was later diagnosed with dementia. As the disease progressed, it took away her ability to knit, a skill she had once enjoyed almost effortlessly.

“I picked up the last bit that she had made, and I thought, ‘This is kind of sad, because it was nice going to the charities,” Scrimshaw said. “They were happy to get this stuff. And I started thinking ‘I wonder if I can start something in Saskatoon like that?’”

That’s when Neighborhood Angels Saskatoon was born. Scrimshaw became the leader of a group of volunteers carrying on his mother’s legacy.

He laughed again as he admitted that he doesn’t know much about knitting.

“I’m just the middleman, connecting everyone,” Scrimshaw said. “But it’s working really well.”

Scrimshaw provides yarn to his 15 volunteers, scouring garage sales and secondhand shops for the best deals. He says he was clueless about the qualities and weights of the fibres when he first started, but now he’s become quite the expert.

“If there’s a bunch of yarn, I know what to look for!” he said with a smile.

As word of the group has spread, donations of yarn have started to pour in at Prairie Lily Knitting, a local shop Scrimshaw uses as a drop-off point for his volunteers.

“I have bags with numbers on them,” he explained, outlining the system that keeps everything organized. “The ladies stop by, pick up their bag and write down the bag they took and what they brought back. I come once a week and take them, then bundle them up every month or so.”

The volunteers knit the donated yarn into scarves, toques, mittens and blankets which are then distributed to those in need in the community. Neighbourhood Angels Saskatoon currently supports three main charities: Sanctum 1.5, the Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital Foundation, and the Saskatoon Police Service’s Mobile Crisis Unit.

Though the group is small, it has made an astonishing impact.

“Last year, we injected over 2,000 items back into the community. Can you believe it? 2,000 items,” Scrimshaw said.

For Scrimshaw, this is all part of a larger philosophy of helping others.

“Both my wife Zorka and I believe so strongly that if everyone in the world did what they could to help their fellow man, it would be a wonderful world,” he said.

“You don’t have to do a million things — just one little thing can change someone’s life.”