OKEECHOBEE — The Okeechobee Sewing Masks for Unity group has been hard at work sewing emergency masks for the public school system over the last few weeks. The mask group, which was started back in March at the beginning of the pandemic, is a Facebook group created by Shayne Clayville in response to the need for face masks in the community. She noticed several women who were making masks and donating them to nurses, doctors and other first responders and thought a central location where everyone could gather and share ideas would be helpful, so Okeechobee Sewing Masks for Unity was born. When the page was created, the founding members had one firm and fast rule. They did not sell their masks. They did not care what you did on other sites, but on the Sewing Masks for Unity site, the masks were free, always!

The newest endeavor of the group began when a friend who works for the school board contacted Cathy Womble to ask if she was still working with the mask group. She said the schools were interested in getting some “emergency” masks for the kids, because we all know life happens. Elastic will break. Masks will be forgotten. Masks will get lost, etc. They had received masks from the county, but they were all adult size and were not going to fit young children. They just wanted to have some on hand for emergencies at each school. They ordered some online, but they were back-ordered. Womble went to the group, and, as she knew they would, they all said they would be glad to help. They immediately began working on the project, and within two weeks, delivered approximately 1,000 masks to be divided among the elementary schools.

In May, the group made over 400 purple and black masks for the graduating high school seniors. Womble said they felt bad for the seniors because not only did they miss out on a lot of the special things that students normally get to do during their senior year, but their graduation was going to be completely different than in any previous year. The group wanted to try to make it a little better by making purple masks for the kids, and they made them in less than a week. With help from Matt Buxton’s lasers, Dena Baker and Womble spent about five hours cutting out the masks, and then 10 members of the sewing group spent six days making the masks.

Baker, one of the first members of the group, estimates they have made upward of 10,000 masks now and Clayville said she would not be surprised to hear the number was closer to 15,000. Buxton said he has cut out 8,500 masks with his lasers, and many of the women cut out their own masks at home. Baker said, on average the group can get approximately 10 adult masks out of one yard of fabric, so based on the estimate of 10,000 masks, the group has used about 1,000 yards of fabric and 4,000 yards of elastic in the last five months. Of course, children’s masks are slightly smaller and would use a little less of each, but this is still a conservative estimate, she said.

Womble said they are often asked if there is any way someone who does not sew can help. The group does not accept money, but does accept donations of fabric or elastic, and one woman even donated a sewing machine. If you would like to help in this effort, you can contact Womble at cwomble@newszap.com or call Clayville at 863-467-7779.