Kristen Mullaney
Blankets laid out across Philadelphia’s Independence National Park by the Blanket Project, December 2024.
Fifty-three-year-old Maine resident Joyce Hauslein spent much of the last year crocheting afghans for people she will never meet: unhoused adults and children staying in temporary shelters, camping in public parks, or sleeping in the streets, in cars, or in crowded dwellings shared with family or friends.
The bed coverings were Hauslein’s contribution to the annual Homeless Memorial Blanket Project, a four-year-old campaign that provides handmade blankets and quilts to unhoused people each year on December 21—the longest night of the year. At this year’s event, organizers brought nearly 1,000 blankets from all fifty states and several countries to Philadelphia’s Independence National Park for display and distribution.
Hauslein, who works full-time as a cashier at Walmart, tells The Progressive that she has been homeless twice, first in 1993 and again in 2020 when her landlord evicted her in order to convert her beachfront apartment into a short-term vacation rental. It was during this second period of homelessness that she became involved with the Blanket Project.
“I spent the first five months of my most recent homelessness in my car,” she says. “I then went to a shelter for thirteen months. While there, I constantly crocheted; I gave the afghans I made to people as gifts when they left the facility. Many of them told me it was the only blanket they had.”
While Hauslein is now housed, she remains deeply concerned about those who are not and describes making blankets as a tangible way to pay it forward. It’s also a way, she explains, for her to thank the shelter workers and counselors who listened to her and helped her navigate the bureaucratic process of obtaining a home. Furthermore, she feels making blankets is a way to offer encouragement to those who are tenuously housed or who remain unsheltered, noting, “I know what it feels like to think no one cares about you.”
Lastly, it’s a way to help unhoused people stay warm, an estimated 700 of whom die from hypothermia every winter, sleeping outside in cities and towns throughout the United States. Not surprisingly, this includes Philadelphia where public radio station WHYY reports that twelve unhoused Philadelphians died from cold-related exposure in 2023, down from more than two dozen the previous year.
While that seems like good news, advocates fear that the number of unhoused Americans in cities like Philadelphia will continue to skyrocket.
In fact, Project Home reports that Philadelphia’s homeless population jumped 38 percent between 2023 and 2024, owing at least in part to the city’s 22.7 percent poverty rate, skyrocketing rents, and dwindling supply of affordable apartments.
Lutheran pastor Matthew Best, who co-directs the Blanket Project, stresses that this spike is an intentional effect of public policies that ignore the needs of the poor. “Allowing people to be unhoused in the richest country in the history of the world is a political choice,” he tells The Progressive. “The hundreds of quilters who donate these bed coverings are actually doing more to help the homeless than most of our policymakers.”
Despite his frustration, Best describes the Blanket Project’s evolution since its founding in 2021 with pride. “We initially intended it to be a one-day thing,” he says. “But over time, it has become a beautiful, viral effort that keeps extending. We received a blanket from Australia this year. We have no idea how this person heard about the project but it has been amazing, incredible really, to think about the hundreds of people who are sewing, knitting, and crocheting these blankets and spending their time and money to make something special for a complete stranger.”
“Too often we speak about the unhoused as a category,” says Marsha Roscoe, assistant to the Bishop of the Lower Susquehanna Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, which co-sponsors the Blanket Project. “The project gives a face to the unhoused since we know that every blanket will be given to an actual person in need. It recognizes that everyone wants to feel seen. Our hope is that every person who receives a blanket understands that they are loved and valued.”
This message is especially important for unhoused youth, a staggering 22 percent of whom were unaccompanied by family in 2023.
It’s a reality that Rebecca Nicholas, the McKinney-Vento liaison at Boys Latin of Philadelphia, a sixth to 12th-grade public charter school, often sees. She works with middle school males who were given a chance to draw designs and write uplifting messages on cloth panels that were later sewn onto blankets. “The Project allows students to share their empathy, love, and creativity,” she tells The Progressive.
“Most if not all of our students have witnessed homelessness or have been homeless,” she says. “The [Blanket] Project shows them that you don’t need millions of dollars to promote social change or show someone you care about them.”
Similarly, Nola Martin, an outreach assistant at four public K-12 charter schools in West Philadelphia, distributed numerous handmade blankets to students whose families have been burned out of their homes, evicted, or forced to move because of domestic abuse. “When people lose their homes they typically feel completely alone,” she said. “Knowing that someone took the time to make a blanket for them, as a gift, reminds them that they have not been discarded or abandoned by the community.”
It may also mean something more.
“Receiving a present like this tells the recipient that they deserve beautiful things,” Pat LaMarche, Project co-director and founder, said. “Handmade quilts are expensive and when an individual or family is given one, it tells them that they are worthy.”
The next Homeless Memorial Blanket Project display and distribution will take place in Denver, Colorado, on December 21, 2025. Information about ways to participate and support the Blanket Project’s ongoing work can be found on its website.