Woman is knitting machine for Cardinal Schools

Aug 16, 2023

For the past 20 years, Jane Zajaczkowski has passed the time by knitting. She has created well-over hundred of sets of hats and mittens for the students at Jordak Elementary School in the Cardinal School District.

“I began crocheting mittens for the children when I volunteered with the CAB (Children and Books) reading program,” said Zajaczkowski, in a news release from the Cardinal School District. “It was a truly wonderful program that not only sharpened the children’s reading skills, it also instilled a true love of reading in the children. In the CAB program, each student took home a book of their choice every day and read it to their parents and family. After a student had read 20 books, they were allowed to choose a prize. I added some of my crocheted mittens to the prize choices, and I was surprised at how many children chose a pair of the mittens as a prize.”

Twenty years later, she is still knitting extra hats and mittens for the children at Cardinal. They are stored at the school, and are available for any student at any given time, the release said. Zajaczkowski knits, labels by age group, and then delivers boxes of these hats and mittens each school year.

“Jane’s kindness is amazing and very touching,” said Robert Kujala, who steps in as the building’s new principal after recently serving at Southington Local Schools, the release stated. “She has donated to our children for years. We can’t praise her enough for doing so much work. And the quality of her stitching is really amazing, you would think it came off a machine!”

The Cardinal students will be back to school on Aug. 21.

“We just want to thank her so much for being such a supporter of our children and school district. There will be warm little hands and heads because of her generosity,” said Kujala.

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