Nolan Clarke sat at a children's table in Holy Trinity Catholic School library Friday and worked white yarn and lace into a Christmas angel ornament for a nursing home resident he likely will never meet.
He wasn't sure nursing home residents get as much regular affection as he does, so Clarke, 10, wants them to know he's thinking about them during the holiday season.
"They need ... something like love and stuff," he said. "It's the spirit of Christmas."
The fourth-grade classes at Holy Trinity in Robinson are making 300 angels for aging adults living in Marian Manor nursing facility in Banksville and bedridden patients at Kindred Hospital in North Fayette. They'll be delivered before Christmas.
The mostly 9- and 10-year-old students began calling the ornaments guardian angels for the senior citizens, teacher Kristine Finn said.
Because "they will watch over them and protect from danger," said Tara Richardson, 10.
Said Malaina Mathews, 9: "It will make them feel good."
Richardson believes in angels. So does Mathews. And Brett LaBarge, 10, said angels look out for everyone -- and the yarn versions will remind the recipients "people are thinking of them, too."
Finn and teacher Laura LaGrosse said they want the students to believe in the power of giving.
"When they become 10 years old, they start to realize it's not about them, and they realize what their place in the world is," LaGrosse said.
The students began constructing sled ornaments yesterday from Popsicle sticks and painting them red. They will give them to families who donate to Make-A-Wish Foundation when the students sing Christmas carols in an Imperial neighborhood Dec. 14.
Alex Jozwiak, 10, hopes the money donated will help grant the biggest wish imaginable for another boy or girl his age who is sick.
He said he'd like that more than finding a video game under the Christmas tree.
"They have a disease, and I don't," Jozwiak said. "I hope I can give something to make them happy."
Daniel Shaw, 9, said he made about 20 angels so far.
He hopes one day when he needs extra attention that someone he doesn't know will think of him the same way he and his classmates were thinking about the hospital and nursing home residents.
Shaw has one wish for a senior citizen who receives his angel. "I want that person to be able to join their angel in heaven," he said.
And he has one request: "You should always think of the people not in as good a condition as yourself."
"This," Finn said, "is giving from their heart."
