Reprinted with permission from the Savage (Minn.) Pacer

The staff at St. Gertrude’s Health and Rehabilitation Center in Shakopee thought a magic fairy was leaving afghans at their doorstep this winter.

“One day, they just showed up,” said Yvonne Anderson, marketing director for the center. “Our staff didn’t know who was leaving them.”

Residents at St. Gertrude’s have been putting the afghans to good use – tucking them in around their legs while they sit in wheelchairs and putting them on beds to keep their feet warm.

“We use them and we love them,” Anderson said. 

Magic fairy?
So who is this magic afghan fairy?

Well, Andrina O’Keefe of Savage has never met a ball of yarn she didn’t like and admitted she was the mysterious afghan fairy, but only after her daughter alerted the newspaper to her good deed.

Over the years, she’s crocheted thousands of dolls, afghans, scarves and pot holders and given them away to family, friends, friends of friends, neighbors and as prizes for silent auctions at charity events. But this winter she took her crocheting to a whole new level by giving away 100 lap afghans to residents of St. Gertrude’s.

She makes them in a variety of colors, but just the right size for residents to use when they are restricted to a wheelchair. The afghans are sized so that someone can lay it over their lap to keep their legs warm without the edges getting caught in the wheels. 

Andrina doesn’t have a pattern to guide her in terms of the correct dimensions for her lap creations; rather, she came up with the correct size by draping the afghan over her own legs as she sat in a chair.
Next up, Andrina has plans to put her afghan-making skills to use for more lap blankets for residents at Ebenezer Ridges in Burnsville, the Minnesota Veteran’s Administration Hospital in Minneapolis and organizations that offer hospice care. Besides St. Gertrude’s, her afghans have also found their way to Friendship Manor in Shakopee.

Enjoyable hobby
Her mother, Hilda VonBank, lived to be nearly 105 years old, and was a crocheter, too, but Andrina didn’t learn the skill from her. “She used to make the most wonderful bedspreads, but she never did teach us kids how to do it,” Andrina said as she let out a sigh.

Instead, Andrina learned from a coworker at Control Data, who taught three others to crochet at the same time with an extra-large crochet needle. That was when she was 38 years old, and her daughter, Cheryl, still has the green afghan.

Andrina will be 79 this month and has no plans to stop crocheting.

“I enjoy it and like to see the finished product,” she said of her craft, “I also like to be creative with different colors and take a lot of pride in my work.”

Detal oriented
Andrina worked at Control Data as a technician/assembler soldering components for 4-by-7-by-10 inch computers used by NASA in space.

“You built it yourself and handed it to the customer,” she said with pride in her voice.

Some of the wires she worked with were the width of a human hair, so to say it was detailed work might be a bit of an understatement.

The skills she put to work there also serve her well with her crocheting, as her family and friends can attest.

Andrina estimates it takes her about 30 hours to finish one afghan in a double-stitch pattern that includes three rows in the middle sections and four rows on each end. Her lap afghan creations start with 110 loops and then she builds upon that with double stitches.

She picks colors for each afghan based on “what looks good.” But when creating afghans that she gives away as baby blankets, she uses softer yarn and switches to a zigzag pattern, which has a plain stitch with 10 rows up and three rows down.

When she’s not crocheting, Andrina can be found doing yard work at her Monterey Avenue, home, running around doing errands or volunteering her time with the American Legion Ladies Auxiliary or at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church.

Andrina was married to the late John “Rollie” O’Keefe and they have three children, Cheryl, Jeff and Curtis, plus seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Andrina’s parents, the late Alfred and Hilda VonBank, lived in Savage and had eight children.