They are so tiny, looking at them can make your heart break.

The caps the Community Center’s knitters made for premature babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Portland’s Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital speak volumes about our newest, most vulnerable Mainers.

On Saturday, July 21, the Harjula family brought 60 caps and six baby blankets the Center’s Monday morning knitting group made to the NICU in Portland. The trip was especially memorable because the knitted donations were brought by two of the NICU’s former patients.

Teresa Harjula had firsthand experience with the NICU and wanted to say thank you because her twin grandsons, Luke and Grant, were born four months premature in 2014 and weighed only 2 pounds each. They spent 3-1/2 months in the NICU, receiving specialized care to sustain them as they fought for life.

Now almost 4 years old, Luke and Grant have no health issues and are able to join their 6-year old brother Logan in play. The boys accompanied their mother and grandmother in bringing the items to the NICU.  “When the twins come here to visit, other parents can see that there is hope for these babies,” Teresa Harjula explained.

“Each of them was brought back to life more than a dozen times,” the twins’ mother, Harley Harjula, said of the difficult time the family experienced. After the boys left the NICU, they remained in the hospital until they were ready to come home. Their mother is grateful for the kind wishes of her friends and neighbors. “I can’t thank this community enough,” Harley said. “People were still sending cards to the boys two years later.”

“Magic happens every day and if you don’t believe it, spend a week in the NICU,” Teresa said.

The knitting project took shape this spring when Teresa sought  donations on her Facebook page to benefit the NICU at the Children’s Hospital. Besides money, she also suggested her friends who knit and crochet might want to make caps for the premature infants.

When she told the Community Center’s Monday morning knitting group about the need for the preemie caps, the group went to work producing the 60 caps and six blankets in three weeks.  “This is what knitters do,” explained the group’s facilitator Carol Cragin. “We do things for others.”

In addition to caps and blankets for the NICU infants, the various knitting groups at the Community Center have created hats and mittens for the area’s clothing closet, school nurse and to patients at the Togus VA Medical Center in Augusta. “One year we made helmet liners and sent them to Afghanistan,” Cragin recalled. Members also knit items that are sold to benefit the Community Center.

For more information on the Center’s knitting groups, call 633-9876. The NICU doesn’t need any more caps or blankets for a while, but if knitters are homebound and would like to work on other projects, they may. Cragin will provide yarn, needles and patterns.

To contribute items for the knitting project, bring them to the Community Center.

The Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital is at Maine Medical Center. For more information about donating, call 662-0111.