By Margaret Maccoll
A close call with death inspired professional knitter to Sydney’s entertainment set, Julie Annabel, to use her needles to help the homeless and traumatised.
The Tewantin resident said while in Nambour Hospital a few years ago she had a “brain seizure and died”.
It took hospital staff 15 minutes to revive her and after recovering the 61-year-old decided to use her knitting for those in need.
Julie’s beanies and scarves are a far cry from the flamboyant costumes she made to grace the stages of Sydney, but she couldn’t be happier.
“I know I could (knit) for other people but I do it for the homeless. I do it because I want to. It gives me a lot of pleasure and satisfaction,” she said.
Julie knits beanies and scarves over summer, then turns her hand to trauma teddies in the winter months.
With new wool she purchases herself, Julie has this summer completed 45 beanies and 30 scarves which she will give to homeless people to warm them during the coming cooler months.
A speedy knitter, Julie completes a scarf in two days and a beanie in just three hours.
“I’ve been knitting for a long time,” she said. “My grandmother taught me when I was a little girl.”
Julie’s grandmother knitted until she was 100 years old, passing away a year later.
“She was the Red Cross’s number one trauma teddy knitter,” Julie said.
In what has become a family tradition Julie, who is a member of the Tewantin Noosa Red Cross, has taken over her grandmother’s position knitting trauma teddies.
Meanwhile, her mother co-ordinates their distribution in hospitals and disaster centres across the nation and overseas.
