Banding together for Israel with looms
Sometimes, the littlest people have the biggest creative ideas. Like six-year-old Sloane Orski, who started making blue and white loom bracelets to raise money for Israel and is calling on the whole community to support it.
As I walked into the Orski house, two adults and a young child are sitting at the table making loom bracelets. Little Sloane is concentrating very hard. She’s been at the job for almost 72 hours now – going to school and sleeping in between, of course – and she has recruited not only her parents, but her extended family, friends and even her parent’s friends to help.
When I was there, the doorbell rang twice with reinforcements.
By the time I spoke to the Orskis on Thursday, the loom operation had donated $16,800 to Magen David Adom with orders continuing to flood in. The figure was expected to go beyond $20,000 by the weekend. It has since surpassed $50,000.
As we watched Sloane, her mum Jess, and a friend make the loom bands, her dad Avi shared the family’s story with me.
Avi’s mum was born and raised in Israel, and his grandparents helped found the State of Israel, so the family ties run very deep. His aunt and uncle and many of his cousins still live in Israel, and like many others are either now in bomb shelters or serving in the IDF.
Avi explained that as the situation transpired, he felt comatose.
“Seeing the level of destruction and barbarity, I just felt totally helpless. We sit on Twitter, and you go down really dark holes. But what do I do from here? And then out of the blue, Sloane has been really into loom band making, and she said, ‘why don’t we make blue and white ones’?”
Avi explained that the family have shielded Sloane from what is going on, particularly as she has fresh memories from visiting her cousins and family in Israel earlier this year, where she met 18 of her family members.
Sloane knows that Israel is sad and hurting. So, she suggested selling the loom bands to raise money.
All it took was one initial message and according to Avi, it has gone completely beserk.
While the loom bands are being sold for $5 each, both Avi and Jess explained that people are being exceptionally generous, at times, giving much more than that. Both commented also that a lot of the biggest donations, heart-warmingly, have come from outside the Jewish community.
Avi and Jess looked at how they could maximise the donations through donation matching, so while they are looking at other donation opportunities, at the moment MDA is the chosen charity.
This is largely due to American businessman, politician, and philanthropist Michael Bloomberg’s announcement that he will match every donation to MDA. Both Avi and Jess’s workplaces have also come on board to help match their initial figure.
And there’s no sign of the operation stopping.
It has even branched out with a US arm, with Jess – who is American – reaching out to a friend for help. A spreadsheet between the two families has been set up to track all the orders.
Avi explained that Sloane’s idea has exceeded all their expectations.
“It’s now our job to execute it, and it has led to a few late nights,” Avi laughed.
Jess though admitted that it has been quite a therapeutic project. Echoing what Avi said about feeling helpless, Jess said making the loom bands themselves has provided a little bit of solace.
But Jess laughed as she pointed out that they’re running out of supplies. There are only so many blue and white loom bands available, and they’re very quickly buying them up.
Both Avi and Jess commented that the loom bracelets are also helping to engage people outside of the community in a conversation about what’s happening.
At the moment, all orders are going through either Jess or Avi’s Instagram accounts. They’re trying to jump while the iron – and the inclination to give – is hot, and demand keeps coming as we’re chatting.
“We’re very mindful that with a lot of these things, people get very supportive very quickly, so we want to try and get things done as quickly as possible, so we can jump on these donations that are flooding in,” Jess said.
And they’re doing just that, recruiting as many people as possible to help with making the bands, delivering the bands and spreading the word via social media.
Sloane, thankfully, has some beautiful memories of her time with her family in Israel. She said the hot springs was her favourite – because the water stayed hot – and a pretty close second was “making the chocolate” with her cousin who is a chocolate engineer with Elite.
And now, she’s making memories of helping her cousins, and all Israelis, with a simple yet creative project, showing that a little six-year-old in Sydney can take an idea and inspire a whole community to support it.
“It’s a good reminder that sometimes our little ones have the creativity that we lose,” Avi said. “Sloane is almost six now and her idea will have such a big impact.”
To order, please send Avi a direct message via Instagram: @aviorski
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