Love Your Melon (LYM) is giving individuals across the country the opportunity to help children battle cancer in America through the purchase of knit caps. Every time someone buys a hat through the organization, the organization gives a hat to a child battling cancer.
Jess Grubb, Crew Captain for Muskingum University’s LYM, got the idea of bringing this organization to campus after watching one of her family members battle cancer. She saw a post on Instagram about LYM and wanted to get Muskingum University involved.
“I think one of the best things in the world is making kids feel better, especially ones that have to go through something like battling cancer,” said Grubb.
Grubb got 20 people together around campus last fall to help promote LYM through social media and word of mouth.
To purchase a hat, individuals can go to LYM’s website, select which hat they wanted to purchase, then at the end of their selections choose “Muskingum University” from a drop-down menu.
Due to the large amounts of hats that have been sold out, individuals can pre-order hats before the release date.
The crew’s goal is to sell 100 hats over the course of the school year. Once that goal is met, the crew members will receive two Superhero costumes. With the costumes, they will be able to go to local hospitals and visit cancer patients with the hope of brightening their day.
LYM is an organization founded at the University of St. Thomas, in St. Paul, Minnesota, by two friends, Zachary Quinn and Brian Keller.
“We founded the organization while we were sophomores in college,” said Quinn, according to LYM website. “We wanted to help those in need and everything else came together.”
The hats were so popular they sold out first weekend.
Quinn and Keller went to their first hospital donation event on December 18, 2012. They found out how cool the idea was that they were able to donate to a cause.
“Seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces that day was incredible so we kept making the hats,” said Quinn, according to the LYM website.
Following two nationwide tours in 2014, Love Your Melon has created Love Your Melon Ambassadors, so college students can get their own towns and communities involved with this organization.
Muskingum’s Love Your Melon Campus Crew Program has Facebook and Twitter sites with more information about getting involved at the local level.
Photo from MU Love Your Melon Twitter.
