Mallory Heise, an eighth-grader at Merton Williams Middle School in Hilton, has been collecting the colorful little tops from squeezable applesauce packets since fourth grade. Apparently, she and her fellow students eat a lot of applesauce because her collection has grown to over 3,000 caps.
“I saw that a lot of people had applesauce pouches at lunch and figured the cap would be an easy thing to collect since they were popular and it kept them from going in the garbage,” said Mallory. “Word began to spread and I started to receive bags of them from students and staff.”
Mallory began brainstorming ideas on how she could use the caps and turned to Pinterest for ideas. At the same time, Mallory’s mom, Carla Heise, a first grade teacher at Village Elementary School, heard from a college friend, Dawn Byfield, activity director at Elderwood of Lakeside, a skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility in Brockport, about how difficult this time is for residents because they are unable to see family during the pandemic.
“I wanted them to know that people are thinking about them,” said Mallory. So she got to work making reindeer, Christmas tree, and wreath ornaments with her caps – 100 ornaments in all. “It took me at least 10 hours, maybe more,” she said. A member of the Hilton Chapter of the National Jr. Honor Society, she plans to use those hours to help fulfill her 15-hour volunteering requirement.
“I learned that even the little things you do can make a bigger difference in other people’s lives,” said Mallory.” I’ve always known that I would reuse the caps and make them into something, and it turned out that this was the perfect opportunity.”
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