There are people who are good at crafting, and then there are people who are flat-out prolific.

And the moment I stepped into Bob Roskamp’s kitchen, I knew I was in the presence of craft greatness.

Before the holidays, a reader suggested I go talk to Roskamp, an 82-year-old Allendale man who crochets blankets for charity. The story idea didn’t come with photos, so I decided to take a leap of faith and give him a call.

Roskamp answered right away, and I realized immediately that he is in a class all his own when it comes to stitching afghans.

“Do you crochet often?” I asked.

“Every time I sit down,” he said, chuckling a bit.

That’s pretty hardcore for anyone, never mind an octogenarian.

A couple of hours later, I was in Roskamp’s kitchen where he unfurled charity blanket No. 421, a pink-and-red striped afghan measuring roughly 54 inches by 80 inches. A tall man, Roskamp held the blanket high above his head so I could read the center vertical stripe he created with afghan stitch that reads “Jesus Loves Me.” To complete the vibrant blanket, he worked out from the center, crocheting vertical striped sections using a V-stitch. Wow.

Kindness for orphans

After he unfolded a couple more of his latest creations, Roskamp started flipping through the albums where he keeps photographs of all his charity blankets and the people who receive them. Many of the recipients are children living in orphanages in Romania and Mexico.

His crafty charity mission started when he brought a stack of blankets along on a mission trip to Romania in the late 1990s. Roskamp gave the blankets to the women who hosted and prepared meals for him and the other volunteers who flew over to install church pews donated by a West Michigan church.

The trip inspired Bob to crochet with a renewed purpose, and he kept crocheting blankets for families he met at the Romanian church.

“I saw a need,” he said. “Those people are so poor.”

On one of his trips to Romania, Roskamp watched parents arrive at an orphanage, drop off their son, who looked to be about 5, and walk away.

“They couldn’t afford him,” Bob said. “Things like that ... it gets to you.”

Inspired to help, Roskamp started crocheting cozy blankets for the children. To date, he’s made five trips to Romania to deliver blankets. His blanket total goes up rapidly, since Roskamp can finish a large blanket in about eight to 10 days, compared to the months most hobbyists spend making just one.

When we met more than a week ago, he was cruising along in the 420s with a new batch of blankets packed and ready for children in Mexico.

“I just feel there’s a need out there, and it’s a hobby, and I enjoy it,” he said, explaining why he spends most of his time crocheting for charity.

The quality of Roskamp’s work rivals that of the best crocheters I know, and his ability to combine random donated yarn to create lovely blankets is most impressive.

“I used to mix inks, so I know how to (mix colors) very well,” said the retired commercial printer.

He even makes his own hooks by carving them from wooden dowels. Instead of wrestling with the often unwieldy commercially available hooks designed for afghan stitch projects, Roskamp uses a 32-inch dowel with a hook carved on one end to manage more than 100 stitches at a time.

Uses even the scraps

If you donate yarn to Roskamp, rest assured that he won’t waste it.

“If it’s 3 feet or more, I use it,” Roskamp said, noting that he likes to make beautiful scrap blankets out of little bits of yarn. Helene, his wife of 60 years, first started making these scrap blankets with yarn leftover from his bigger projects. These days, Helene, 85, leaves the crocheting to her husband and weaves in the ends for him while he goes on to the next blanket.

Roskamp’s mother taught him and his three siblings how to knit, crochet, sew and embroider when they were growing up in Coopersville. The father of two, Roskamp credits his daughter with getting him back into crocheting later in life when she got him an afghan kit.

“It keeps me busy,” he said, noting he often stitches caps for premature babies in doctor’s office waiting rooms. “I can’t sit still and do nothing.”

While smartphones, tablets and other devices seem to occupy the masses these days, Roskamp is a proponent of creating something tangible with his time.

“After they push buttons on an iPod for about an hour, what do you get?” he asked.

Definitely not a blanket.

While basketball is a little too fast-paced to watch while crocheting, Roskamp said he does a lot of stitching while watching football and baseball on TV.

“It takes five minutes for the pitcher to throw a ball, so you get a lot done,” he said.

While the volume of his charity crafting is extraordinary, Roskamp downplays his efforts.

“I can’t get on a pulpit and preach,” Roskamp said, explaining that he’s simply using his skills to put a little warmth out into the world.

“It makes me feel real good,” he said.

Perhaps it’s time for more men and women to take a page from Roskamp’s playbook. Just imagine how many blankets could be made if we all crocheted for charity during the Super Bowl. Kudos to Roskamp for doing more than his share.

Email Jennifer Ackerman-Haywood at jennifer@craftsanity.com or send story ideas to P.O. Box 888192, Grand Rapids, MI 49588. Read her blog at craftsanity.com, follow @CraftSanity on Twitter and check out the winter issue of her magazine at craftsanity.com/magazine.