A Look at the Many Benefits of Knitting

I’ve written a lot in the past about the benefits of knitting, and there are a lot of them, from improved mental fitness to help with healing after an accident or injury.

Knitting is relaxing, can help you sleep and is an easy way to help people if you knit for charity.

Over at the Lion Brand blog, Kathryn Vercillio has outlined the 10 Most Important Health Benefits of Yarncrafting.

My personal favorite may be number 4:

Crafting May Reduce or Postpone Dementia
Several studies have shown that knitting and crochet can postpone age-related memory loss. The crafts can also be soothing for those people who are already experiencing signs of dementia. Recently, researcher Yonas Geda, MD, a neuropsychiatrist at the Mayo Clinic, completed a study that showed knitting is neuroprotective and may reduce dementia by as much as 50%.

Sounds good to me!

[Photo of eye pillow via Lion Brand Yarn.]

Next Pattern:

Many times when I write these posts I will say something like “you can use any yarn you want” or “this would be a great stash-busting project.” That’s just how my mind works. And my stash, too, since I probably have sweater quantity of two or three yarns at most, but tons of singles and odd balls and leftovers.

Blankets are generally a really good way to use up those bits, but in this case, I think you’re going to want to plan it out a bit better.

Looking at photos of the Color Study Blanket from Purl Soho, it looks like it’s made with two yarns held together, and that block in the center is worked with one of each color from the adjoining sides to make a mixed up color.

But that’s not actually how it’s done. This is three separate colors (four, really, with the neutrals in the corners) chosen form a yarn with an expansive palette so they play off each other. The project calls for a worsted weight superwash wool, which is a great choice for a blanket that’s both warm and washable.

This pattern was originally designed by Laura Ferguson and was updated by Hiromi Glover. It is worked in one piece in garter stitch intarsia, which is a great way to learn the intarsia technique if you don’t already know it. It comes in crib or throw sizes.

Despite the introduction to this post, I am going to go ahead and say that, yes, of course you could do this blanket with scraps or odd balls or even just choose five colors that don’t blend together so easily. But I really do love the look of the color play, and I think it would be worth your time to find colors that play well together to get a similar effect.

This pattern is available for free from Purl Soho.

[Photo: Purl Soho]

Next Pattern:

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