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Crafty Help for Fire Victims

July 8, 2012 by Sarah White

high point fireReports out of Colorado are that the biggest fires are now mostly contained, thank goodness, and thoughts turn to helping people recover who may have lost everything. Craftsy, which has its headquarters in Denver, recently reported that it made a $3,000 donation to the Rist Canyon Volunteer Fire Department and was hoping to help raise $10,000 through First Giving (as I write this they hadn’t quite raised $4,000, so help them out if you can!).

I talked to a pal at Interweave, located in Loveland, last week, and she said no one at the company had lost their home but friends and family had been impacted. There’s a story on the Weaving Daily website about Nancy, a woman who lost everything in the Waldo Canyon fire, including her beloved cat and her loom. Fiber folks are stepping up with offers of looms and yarn, which is lovely to see. And a contributor to Spin-off, Kris Paige, lost her home and barn to the High Park fire. All her animals were temporarily relocated, and the family has set up a website to accept donations to help in their recovery.

One other way knitters can help is by buying Bijou Basin Ranch yarn. The company produces yak yarn and fiber products and is located in Elbert, Colo. They’ll be donating at least 10 percent of all online sales of fiber and yarn to the Red Cross and the Colorado Professional Firefighters.

Know of other ways knitters can support those who have been affected by the fires? Spill it!

[Photo of the High Point fire in June by Bijou Basin Ranch.]

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Knit a Linen Stitch Hot Pad

Linen stitch is one of my favorite knitting stitch patterns that, every time I use it in a project, I think about how I don’t use it often enough. 

It’s an easy stitch to make, with slip stitches done with the yarn held to the front of the work on the right/front side and to the back on the wrong/back side, which makes the strand of yarn a visible part of the pattern. 

It also makes a fabric that is thick and looks kind of like a woven fabric.

I recently used linen stitch to make a double-thick pot holder, which I worked in a kind of interesting way. I didn’t want to have to do any sewing on the project, so I started it from a crochet cast on and picked up stitches from the side of the cast on to make the hot pad all in one piece in the round with the edge sealed. 

This requires working on two circular needles, which is another technique I don’t use that often and am always reminded how much I like it when I do. 

The combination of double thickness and the stitch pattern makes for a hot pad that’s already pretty thick, but I also added a bit of old towel to the inside before I closed up the end to make it super thick and extra protective for your surfaces. 

I found the engineering challenge of this construction method to be a lot of fun, but you could also just knit it as a tube (casting on twice as many stitches as I did) and sew up the ends by hand when the knitting is done. Either way you’ve got a useful and pretty addition to your kitchen, whether you work it in a solid color, stripes or as a stash busting project will all your cotton odd balls. 

You can grab the pattern over at Our Daily Craft, or check it out on Ravelry. 

40+ Hot Pads You Can Sew For The Kitchen [Sewing]

A Cozy Knit to Calm Your Mind

Double Knit an Infinity Scarf

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