Knit a Lemon to Relieve Tax Day Stress

Tax day in the United States is a pretty stressful day for some people, and the Craft Yarn Council is encouraging people to take time for some stress relief by knitting and crocheting lemons.

In particular, knitting and crocheting lemons that will be distributed outside the James A. Farley Post Office Building in Manhattan on April 18 (later than usual thanks to a holiday in D.C.) to remind people to make lemons into lemonade and spread the word about the health benefits of knitting and crochet.

Confirmed by numerous studies and reports and personal stories from knitters and crocheters around the world, and highlighted in national and international press — including a recent New York Times article titled “The Health Benefits of Knitting” and stories on Yahoo!, CNN, Daily Mail and more — the stress-busting crafts are known to reduce blood pressure, decrease anxiety and stress, boost mood, increase mindfulness, elicit the relaxation response and much more. These health benefits are what triggered the non-profit Craft Yarn Council to start a health initiative and spread awareness about the positive effects these crafts bring through its Stitch Away Stress campaign and host the NYC Lemon Drop Campaign for Stress Awareness on Tax Day.

“Upon discovering all the studies out there that prove these crafts reduce stress and boost mood and hearing so many personal stories from knitters and crocheters on the topic, we felt it was important to draw more attention to the subject and help more people who are stressed out find a way to relax and feel happier,” said Craft Yarn Council Co-Executive Director, Mary Colucci. “Since April is National Stress Awareness Month and Tax Day is historically one of the most stressful days of the year for Americans, April 18 seemed like the perfect day to stitch away stress.”

Tags attached to the lemons will direct recipients to the website www.stitchawaystress.com where they can go to learn how to knit and crochet, download the free lemon stress ball pattern to make one themselves, explore all the health benefits of knitting and crochet and more. Those waiting in line may have the chance to learn a stitch or two from the knitters and crocheters handing out the lemons as well.

The knit and crochet lemons were designed by Twinkie Chan and are super cute. Even if you don’t live in New York, you can stitch some lemons and drop them at your local post office on tax day to spread the word about the stress-busting properties of yarn craft. What a sweet idea.

[Photo via Craft Yarn Council.]

Any time of year is a good time for stash busting, but if you can combine it with knitting a blanket that will keep you warm when it (finally!) gets cooler that’s even better. Let’s take a look at some fun patchwork blanket knitting patterns.

If you want to keep it super simple, you can just make blocks of garter stitch and sew them together, like the beginner’s patchwork baby blanket from Mini Baa Baa or the color block blanket from Make and Do Crew. Both projects are worked in strips and sew together, with the baby version calling for two strands of DK or light worsted weight yarn held together and the larger one using bulky yarn.

Add a little more texture with the mixed blocks of the cottage quilt throw from Mama in a Stitch. This one combines garter stitch and seed stitch and uses worsted weight yarn. She used a crochet join to make the chains on top of the blocks, but you can join them however you like. It calls for eight colors but you can use what you have, and there are three size options.

Get a real sampler style patchwork blanket with this design from Knit Sew Make. It calls for worsted weight yarn and has four size options. All of the patterns just use knit and purl stitches so this one is still pretty easy for beginners.

If you want a more complex colorwork project that will keep you entertained all season, try the Peace by Piece blanket pattern from Needle and Feather. This one is made up of two color colorwork blocks and calls for worsted weight yarn. You can choose to use just a few of the blocks and repeat them more often, or make multiples of the whole set.

The knitted patchwork recipe from Martine Ellis (free on Ravelry) uses mitered squares in fingering weight yarn, so it’s perfect for using up all your leftover sock yarn and mini skeins. This one is a tutorial more than a pattern so you can make your blanket as big as you like or keep going until you run out of yarn.

Susan B. Anderson’s 100 Squares blanket (find it on Ravelry) has a lot of mitered squares, too, but they’re arranged in fun ways and includes some quilt inspired designs as well. This one also is a bit of method more than pattern but it sure looks like a lot of fun for using all the leftovers.

Of course you can totally improvise a patchwork blanket using the yarn and stitches you like, but I hope these patterns inspire you to look at your leftover yarn in a new way.

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