Knitting in the News: Help for Dementia Patients and Knitting is Good for You

I love stories about how people use knitting to help others, and thankfully there are lots of ways that we can use our needles for good. The staff and patients of Southmead Hospital in the UK (as well as other volunteers) have been busy making “twiddlemuffs,” knit muffs that feature a variety of textures, buttons, knit flowers and little toys, which are used by dementia patients to keep their hands warm and busy.

It’s frustrating for patients who have been active (and maybe even crafters themselves) to not be able to see or concentrate long enough to do activities they used to enjoy, and these knit objects give them something to focus on, as well as tactile and mental stimulation.

The hospital had been the site of a knitting program, and joined forces with a local knitting group to provide after-work knitting times for staff and yarn for the project.

You can find a pattern on Ravelry if you want to get a closer look.

There have been untold numbers of stories about the health benefits of knitting, and the latest one making the rounds on the Internet comes from Yahoo! Makers and covers a study at Northern Arizona University looking at Textile Therapy, or how working with needles and yarn — or a needle and thread, for that matter — provides mental health benefits.

Clinical psychologist Ann Futterman-Collier studied 60 women with varying levels of stress and had them either write, craft or meditate and keep track of their mood during the activity. People who made something with their hands showed the greatest “mood repair” including decreased negative feelings and less inflammatory response in the face of stressors. Yet another reason to keep your needles close at all times!

[Photo from the Yate and Sodbury News.]

Over the years I have shared a lot of pumpkin knitting patterns, and I’ve knit and crocheted a lot of pumpkins myself. But it feels like there are always more fun things to try with knit pumpkins, so this year I wanted to look a little more beyond basic stockinette or ribbed pumpkins and share some pumpkin patterns with cables, bobbles and colorwork.

In the cable collection we’ve got these cute little basic cable and ribbed pumpkins from Elly Bear Knits. There are two sizes that make a wide, flat pumpkin and a taller round pumpkin. Both are worked in the round as a tube that’s cinched top and bottom when you’re done, and they use bulky weight yarn.

Another cute cable pumpkin knitting pattern comes from Gray Bear Akswokrat. This one is knit flat and it looks like a chunky yarn but you could use other weights to make pumpkins of different sizes. This one also has an I-cord stem and uses yarn to cinch up the sections of the pumpkin, giving it a more natural look.

Add some bobbles to your pumpkins with this design from Autumn Shelter Makes. Also worked in the round in a tube, it features a repeating pattern of bobbles and uses yarn wrapped around the outside to make segments. This one looks like worsted weight yarn to me.

Of course there’s nothing that says your pumpkin has to be a single color, so let’s throw in some colorwork. I love the look of the Cozy Fall Pumpkin knitting pattern from South Stitch Girls. The little leather loop adds a rustic touch but you could also just add a stick. These pumpkins have five colorwork options and are worked in worsted weight yarn in the round.

There’s also the Autumn Fair Isle Trio pumpkins pattern from Equestriann Style, which has three different sizes of pumpkins with four colorwork designs. They are worked in super bulky yarn in the round and look good with high contrast or more muted color combinations.

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