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Need Something to Knit While Stuck at Home? Why Not Knit for Charity

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There are so many ways we can help others in this time, from monetary donations to sewing masks and making blankets and other items.

It’s always true when it comes to charity knitting but maybe even more so now: check with the charity or place you want to donate to and see what they need and whether they are currently accepting donations.

Offices for nonprofits might be closed right now, or they might not want to accept donations if they don’t know they were made by a healthy person or if they are going to hospitals.

Warm Up America has current needs listed, for example, but their office is closed so they are not accepting donations to be shipped there (there are other projects that can be sent elsewhere, or you can hold items to ship later).

Hat Not Hate’s deadline is August 1, and they note that by the time the hats are distributed it’s unlikely the virus would still be active on the items. Shira Blumenthal is doing Facebook Lives on the Hat Not Hate Facebook page Monday through Friday for the foreseeable future.

Project Linus started a knit and crochet along March 7 that you can still join. You can get the pattern for a $15 donation (or $30 for both knit and crochet) and get access to a Facebook group about the project. The charity encourages crafters to contact their local collection site before sending or dropping of blankets to ensure they are still able to receive them.

Knitted Knockers says it is slowly and carefully continuing to distribute knit items on a limited basis at this time.

I know this barely scratches the surface of the options for knitting for charity but I wanted to throw out some options if you are home and looking for someone to knit for. If you have a favorite knitting charity and you know what their response is right now, let me know and I will add it to the post.

Comments

  1. Member of charity knitting group here, great to encourage charity knitting. Hope you won’t mind me saying, from experience, that it’s good to check the charity needs stuff (as you say). The field of charity knitting is littered with some well-meaning failures..we knitters are prolific, love to find a new idea, bootees for burnt koalas, octopuses for preemies etc that I’ve seen some websites disappear, innundated with items they can’t find outlets for. Do check before sending.

Have you read?

Knit a Pastel Plaid Sweater

There’s just something about plaid that makes it a classic for any time of year in just about any colors you can imagine. 

The lines on the Piet Sweater from kolibri by johanna give a modern take on plaid with bright, poppy colors and a hint of pastel. 

The project is worked with two fingering weight yarns held together (an alpaca and a mohair for a bit of fuzz) or you can use any DK weight yarn that gets you the correct gauge. 

The pattern is worked from the top down, mostly in the round, and uses short row shaping to shape the sleeves, which are knit directly onto the body and cuffed with ribbing to emphasize the balloon shape. 

Horizontal stripes are knit as you go, while the vertical stripes are added at the end with a crochet hook. 

It is meant to be oversized but also cropped, though you can adjust the length if you like. 

The pattern comes in seven sizes, and uses a main color and four contrasting colors. The actual chest measurement of the finished sweater ranges from 41 to  55.5 inches, or 104-141 cm, and is meant to be worn with 6 to 8 inches/15 to 20 cm of positive ease. 

The designer rates the project as for advanced knitters, but if you have some garments under your belt and are comfortable with short rows and a little bit of crochet you should be fine. 

The pattern is available in English, French and German on Ravelry. There’s also a cardigan version of the same style of sweater if you’d rather have a cardigan than a pullover. The sample of that one has a much more toned down, pastel color palette so it’s interesting to see how the pattern looks in different yarns. (There are quite a few projects for both sweaters on Ravelry if you want to see how it works in different colors.)

Photo: kolibri by johanna