Watch This Sweet Short Film on the Value of Knitting

When animator Samantha Moore’s mother lost the ability to follow knitting patterns because of dementia, Moore taught herself to knit through YouTube tutorials and was able to find comfort in knitting as her mother’s health declined.

She began to interview knitters about what knitting means to them and how it gets them through hard times and made the animated short film, “Visible Mending,” which you can view at The New York Times’ website.

The video includes several British knitters and is illustrated with knit characters that either they or Moore designed. The video is full of knit and crochet and stories about how knitting gives us a place to explore and be comforted, to know that mistakes don’t really matter, and to share our love and creativity with other people.

This time of year seems perfect for thinking about what knitting (and crochet if you do that too) means to you, what value you get from it and how you can share that with others in the new year.

Knitting may seem like a simple act of making things, and it is, but it is or can also be stress relief, self expression, a way of connecting with other people, a way to learn new things, hold on to traditions of the past and so much more. It gives us ways to use our talents to be charitable, to make gifts, to teach others.

I know I want more of all of that in the year to come. I’ve been using this in between time to work on some knitting projects to donate to a local warming center, and hatching plans to continue to do more of that in the new year.

I hope you’ll watch the film and think about what knitting means to you, and come back and share it with the rest of us!

[Photo via The New York Times]

Fall will be here before we know it, and that means there are holidays coming right behind where we might be entertaining at home. It’s always fun to have a hand knit touch in your home for other people to see, and if you’re going to be in the kitchen all day you might as well have some nice knit dish cloths to use.

I love this little plaid hand towel from Darling Jadore. Use a little bit of leftover cotton yarn from another project for the plaid portion. It looks like the horizontal stripes are worked as you knit and the vertical stripes are done with duplicate stitch, making this a quick and easy project even newer knitters can make.

Combine garter stitch and an easy eyelet pattern worked sideways to make the Annette Dish Towel from Cluck Cluck Boots, which is meant to be reminiscent of flour sack towels. It calls for DK weight yarn and you can work it in one color or two (or even three!).

Add a little more texture with this set of kitchen towels from Whileberry Creative. They’re mostly worked in garter stitch with borders in easy knit/purl patterns, and you can work them in sport or worsted weight yarn.

Two of Wands Shop has another cute allover knit and purl pattern they call the Seersucker Textured Tea Towel. It’s an easy repeating pattern worked in worsted weight yarn, and there’s a chart in the pattern you can use, but don’t have to, if you want to practice knitting from a chart.

The Classic Cloth dish towel from Handmade Home by Connie is another one that can use a little leftover yarn in a contrasting color, or you could color block it our use stripes throughout the pattern. This one uses worsted weight yarn and another easy repeating knit purl stitch pattern.

If you like to hang your towel on the oven handle or elsewhere but it’s always falling off, try the Stay Put kitchen towel from Fancy Step Knits. This project is worked in garter stitch and includes a hole partway through so you can pull the towel through itself over a rod or handle. Stripes are optional but a nice addition.

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