Dear Kay,
I’m reading the news, coming from cities famous and obscure across the globe, and it’s hard to feel cheerful with so much madness afoot. It’s a grim way for the world to head into a holiday season.
That said, the flip side to all this terror is a season when it’s easy to find ways to contribute to worthy causes. Knitters tend to be generous, so here are places where good folks are cooking up ways to support organizations that deserve the support. Please share a comment if you know of other ways to give in this season.
Give a Sheep
Clara Parkes of Knitter’s Review is all about the animal husbandry, via Heifer International. She writes: “Few gifts have the opportunity to endure quite like the gift of livestock—and training in animal husbandry—to deserving families around the world. Key to the Heifer program is a commitment from each recipient to pay it forward, which is how the gift of even one sheep can eventually help an entire village. Not that you need any enticing, but I feel like giving you something extra this year. I’ll pick 10 donors on January 1st, 2016, and I’ll send each of you a surprise skein of Clara Yarn. Happy New Year!” Here’s the link to Clara’s Heifer International team page.
For some reason, Clara’s heifers make me think of cheerful animals, and there’s no more cheerful animal than Babe, the sheep-herding pig. Maybe we all need to watch Babe. Maybe that’s a thing.
Bristol Ivy Gives Back
Bristol Ivy is donating 50% of her pattern sales for the month of December: 25% to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and 25% to Doctors without Borders. Ravelry makes it easy to email a pattern to a friend as a gift, and lord knows there are no patterns more tasty than Bristol’s. Have a look here for a stocking stuffer that every knitter will welcome.
Winterlong is a gem.
The Picot! Picot! Cowl is cool, too. Picot is the unsung hero of the edging world. It really gets its moment in this cowl.
Riding Her Hiney Off
The Yarn Harlot, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, raises money each year for the Toronto People with AIDS Foundation. Her six-day bicycle rides have made for fine armchair cycling for those of us who can’t handle a 600km car ride from Toronto to Montreal. Stephanie rides again next July. You can be the wind beneath her, um, wings right here.
You know that saying: “Give ’til it feels good?” Let’s aim for that. I gotta go watch the talking sheepherding pig, and probably get out Charlotte’s Web while I’m at it.
Love,
Ann
PS Only a few short days until A Thing We Are All Excited About is revealed. I am blowing colossal amounts of time fooling around with it, but hey—everybody needs a new craft, right?
We once gave the teacher a goat from Plan Canada. And I think some mango trees. That was the best teacher gift ever, I believe.
MercyCorps.org is one of my favorite charities. Also Planned Parenthood. And many local charities that preserve and educate about the natural world.
What a welcome post in this dark season. I love Heifer and it’s pay it forward model. A few of us are so inspired by Bristol’s donation that we’re joining her with our own donations for pattern sales. Bristol is updating her recent Instagram post with those also donating a portion of pattern sales to worthy causes.
Thank you for this great post. The world is a crazy place that’s been making me sad lately. This post made me happy!
Quilters in Lutheran church basements across the country welcome donations of fabric of all kinds to sew into Lutheran World Relief quilts. If you are downsizing your fabric stash or cleaning out a linen closet, we will take what you have. Curtains, sheets, tablecloths all make it into our quilts. Before we ship our quilts, we like to display and dedicate them. Scroll through our group page to see all the quilts! https://www.facebook.com/groups/lwrquilters/
So happy to see you plugging Bristol’s donations from her pattern sales. I was just thinking I should ping you to see if you knew about it! 🙂 I can’t wait to see what the Thing We Are All Excited About is! *claps hands in excitement*
So your headline makes me think you need to know about this site b/c their theme is also Love Wins. They’re not affiliated with any yarn work, though.
This group raises money in Love Flash Mobs to be given to people struggling for any number of reasons. No one is allowed to donate more than $25, proving that small gifts can do great things, that love wins. The last project was to raise money to help a women’s center in Haiti build a new wing because it was doing so much good work, it couldn’t serve all of the women who needed their help. And some of the money is going to a woman in Berlin who is helping refugees.
I’m not a religious person, but the founder of the group is–there’s very little religious content, and when it’s there, it’s so genuine and “everyone is loved” that I am impressed by the way the founder accepts everyone and makes them feel better.
Anyway–here’s the link to the nonprofit side of the group (Momastery is the blog, book, etc.). Together Rising is the nonprofit: http://togetherrising.org/
According to Instagram, Kate Atherley is making the same donations as Bristol Ivy, and Amy Tozer/Urban Farm Wife is donating 100% of the sales of her patterns to those two organizations!
Another worthy cause – CERF+, the Craft Emergency Relief Fund. Provides emergency funds for crafters of all sort facing disasters (fire, flood) or illness. They even have a special fund for fiber artists.
Thank you for this. Babe is one of my favorite movies ever, and like stockinette in the round or garter stitch, so comforting! I like that your suggestions for giving are knitting-related. I came across this blog post a couple of days ago, and found it and its suggestions wonderful. “Fifteen Things for When the World is Sh!tty and Terrifying. (And, as I said on FB, I also found it “thoughtful, sad, empowering and hopeful.” She’s a good writer, but the language is NSFW…or for tender eyes and ears!
http://iambeggingmymothernottoreadthisblog.com/2015/11/28/fifteen-things-for-when-the-world-is-shitty-and-terrifying/
These are all excellent ways to pay it forward, and help others. Thanks for sharing. I am inspired that others are sharing more of their ideas and places we can all make a difference. I knit teddy bears for charity. They go all over the world to needy children who need a friend to love. I always accept wool and yarn of any kind (except scratchy) to make these bears with, including partial balls of sock yarn. My last group of bears travelled to Ukraine and to Haiti. Can’t wait to hear about this exciting new craft of yours!
For the last few years, my husband and I have decided to donate the money we would spend on Christmas gifts for each other to local charities. We give to our local food shelf, Eldernetwork, Paws & Claws, and this year our church (we want to buy a food truck to take to neighborhoods to give meals to the needy). We feel that we have blessed in many ways and like to pay it forward.
By the way, when I dropped off the donation to Eldernetwork last year, the woman accepting the check asked if she could give me a hug. That was a feel good feeling that lasted a very long time!!!
Comment
These are great! I love Heifer International, especially their pay-it-forward model. Also, what better gift for a knitter to give or receive than a sheep? Given that most knitters I know have no place to keep a sheep, a Heifer sheep seems the way to go.
If you’re looking for a way to make your own knitting share the love, think about knitting a hat or scarf for refugee children: https://stitchingforsyrians.wordpress.com/