Textile Museum, Washington, DC Feb. 26, 2011

Dear Friends,

Ann said she wanted photos!! Here are 4 from our get together. It was wonderful to meet and get to know other knitters for the cause. The ikat exhibit was also extraordinary. Hopefully others will post their photos.

Linda S.

My first posting

Hello fellow knitters!  I just wanted to make my first post on this blog.  First off, you all ROCK!  What a great group of crafters we have here all working together for a great cause.

Anyhoo, I've knitted for A4A in the past, but only recently happened upon this blog through the ravelry group.  Here is a sweater I made for the earlier youth campaign, although I'm not sure it made it to its destination in time for the deadline.  If not, it goes for the second campaign.

I'm wearing the sweater (faceless, I know)...I'm about 5'6 so it should fit some one in the youth range.  I wish I made the neck hole a bit smaller, but I was running out of time.

I'm currently working on another sweater and hope to complete that by the next deadline.  I'm trying to find time to knit between working and having a one year old.  :) 

Keep it up everyone!

DC Meet-Up, Feb. 26, 2-4 pmTextile Museum!

I posted this to our email list and also posting here for others who may catch the message ...

Let's Meet!

Knitting, Tea, and Conversation with afghans for Afghans

February 26, 2 to 4 pm

Textile Museum, Washington, DC

The exhibits on ikat and recycling will interest you, so leave extra time before or after our group -- exhibit info here.

Location and transit information here.

I will bring my laptop to show slides from many of the distributions of our wool gifts to the people of Afghanistan. This is a casual program.

Please share this message with your fiber friends in the DC area. The more, the merrier.

Thanks to the Textile Museum, and especially to Tom, for welcoming us at their beautiful museum.

Hope you can join us! Real people and faces -- I am so excited!

See you soon,
Ann

http://www.afghansforAfghans.org

See Jackie's sweater and pets!

Jackie sent us a letter (with her knit gift package) to check out her blog, Woolyadventure, and I just got around to it ... see her cardigan for the kids and be sure to look at her fiber animals when you get a moment. Hi Jackie!

a few sweater patterns

Now that the call has gone out, again, for sweaters, with time enough to finish one up, here are a few free patterns I'd filed away for the next opportunity.

This one has a shawl collar, a feature that virtually eliminates the possibility of a neck that's too tight. And it uses bulky yarn, so it's fast. Remember -- you can stretch your yarn using stripes and color blocking. I would make the larger size; the smaller size will only fit the very youngest kids. (knitted)

This one is crocheted, and looks quite nice. You do have to join the site to access it, but there's no fee and they do not send you mail. Again, I'd make at least the medium size of this one. Edited to add a comment from a crocheter who couldn't convince her computer to post to the blog: "The crochet sweater pattern that you gave a link to is a very nice one. May I suggest that you advise people to buy some extra yarn and make it longer than the pattern calls for? It is one I have made in the past, and the sweater barely has tummy coverage. It needs at least another two inches to be warm and modest enough."

Here is a worsted weight turtleneck, easily converted to a crew neck, which is probably more useful. (knitted)

The men's sweater on this page uses heavy worsted and has an easy stitch pattern (knitted)

Hope these help you come up with some good ideas. . .

first message

Hi! I'm glad to be a blog member. Two pictures of knitted items I have sent. There are others and more to come. Linda S.

New Campaign

I was so pleased to learn that A4A will continue the youth campaign, for another year.
I'll start a sweater, too, in maroon. I like the all-one-piece-from-the-top-down type.
I'll put in a couple of cable stitches.

Sweater start

I found some nice green wool worsted on sale a while ago and think I will start a  sweater with it .
I have a pattern I have used several times for my 9 year old granddaughter that should do nicely as it has good coverage and is interesting enough to keep me going.  I also have worsted weight socks that I started a while ago that I didn't finish in time for this campaign.  They use up odds and ends -- some worsted and some sock yarn used double - and should be warm and colorful.  I was happy to learn that they won't go to waste.

24

Last fall I published a photo of the yarns I'd chosen for a Peace Fleece blanket for the current A4A campaign. I finished it this morning at 1:30; it was in the mail at 8 a.m. Eastern time, and I have high hopes it will squeak in under the wire on Monday.

I call this blanket 24 (apologies in advance, metric folks -- this conceit is only supported if I speak in terms of inches). It was made in 4 sections, each measuring 24 inches by 24 inches, and each based on an equation that equals 24. The first section was 4 stripes, each 6 inches wide (4 x 6); the second was 6 4-inch stripes (6 x 4); the third was 8 3-inch stripes (8 x 3); and the last was 12 2-inch stripes (12 x 2). I got into the second skein of each color, so it used a lot of yarn -- but all of it was already here in my house.


The challenge was not the knitting -- garter stitch rectangles are well within my ability -- but the colors. I tend strongly toward jewel tones and brights; these muted, tweedy, fall and winter landscape colors are unusual for me. I had them in my stash because I've sampled all of the Peace Fleece colors at one time or another.

I wish you could see how all of them glow in the sun; there is extraordinary depth to all of them, and the blanket is many times more attractive than these photos show. The bright orange is actually a rich pumpkin color with golden overtones; the gray is full of flecks of rose, gold, and blue; the very dark color is a deep deep green with blue highlights, etc.

I'd have liked to add a border, but it was easy to decide between artistic fulfillment and keeping some kid warm. And, based on the way it felt on my lap while I was sewing it up, this blanket is WARM.

I'm hoping for a cascade of pictures from all of my fellow last-minute mailers. . . can't wait to see all your good things!

Success!

Hello! Thanks for the encouragement regarding my socks struggles. I made a New Year's resolution to master socks, and I have done so! Here are two pairs -- a mama bear size (for a teenager) and a baby bear size (for a 7 year old with skinny feet.) I followed Ann Budd's Knitter's Book of Patterns. They are going in the mail today. WooHoo! More socks to come for the next campaign.

Join the a4A email list ...

Most members of this blog are probably signed on to our email list, but for readers who may not be ... if you would like email notifications about our campaign details and due dates, program updates, announcements and reports -- including precious photos from time to time -- about distributions of our wool gifts in Afghanistan, and other intriguing news from the afghans for Afghans project, please sign up for our email list. The sign-up box is at the top of our homepage. We send 2-3 emails per month on average. Hope everyone enjoyed the news treat from Church World Service last week about their distribution of our blankets and garments! We're so fortunate to have partnered with an organization of that caliber, and I hope we have the opportunity to do so again in the future, enshallah.