I was sitting in my living room, thinking about all of the yarn that I had stored in my craft room - what was I going to do to minimize this stash (ok, 'stash' is a nice word - it's more like a hoard, a big, fat hoard). Then, it hit me! Knit mittens! Ok, so the message wasn't that clear but in essence what it came to was - knit a bunch of mittens and hats and deliver them to my sons' old elementary school. After all, they would know who needed them, when the time came to distribute them.

Then, as many of my ideas do, it grew. What if I could gather together like-minded (read “socially-conscious”) knitters who want their knitting to make some sort of difference? Who better to receive this bounty than our county’s kids? There have been so many times when I have been overwhelmed by the kindness of the people of this region, especially in the last few years. It’s not that county got nicer; it’s that my eyes could finally see just how good these people are. Typical of a lot of farming communities, they take care of their neighbours when they have to and let their neighbours help them when they need it. Being a city/suburb-kid, it took me some time to figure this out. I want to channel a little of this energy into keeping our kids warm this winter. Ok, enough sap – let’s get to the project.

The goal is to knit at least 20 pairs of mittens for each of the county’s schools. It’s a biggie, that for sure but even if we only get a few schools covered, it’s better than none at all. Still, I really hope that we can do this.

Here are the guidelines:

• Acrylic yarn is easy-to-care-for and will not shrink if tossed in the wash; let’s stick to yarns that are wool-free to minimize allergic reactions, as well
• No draw strings, string ties in hats, no mitten cords, please – these are items that can injure small children and c’mon, that’s not where we’re going with this. For more information, please check out the Government of Canada’s information on safer children’s clothing.
• A variety of sizes, styles and colours are needed. Let’s make things that our kids will wear

If you want to participate in this challenge; please contact me (put “knit for kids” in the subject line of your email to help me weed out spam).

This is a totally volunteer-driven exercise and any donation (whether of time, materials or even a place to meet, coffee to share with the group when we get together – anything – would be most appreciated)