Last week my facebook page blew up with posts about penguins needing jumpers to help them recover from oil spills…Every non knitter friend that I had posted various articles from various news sources about the call for sweaters. It turns out that the Penguin Foundation and others have had so many donations of sweaters, that they are stockpiled in storage or being put on stuffed toys sold in gift shops. But its just such a catchy story that it keeps on circulating… Snopes actually has my favorite rundown on how this story keeps circulating and the truth behind it. There is also this snarky cartoon.
One of my frustrations with charity knitting and crochet is that it is not uncommon for the items to never be put to good use. They sit in gift shops, are sold by the charities for the cash or never make it into the hands of those who need them most. This is not to say that all charity stitching projects are bad, but a caution to fully research before spending countless hours working on something. For this reason, we don’t respond to every request for charity stitching. We have carefully chosen who we work with and, for the most part, have partnered with one local and very trusted charity for stitch-a-longs.
So rather than spend time making jumpers for animals that may or may not ever wear them, why not help our local community in an fun and really meaningful way. We are once again partnering with our favorite local stitching related charity – Project Knitwell. EAch year they collect hats for babies in the NICU. But they want hats that are a bit different than just preemie sized hats. They want fun and playful hats with spring themes, meant to put smiles on the faces of these babies’ parents and caregivers. This year the need for hats has expanded to bereavement caps as well. These are particularly small, for obvious reasons, and shouldn’t take more than an hour to make. Read the full details about this inspiring and wonderful hat drive here. AND as a bit of an incentive, I am throwing in a 10% off coupon for every hat you turn in to us this year. Deadline is April 5th.
