Category / Wrapped in Love

by princesshotflash

Repurpose, Restart, Happy New Year!

Decided to frog (rip apart–knitting term) the first sweater I ever made. It was for Oat and made with 2 strand of super soft merino wool from Morehouse Farm in NY. I decided to make a throw for my dad who is always cold in Hawaii.

2691399216_bca0487d38_oHere’s Oat wearing the sweater in Prague in 2008. This is the beginning of my Mr. Handmade.

My little Orange loved helping me with frogging the sweater.

He’s exhausted from all his hard work.

Ollie knows better to get involved with the yarn. Sleeping on my leg is his job.

This is what I’ve been doing. Trying to repurpose things that meant something to Oat. Repurposing his knit hats into shawls and wraps for Wrapped in Love. Hawaiian shirts will be turned into a patchwork quilt. And hopefully I can turn his old jean into an interesting project.

I hope this help me with a restart in 2018. Lots of changes and more to come.

Happy New Year to everyone! Hope it is good one for everyone.

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by princesshotflash

#GivingTuesday

Looking for an organization to give to this #GivingTuesday. There are two organizations that I’ve supported this year and like to share with you need a suggestion.

Elijah’s Promise

As a foodie and former restaurant owner, this organization is dear to my heart. They have many programs that help the community, I’ve been involved with the soup kitchen. They serve 300 meals a day which is an incredible feat with donations and volunteer help.

I volunteered one day last spring in their kitchen prepping for lunch, serving and cleaning the kitchen. And just this past weekend, with my restaurant closing, I donated as much as I could from my restaurant from fresh food to dry goods to cleaning supplies. I hope my donations help them feed at least one meal service.

Wrapped in Love/NJ Sharing network

They are very special to me. Through NJ Sharing Network, I was able to donate Oat’s corneas, tissue, and bones to help others. Wrapped in Love is a volunteer group that creates wraps, shawls, scarves, and lap blankets to send to donor families on the 2 year anniversary of their special gift. I’ve started attending their knit nights and created Oat’s knit-a-long get my friends to join Wrapped in Love efforts.

NJ Sharing Network is a really special organization. They checked in with me on Oat’s 6 month anniversary. It was such a surprise and wonderful feeling to know how much they care about their donor families to check up on me on this anniversary.

I’m going to knit night tonight and I’m delivering my sister’s lap blanket, Martha’s (the fastest knitter I know, even faster than my sister) mom’s scarf and my chunky gray lap blanket for donations. The first of Oat’s knit-a-long items.

Corinne’s lap blanket
my gray chunky

Or do you have too much crap like me

#Lupuspickup.org sent me a post card telling me they will be in my area for pick up and this spurred my cleaning cells into high gear and I collected 6 bags of clothes and shoes (mostly Oat’s) and 1 box of housewares donation. So easy to schedule an appointment and perfect timing for me to help me get rid of stuff.

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donation waiting for pickup

by princesshotflash

OMG! Look what I got!

Blanket One has landed with bunch of goodies for me.

infinity cowl in superwash wool

more goodies

Downton Abby Tea (black tea infused with honey), silly putty, and a groovy pattern–oh wait–it’s a notebook. Thank goodness, there would have been major alterations to the pattern. I’m not my 1970’s figure anymore. Haha!

Now for the best part of the box…

Blanket One

A beautiful light blue cotton/microfiber lap blanket courtesy of my sister, Corinne, who is an awesome knitter. One of her projects that came out of hibernation.

I’ll be taking this to Wrapped in Love Knit Night along with my gray bulky garter/stockinette blanket. I hope whoever gets Blank One from Wrapped in Love will loves it as much as I do. I know Oat would love. He would want it for himself, he is really Mister Handmade.

by princesshotflash

Oat’s Knit-A-Long

UPDATE: If you are mailing your finished piece, here’s my address: 6 Edgebrook Road, New Brunswick, NJ 08901.

I finally got out to Wrapped in Love Knit Night last Tuesday. Wrapped in Love is a group that crochet and knit wraps and shawls for donor family of the NJ Sharing Network. A friend shared with me a post from Facebook about this group. NJ Sharing Network handled the Oat’s tissue donation and I decided to that I wanted to stay involved with the group in some way.

At this knit night, there were 9 knitters and crocheter at all different levels. Lisa the coordinator of the Knit Night told us about the Wrapped in Love group. Their goal is to send a handmade shawl or wrap to a donor family on their 2 year anniversary with note to thank them and tell them that they are in NJ Sharing Network’s thoughts. She mentioned they were presently behind by 100+.

I wasn’t sure of having a knit-a-long, I thought I’d just go to their knit nights. But when Lisa said they were behind, I’d thought I’d could help by asking my knit/crochet friends if they wanted to join in to knit a shawl, wrap or lap blanket for the Wrapped in Love group.

Oat’s Knit-a-Long

I’m calling Oat’s Knit-a-Long. He would want everyone shawl, wrap or blanket for himself as he loved handmade items. I called him Mr. Handmade because he would wear so many handmade piece at one time during the winter.

The specs

The shawl, wrap or lap blanket doesn’t have to be any specific size, pattern or yarn. It’s needs to be handmade to honor the donor family for the generous gift they have made. There is no special date that needs to be meet as I know everyone is busy. You can send me your finish piece and I’ll delivery it to one of the knit nights I attend. Just let me know the fiber content and I’ll added it to the tag with your name and our knit-a-long.

Please let me know if you will be joining me in knit-a-long. It will help me keep track. You can comment on this post or comment on my FB page.

What am I knitting

I have couple of items I want to get done for Wrapped in Love. Two are works in progress and the other two are just an ideas at the moment.

  • I’m still working on my feather and fan pattern with the beautiful yarn from Megan. The color way is playing out well and it will be a beautiful piece to honor a donor family.

This color way is so beautiful!

  • I’ve also started a simple garter stitch lap wrap gray bulky yarn. I love the simplicity of garter stitch and bulky yarn. And it is so soft!!!
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It’s mindless knitting that I can do at night to relax

  • I frogged (ripped out) 4 of Oat’s hat that I’d like to combine to make a shawl or wrap. These hat had too many moth holes to give a way. They were all made by me for Mr. Handmade who love to have stuff made for him.
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all wool, the bottom 3 are all NJ and NY sourced.

  • And I have some really silky yarn that I want to knit a shawlette pattern that I knitted a while back that was quick and easy.

Oh!

  • I wanted to show you a picture of the baby blanket I finished for a friend. Cute baby always makes your finished piece look better.

  • I also finished up a couple of pussy hats that that I’ve been working on for a friend. I promised to make an egg apron with the leftover hat yarn for him. I think it’s going to look great. I’ll start it after I finish up the gray lap blanket. The pattern looks like pretty easy night time crocheting pattern.
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2 hat–top with stripped stockinette crown; bottom with solid seed stitch

  • M, a regular customer of the restaurant, came by and asked me if I would teacher her how to knit. She had broken her foot and was house bounded for the at least 6 weeks and needed something keep her occupied. So I’m teaching her to knit, every Saturday at the restaurant. She made a gater stitch rectangle so far that we are turning into to make a teddy bar for her granddaughter. She’s picks up really fast and her stitches are a really even for a beginner. She knows how to knit, cast on, bind off and rip apart (frog).

stitches are even just some dropping stitches, easy to fix

I hope people can join my knit-a-long. Remember just let me know if you are doing it. Thank you, I really appreciate it.