Busy with knitting

I started this blog a few weeks ago with good intentions of posting fairly regularly. Well, it's been a busy few weeks, filled with all kinds of activity except blogging.

After the earthquake in Haiti happened, I was thinking about what I could do to help. A day or two after my last post here, I googled "Blankets for Haiti" and came across a blogger who has a friend going on a mission trip to Haiti and the Domnican Republic in the end of March. This trip was planned long before the earthquake. She asked her friend if people could send handmade blankets along with them on their trip, and the friend enthusiastically agreed. And so began a flurry of blanket-making here the last few weeks.

It is a great blessing to be able to help with my hands, to hopefully bring some joy and comfort to a suffering child through knitting or crocheting something soft. I'm nearly done the current one, and then they will all go in the mail next week. I also have a big pile of squares and samples that I am sending to another knitter who is assembling squares from all over North America to make blankets for the people of Haiti.

The blanket above was actually knit as a class sample for a night school class that I was supposed to teach, but which was canceled due to low enrolment. I felt inspired to send this blanket along.

This blanket was knitted a couple of years ago as a sample that went in a knitting magazine to which I contribute. I had been waiting to find a good place to send it, and when this opportunity came along, it seemed just right.

I have to keep my hands busy, so when I'm not doing anything else, I'm knitting. It has been a great source of creative expression, as well as a wonderful way to "chill" during the day. The other day we were having a conversation around the dinner table, and Bethany commented that knitting is like breathing for me. What a great gift that God has given me.

I have had people tell me that they don't have the patience to knit. I don't find that it takes patience, though it does take the ability and/or willingness to still yourself long enough to get something done. I don't often sit and knit in long sessions, but in bits of time throughout the day. I started doing it that way years ago when the children were small, even knitting while they were (safely) in the bathtub. It's amazing how those bits of time have added up over the years, and I have something to show for it.

So, now and then I'll show a bit of my knitting here, when there's something worth posting. I just thought I'd put it here for today, since that's what has been filling my time as of late.