What?? A Knit-A-Thon : permission to knit all day

Knitting for a Cause

With all of our cold and snowy days this winter, it seems like all I’ve wanted to do is knit — hats, socks, scarves. My version of hibernating, I guess!

But this winter, some of that knitting will have a purpose beyond keeping hands busy.

I’ll be participating in the 6th Annual Knit for Food Knit-a-Thon on April 11th, a 12-hour knitting marathon that raises both funds and awareness for food insecurity.

Knitting has always felt like a quiet way of caring for people — warm hands, warm heads, small comforts made stitch by stitch. So it feels especially meaningful to spend a whole day knitting in support of organizations that help provide something even more essential: meals.

I started knitting when I was little. We had the Childcraft edition of the World Book Encyclopedia, and I taught myself from the knitting entry. Two of our neighbors were knitters, and they helped me advance once I had outgrown Childcraft’s knowledge.

In the mid-1980s I lived in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area, where I discovered yarn stores filled with fibers I had never seen before.

I worked at a store in Cedarburg knitting commissioned sweaters (stockinette stitch, expensive yarn, and for a man who must have been a giant!) and later as a salesperson at a lovely shop called The Yarn House in Elm Grove.

While working there, I made a skirt and top for my mom from a beautiful silk/cotton blend yarn. I still have it, though it will never fit me.

Watercolor rendering of Bob The Fish Sweater

It was also the owner of The Yarn House, Shirley Grade, who convinced me to enter a sweater in the Wisconsin State Fair. The sweater I made for the Intarsia category was called Bob the Fish — a nubbly cotton sweater with a hot pink background and a cheerful fish worked in variegated yarn.

Bob the Fish took second place!

Since then I’ve made all sorts of things, but these days my knitting is usually hats, scarves, socks, dishcloths and the window cats. There is almost always something on my needles, and most of those projects are small enough to travel with.

So imagine my delight when I discovered there’s an event that actually encourages you to sit and knit all day.

During the Knit-a-Thon, knitters around the country spend 12 hours knitting and crocheting while raising funds for organizations that address food insecurity.

100% of the funds raised are divided among four incredible organizations:

• World Central Kitchen

• Feeding America

• No Kid Hungry

• Meals on Wheels America

My fundraising goal is $500, and I’ve already donated the first $100 to get things started — which means we’re already 20% of the way there.

If you’d like to help, even $10 or $25 moves us closer to the goal and helps these organizations provide meals for people who need them.

Donate here:https://givebutter.com/knitforfood26/susanmayer1

As a little extra bit of fun, anyone who donates through my link will be entered into a random drawing to receive whatever I knit during the event on April 11th.

If you have ideas for what I should knit (and that you would like to receive as a donation gift), send them my way through the Contact Me link in the footer.

If donating isn’t possible right now, sharing this post also helps spread the word.

Thank you for supporting this wonderful cause — and for cheering me on for all twelve hours of knitting!