Warmer Winters is a non-profit organization of volunteers in Massachusetts who warm the Winters of people in need by giving hand knitted items to homeless shelters and agencies that work with people in need. This year the need is greater than ever for people on fixed incomes who will not be able to heat their homes. We give sweaters, afghans, as well as hats, scarves, mittens and slippers. We would gladly accept any of these items.Last Winter we gave 1500 items to shelters and agencies in four towns. With your help, we can increase that number to 2000. New England Winters can be brutal for people struggling to keep warm. Our website is http://www.warmer-winters.info We're always looking to set up more chapters and have an e-mail newsletter we'd be happy to send to anyone who is interested.

I have designed a snood to fit greyhounds, and it is free to those who wish to knit for rescue organisations and auctions and those who own ex racing greyhounds or rescued sight hounds and lurchers. This pattern is also available for a donation of $3 or £1.50, 100% of which goes directly to Essex Greyhound Rescue which we use to pay for food and vets bills (none of the fee is retained by Erssie and no admin is charged) You can find this design on Ravelry, where my username is 'erssie'. The pattern is known as: Dizzy Lily: A Snood for a Hound and is in my projects, otherwise it can be found in the Erssie Knits Gallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/erssie/2037470381/in/set-72157600048227452/ It can be found on my website http://www.erssieknits.com or you can email erssiemajor@yahoo.co.uk for a free pattern, giving details of your rescue dog or send a donation through PayPal using the same email address. Thanks Erssie

Every minute, a woman with no medical care dies in pregnancy or childbirth Millions of mums in poor countries get low-quality health care, or are forced to go without it altogether. High fees, a shortage of hospitals and clinics, and not enough doctors and midwives means women struggle to get the medical care they need and all that too often they don?t survive to look after their babies. In Africa and South East Asia pregnancy and childbirth represent the biggest cause of death amongst women of childbearing age. Oxfam is asking supporters to help campaign for better healthcare during pregnancy and childbirth by knitting squares for a giant baby blanket, where each square represents a newborn baby, left needlessly without a mother because of lack of healthcare. These squares will be joined together and handed into the UK government in September. Instructions Each square should be 9 inches in size and preferably made using double-knitting weight yarn. You can use any type of yarn, provided that it is washable. All colours are welcome. Superwash wool or washable cotton yarns are particularly suitable. Typically this weight yarn will knit up to around 21-24 stitches to 4 inches in stocking stitch on 3.75-4.5mm needles (depending on how tightly you hold the yarn, you may need to use a different sized needle to get the right gauge). At a gauge of 24 stitches to 4 inches, you will need to cast on 54 stitches to make a 9 inch square. If your gauge is different, please make sure that you use the right number of stitches and rows to give a 9 inch square ? odd sized squares can be very difficult to piece together. Plain stocking stitch always curls up at the sides. You can prevent this by knitting a narrow border of garter stitch all round the square. To do this, just knit the first and last five rows (no purling!), and always knit the first five and last five stitches of every row with your stocking stitch in between. Many people like to make patterned squares. You can find a dictionary of stitch patterns available free at each of the sites below: http://tinyurl.com/2ketdl http://tinyurl.com/2v556p http://tinyurl.com/369xvz Others may wish to use up different coloured odds and ends of yarn to make striped or multicoloured squares. Some ideas and examples are available here: http://tinyurl.com/5rrf4 http://tinyurl.com/32dcbq If you want to design your own multicoloured pattern, you can find special graph paper to do it at the sites below - just print out a sheet and have a go at creating your own unique square. http://tinyurl.com/pp9wm http://tinyurl.com/5fnkw Crochet Squares are also very welcome. There is a wonderful selection of free patterns at the site below. You can enlarge the small squares by adding a few extra rounds until you reach nine inches. http://tinyurl.com/cbsje To finish please weave in all yarn ends on you squares and, if necessary, block them neatly to size. This will save lots of time when it comes to assembling the blankets. Send knitted squares with your name address and email to Sarah Blakemore, Oxfam campaigns, 47 Park Square East, Leeds LS21 2NL by 1st August 2008.

Hello! We would appreciate your help knitting warm hats for a group of Tibetan Buddhist nuns near Lhasa, Tibet. Our goal is to complete 250 hats by March 3, 2008. If you would like details, including a free pattern (simple and quick to knit) and yarn suggestions (about $6.50 per hat), kindly visit our website at http://mysite.verizon.net/reso5cyd/hatsfornuns/ Thank you for your help!

http://www.geocities.com/earlyangelsproject/ Early Angels is a site set up to try and encourage people to knit for the premature babies at their local hospitals SCBU's and NICU's. The site has loads of free preemie patterns and we also accept donations. We are also always on the look out for any volunteers who would like to come on board with us and donated their knitted baby garments (we also accept crocheted and sewed garment, unfortunatly we dont have any patterns for these up on the site yet).

Head Huggers is an organization that collects and distributes chemo caps. http://www.headhuggers.org

What colour is your Scarf? Hello! I would like to enlist the help of anyone who wishes to help me with a Community project to knit a total of '500' colourful scarves for homeless people by Saturday 8th December 2007. The scarves will be distributed to both national and local Homeless Charities including Sr. Joan in New Addington who works with homeless people in London (at Lincoln's Inns Fields and at Waterloo), Crisis a national homeless charity and 'The Passage' in London who work with homeless people. Your scarf can be any colour and should be about 60 inches long and 7 inches wide. I've included a pattern for a basic scarf below, if required. You'll need a pair of knitting needles (size 5mm or 6mm) and some wool (200gm). In my local parish, Our Lady of the Annunciation church on Bingham Road, Addiscombe, Croydon, I've arranged some knitting sessions to allow people to come together in the large church hall to knit their scarves and also to give non-knitters the opportunity to learn to knit. You are welcome to join in the knitting sessions and also the scarf collection event on Sunday the 9th December. Future sessions on: Sunday 2nd December 9.00am to 12pm Sunday 9th December 11am to 1pm- knitted scarves to be handed over to Charities; celebrate with tea, coffee & mince pies I would really appreciate your help with this project! Do email me or ring me to let me know how you get on. The scarves will need to be completed by Saturday the 8th of December. Many Thanks. Fiona Lobo Tel: 07796 238009 Email: fiona.lobo@yahoo.co.uk ----------------------------------------------------------------------- To knit a plain/basic scarf You will need: 200 gm double knit wool; 1 pair of 5mm (US Size 9) or Size 6mm (US Size 8) Knitting Needles. If you use a big size needle (e.g. 6mm), you'll only need to cast on 45 stitches. The scarf will be approx 7 ins wide and 60 ins long With 5mm or 6mm needles, cast on 51 stitches. Rib Row 1- Right Side- K2, *P1, K1; repeat from * to last stitch, K1 Rib Row 2- K1, *P1, K1; repeat from * to end. These 2 rows form rib. Work in rib until scarf measures 60 ins ending with Right Side facing for next row. Cast off in rib. Fringe (optional): Using 4 strands of wool 10 ins long for each tassel proceeds as follows: Fold strands in half, using a crochet hook draw the looped ends through edge of scarf, pull ends through loops and pull tight. Continue all along ends of scarf.

Hello there! We are a group of like minded knitters and crocheters who make things for various charities all over the world. (We reached 80 members today and rising!). We have a Blog http://charityknitters.blogspot.com/ a website http://www.lovinghands.org.uk/ and also a brilliant Forum (link on the website) where our members can chat and exchange news etc. We make things for The Baby Pack Project, Burundi Bears, Preemiesuk, Local SCBU's, Boobs for breastfeeding and also for ladies who have had mastectomies, Warm Clothing for Blythswood Care and Blankets for animal shelters. We are always delighted to have new members join us either on line or by post or by coming along to one of our meetings (Mondays 1pm - 3pm in Kelty Community Centre, Main Street, Kelty or Mondays 7pm - 9pm in the JRD Trust, 9 The Esplanade, Kirkcaldy). Why not join us - you know you want to :0)

We're a small group of volunteers that knit and crochet clothing for premature babies. We also knit burial items for babies that, sadly, don't survive. For more information about PreemiesUK, to volunteer your services or donate materials (wool, buttons, ribbon etc), please contact Shelley http://preemiesuk.googlepages.com/home.html

Feed The Children cares for some of the most vulnerable children in the world; orphaned, abandoned, homeless and affected by HIV/Aids. The charity doesn't just ask for financial support, but also accepts donations of gifts in kind to send to places like Angola, Kenya, Uganda and Liberia. FTC accepts donations of knitted clothing for babies and children, and blankets for all ages - even in the hottest parts of Africa, the temperature can drop several degrees at night, putting under nourished children at risk. In addition, FTC sends emergency aid to disaster situations; knitted jumpers, socks, hats, gloves, scarves and blankets were sent to Pakistan after the earthquake, to Jordan for refugees from Iraq, and to Helmand Province, Afghanistan, in the midst of conflict. To find out more about knitting and fundraising for Feed The Children, see http://www.feedthechildren.org.uk/pages/resources_knitting.shtml

How to help Annie Modesitt and her family When Annie's family found itself facing a serious health crisis with limited funds - her husband, Gerry, was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma in April 2007, they realized - like many insured American families facing a similar situation - they didn't have the resources to cover the non-medical expenses involved in his treatment and recovery. Annie came up with the idea to 'sell' the pattern for a popular dress she had designed for a friend to wear to the Emmy's. It seemed a graceful way to attack this problem - folks could pay as much or as little as they wanted for the dress pattern (or download it for nothing if they could afford nothing) and they would create a fund to offset their expenses. To read more or to download Annie's Red Carpet Convertible pattern go to: http://www.anniemodesitt.com/patterns/rcc.html