If you're anywhere close to my age, you well remember the saying, "Avon Calling". When I was young my Mother sold Avon. I loved watching her open her deliveries to bag up her orders, to play with some of the samples.....it was way cool. She walked door to door back in the day. Shortly after graduating from high school, I too sold Avon; though I was not nearly as successful as she had been and it was short lived when I got a full time position as a clerk typist.
Fast forward Avon is now light years ahead of those door to door sales. They, like so many business have a presents on the web. YOU can shop from the comfort of your computer chair with a friend of ours, Sherry K and when you do; you'll be helping the homeless and others in need. You might now be scratching your head saying...Sandy's gone off the deep end..again... how does buying Avon's lipstick or jewelry help the homeless? The money our friend and long time supporter here on Bridge and Beyond makes from sales goes to her purchasing of yarn...........which turns into awesome goodness from her hook and is then donated to the homeless at Faith Mission, or others in need. You could make it a double win win, lip gloss, deodorant, shampoo, lotions, soaps all are items we donate on a regular basis. Personal care items are needed 12 months of the year by families in all the shelters, by those living under the bridges. You could order from Sherry K, donate personal care to Bridge and Beyond and help Sherry with the yarn she needs to help others. So hope over to her blog and see the wonderful items she makes HERE, and visit her AVON page HERE.
AND, the other plus of ordering Avon from Sherry, you're still helping even when time is tight and you can't knit or crochet. AND you can tell all your non knitting and crocheting friends, this is a perfect way for them to help.
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
Thank you Sandra L, fellow Ohioan for this thoughtful donation of yarn. Sandra L and I know each other from a love of history and of graveyards. Now that might sound a bit odd, but a group of folks whom initially met on line through find a grave, get together periodically and tromp graveyards. It was on such a tromp through Green Lawn Cemetery here in Columbus where I first met Sandy. She's a walking history book and is very involved with a special program they have called, First Saturday. If you're interested in history or enjoy the peace, serenity, or beautiful art work an old cemetery such as Green Lawn has, I encourage you to go.
Sandy is a fellow crocheter who can no longer crochet due painful hands. She recently cleaned out some closets and asked if I could some yarn? LOL, if you know me, or have read this blog before you know the answer to that question. She and I recently got together and had breakfast, visited and I found a home for her yarn balls. Lots of colors, I may start a scrappy ghan, or I may use these colorful balls of yarn to make some of those wrists warmers I posted the pattern for yesterday. In fact, I think that's a perfect use. Thank you Sandy for the yarn donation. I'm sorry you can no longer crochet; but know that your donation will serve others.
Adding Wrist Warmers/Fingerless gloves to our actual count now. What is the correct name for them?
**Still looking to make contact with a Carol C with a military address, please if you're reading this send me a pm with the contact form**
2014 DONATIONS:
Hats: 619
Scarves: 331
Socks: 141
Afghans: 16
Slippers: 77
Rain Ponchos: 61
Mittens & Gloves: 68
Wrist Warmers: 1 (the yellow pair pictured yesterday)
Cotton Washcloths: 247
Shawls, Sweaters, Vests, Poncho's, Skirts, and Shrugs etc. 13
Neck warmers, cowls, gators, wrists warmers/fingerless gloves and other misc items aren't tabulated; as well as personal care item
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
Modeling with one hand and photographing with the other hand, sorry folks, that makes for not the best picture. These are wrist warmers, recently designed by our good friend, and long time supporter, RoseMarie. She has made them in past using double crochets and I asked if she (she's sooooooooo creative), could mess with the pattern and come up with one using sc? And here you have the results. I thought the single crochets would make them a bit more sturdy and warmer.
Mittens is something we've never gotten enough of, in terms of our donations. And while wrist warmers obviously aren't as warm as full mittens, I thought it might help us bridge the gap. Mittens aren't the easiest to knit or crochet and not something many of us have the ability to do. However, I think this is something many of us can do.
Turning my hand over so you all can see the other side.
Here's the pattern:
Chain 24 and join to form circle, being careful to not twist your chain.
Add marker so you can tell where the end of the row is, adds in counting rows.
Row 1: sc (single crochet) across to the end of row, do not increase, do not add extra sc when you would normally add when to go to the next row. Stitch count remains 24.
Row 2: Repeat row 1 until 27 rows are complete. Stitch count is still 24, no increases done.
Row 28: Form the thumb opening
sc across 20 stitches (4 stitches remain), chain 4 and join this chain to the end of the row. Your chain 4 and the 4 remaining stitches are equal, and your stitch count is still 24. No increases or decreases made.
Row 29: sc across row (stitch count 24) You will sc into the 4 chain stitches at your rows end
Row 30: repeat row 8 more times (a total of 9 rows from forming your thumb opening).
After completing row 37, bind off.
Using a darning needle work your tail in.
RoseMarie used an I hook in this example. It very nicely fits me. I'm a small woman.
Using a larger hook would make the wrist warmers larger, using a smaller hook would make them smaller. Would think we could play with adding a few stitches if we want to fit a man. Using too large a hook might make them less warm, as they would be more open??
Thank you RoseMarie for your dedication. You are a AWESOME.
Yarn used, regular worsted weight.
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
Thank you Connie. Connie and I used to work together. She's had a rather tough year with medical issues of her own, followed by caring for her elderly Mother-in-Law. But, even with her own overly busy life and many hard issues to deal with, she's thought of us here on Bridge and Beyond and the homeless folks we care for. That's pretty special in my book. Connie's Mother-in-Law used to crochet and after her passing and the necessary cleaning out one's household, Connie found pieces parts of an afghan her Mother-in-Law had started to make. Opening the box and laying things out to see what we had to work with, you can see lots of brightly colored squares. Some are partially attached, some aren't. Plus, there's some black yarn, used for the edging.
After further separation, it appears she perhaps changed her mind on how to assemble the afghan, and or perhaps there were several people working on this. This is only speculation, but...you can see in the foreground squares attached on the diagonal. Towards the middle of the picture you see where squares were attached in rows. Though the rows weren't joined I laid them out to count and determine how many would be needed to continue in this vane. These are small 4 inch squares and in a couple of the rows there were 15 attached to make a row. Farther back are the un-joined squares. Counting and measuring tells me there's not enough to continue with 15 squares in a row, so separating the squares was next on my list.
As I begin to separate the squares, both those joined in rows and those joined diagonally, I realized some were stitched together, some were crocheted together and in some cases both was done in the same row........again making me wonder if multiple people had started assembling. There were some I was unable to separate, but as you can see, squares are now ready to be re-counted and designed into an afghan. I also thought, this would give me the opportunity to see how many of each there were to determine if Connie's Mother-in-Law had a pattern, color-wise in mind as she was making her squares. I don't believe so, as there are many singles, while others have 2-4 of the same color, and a few have a nice stack of 8-10. Not a problem, certainly it will be brightly colored, and cheerful once I get it assembled.
Please stayed tuned and check in to see the progress. Many thanks Connie for your thoughtfulness during a time in your life when it would have been easy, just simply not to bother with passing this along. I'm sure your Mother-in-Law would be pleased to know her work will be continued.
*A team of helping hands aid the homeless, the title of this post seems so appropriate, Connie's MIL, Connie and now me; and perhaps there were others involved as well*
I always name afghans and the first that came to mind was something I've already used Kaleidoscope. Open to suggestions here folks........thoughts?
2014 DONATIONS:
Hats: 619
Scarves: 331
Socks: 141
Afghans: 16
Slippers: 77
Rain Ponchos: 61
Mittens & Gloves: 68
Cotton Washcloths: 247
Shawls, Sweaters, Vests, Poncho's, Skirts, and Shrugs etc. 13
Neck warmers, cowls, gators, wrists warmers/fingerless gloves and other misc items aren't tabulated; as well as personal care item
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
Thank you AnneMarie for this generous donation of crocheted hats for our homeless here in Ohio. AnneMarie has been such a faithful supporter of Bridge and Beyond. So many folks have benefited by her thoughtfulness and skillful crochet hook. Extra thanks for tagging ALL your hats with size! Such a nice variety in both color and sizes.
As always, please keep up the good work AnneMarie; we certainly appreciate you.
2014 DONATIONS:
Hats: 609+10=619
Scarves: 331
Socks: 141
Afghans: 16
Slippers: 77
Rain Ponchos: 61
Mittens & Gloves: 68
Cotton Washcloths: 247
Shawls, Sweaters, Vests, Poncho's, Skirts, and Shrugs etc. 13
Neck warmers, cowls, gators, wrists warmers/fingerless gloves and other misc items aren't tabulated; as well as personal care item
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
This is incredible! This is art, this is crochet, this is a playground. Saved this picture awhile back from Facebook and just re-found it in my files to share with you all. Can't imagine how long it takes to do this, or how she makes it strong enough that kids can and do play on it. The artist is Toshiko Horiuchi-MacAdam, a Japanese artist.
Just thought you all would enjoy this.
Here we are in a new month already, where does time go? Looking back to this time last year, Oct 3rd's post from 2013 here are our donations:
Hats 645 (currently 609, -36
Scarves 402 (currently 331, -71
Socks 251 (currently 141, -110
Afghans 44 (currently 16, -28
Slippers 189 (currently 77, -112
Rain Poncho's 208 (currrently 61, -147
Mittens 98 (currently 68, -30
Cotton Washcloths 651 (currently 247, -404
Our donations have gone down in every area. This happens with all charities. People find something else to support, money get tights and it becomes harder to buy the yarn and or mail the donation. I can't help with the mail but, can help with some yarn donations to those in need of yarn to support the cause. Leave a comment here,or use the contact form in the right sidebar to let me know you need some yarn.
I am hopeful things will pick up, know even if our numbers our down I do value each of you and your thoughtfulness.
When you can't knit or crochet, you can still help. Visit the blog, leave comments, tell your friends, share the links, save samples when you travel and donate personal care items.
Thank you for your support folks, let's do our best and hope our numbers increase a bit so we can care for more folks in need.
All donations regardless of size and number are valued. All donations are appreciated. The Power of One is awesome, and when we work together The Power of One becomes The Power of Many.
Where are You and Your Yarn From?
I'm trying to identify where everyone is from, partially for fun. Take a look at the map. Also, believe it will aid me in cases where we have several people with the same name. Please look at the lists of bloggers and non bloggers and see if I have the state you hail from. If not, please leave a comment and let me know.
Additionally, we've had help from Scotland, England, Germany Puerto Rico, Canada, and France! They don't appear on the map, but their help is still greatly appreciated.
