Our Graphic Designer

Lynn Walma is the Warm Hands graphic designer - and every shipment, she makes time to send us a haul as well. We love Lynn! Above are a sample of her items. Lynn, I do have one grievance: I'm working on a crochet blanket right now, and my boy was watching me take pictures of your stuff. He took a look at your stunning flower crochet and said, "why can't you do something like that?" Um, because I only know one stitch and can only crochet in a straight line. Can you please comment though and let me know where you got the flower pattern? The back is just as pretty as the front.

I also took a pic of the tag that you made (Carlene, it has the website on it!).

It came from Japan Part 4...

Barbara Dreher is the Japanese-Canadian connection. I absolutely loved the items you sent in Obassan, and I have to tell you that this is the first time I've seen the labels actually sewn in and you're making me think that I'd better get that started if we're going to make our October shipping deadlines. Yikes!

The neckwarmers are fabulous - a couple of the communities asked for them because the kids are out hunting or ice-fishing for extended periods and need warmer clothing. Thanks Barbara!

From Kamloops to Bedford...

Finally, I am back in town and get to open the boxes that have started to pile up! thought we`d start with a ``from east to west`kinda story.
The picture above is from Kathleen Walling of Bedford, Nova Scotia. Kathleen, you need to come to Ottawa and help us pack because I have no idea how you got such a ton of stuff in such a small box. It exploded when I opened it. The pics below are an attempt at my being arty with more of Kathleen's stuff (note my polished toe in the "flower" picture. Okay so I've got a way to go in the photog dept):








So we have Maureen Lefebvre from Kamloops BC who sent in the below lovely pair of warm woolies. Maureen I love them and thanks for including the label on the wool, and the $ which will go to boots!

The Purple Sock in Coldwater

Yes its been awhile! While we've been summering and cottaging and soccering, the folks in Coldwater ON and nearby have been knitting us a bounty of stuff. Last May, Lynn Stitchman (fabulous name for an owner of an LYS) of the Purple Sock (check them out at www.thepurplesock.blogspot.com and see pix of the store and team Purple Sock above) started a Warm Hands project. Its August and voila!:

These two beautiful crochet blankets are made by Teresa of Phelpstor. Thanks Teresa, if you're reading this:

And the two little sweater sets below were done by Gayle from Coldwater. I moved from room to room to try to get a decent set of photos but no luck on this grey day. Can you tell my deck needs staining? Check out the little ducky buttons on the cardie's:

And these two hats and pairs of socks are from Pat of Coldwater. Very cute!

Hats hats hats + one pink neckwarmer from Brigitte from Collingwood. My favorite is the pink hat with the tassles - perfect for a little girl (or boy, no judgement here).

And last but not least, Jessie from Oshawa went to town with 14 sets of beehive mittens plus various socks. Jessie thank you so much - my daughter tried on the mittens and confirmed that they are "warm and cozy":

Kathleen Walling of Bedford N.S....

knitted these fabulous socks, sweaters and neck-warmers (that is my attempt at being arty with the neck-warmers). Thank you so much!

I picked up some beautiful Noro (I think) blankets from Yarn Forward but no tags :(

If you are reading this, noro-knitter, I would love to hear from you...

Hope that summer is going well for all you warmhanders, and that fall will bring in as many beautiful items as we have received in previous years. So many partners, so many projects, so much fun. Thank you all!

First Air is In!

Okay, for some reason, I'm having trouble with the enter button on my computer, so I'm going to colour-code. The lovely folks at First Air have said yes to helping us with the Pauktuutit-Warm Hands project, which is amaaazing. Thanks First Air. So here is a summary of the campaigns. The closing date for all of them is September 30th. 1. Through our Pauktuutit contacts, we will be shipping to Rankin Inlet. We've got 2 projects on the go out there: Wool-Aid will take the lead on the daycare project: we have been asked to provide the following for the daycares located there: For the three daycares in Rankin, we need 67 blankets. We will need four (4) hats and four pairs of mittens for kids between the age six (6) months to eighteen. 30 pairs of mittens and 27 hats for age eighteen months to three years and thirty three pairs of mittens and hats for age four to six. The blankets need to be machine washable. In this case, the blankets will stay at the daycares and be washed every week, so it is important that they not shrink. I love the idea of providing each child with something unique that they can call their own. We have also been asked to provide items for the safe shelter there - here is the feedback from the head of the shelter there: The Rankin Inlet Women's Safe Shelter has served 43 women and 68 children aged between birth to fourteen. The breakdown is as follow: 12 (Birth to 2 year old) 46 (Age 3 to 5) 10 (Age 6 to 14). Those items will be gathered and shipped through Warm Hands. The weather there right now is a balmy -20C, -9F. 2. We are also shipping to Gjoa Haven! Here is the note from Hannah Quirrqat, who saw us at the Pauktuutit AGM, grabbed a couple of blankets for young moms in her community and said, "we're definitely in!". Ublaakut Anita (were still am here), Kudos to First Air again,! These items will be given to the Mom’s & Tot’s Centre here in Gjoa Haven. They have gatherings for young moms and their children. They hold gatherings to learn about good foods for both mom and baby, they invite elders to their meetings the elders show & tell young mom’s how to raise their babies. My daughter in law works for them. We have a big population of young mothers here in Gjoa Haven! Spring is almost here, and there will be families going out on the land so blankets/hats & mittens are needed for their trips. A lot of people start heading out to go fishing and caribou hunting at Springtime. Fresh caribou meat & Fish are everyone’s main diet here in Gjoa Haven. Thanking you very much in advance for your donations. So knitters and crochetters (never forget Carlene), knock yourselves out - every had, mitten and blanket will be well used and well loved. 3. We are still working with the Innu of Northern Labrador - the lovely folks at Drachenwolle will again be shipping socks to us from Germany, and we'll fire them along via the fabulous Provincial Airlines. Sheshatsuit has also made a request that if at all possible, we ship them sweaters for their elders. 4. Last but not least, we got a note from the E.D. of the Moosonee Native Friendship Centre. The stuff that we sent has already been shipped out, and Wool-Aid sent out a supplementary shipment. Once again, you guys are great - thanks to the web, Amy and I feel that we know you all so well. As long as you knit, we'll keep shipping to Northern kids. Thanks everyone!

September 2011 Campaign and Other Stuff

Okay, so here is what has happened lately:

1. Carlene and I went to the Pauktuutit Annual General Meeting. What an amazing group of northern women. Basically the AGM gathers Inuit women from all over Canada, and they meet for a week to talk about the issues of the day. The President introduced us, and three communities approached us to start thinking about working up a project with them - nice! One of the ones that really struck my fancy was an Inuit daycare and safe shelter in Rankin Inlet. Immediately, I'm thinking, hey, if we could give every child in that daycare a blanket for naptime wouldn't that be something. The really amazing thing was that Pauktuutit thinks that they can hook us up with the head honcho's at First Air so we can coordinate the shipping. (First Air, if you are reading this, we really really want to work you).

2. We spoke with Sheshatsuit this week. I love those guys - its taken a few years but I think that they kind of know "the knitting ladies" now. They tend to laugh when I'm talking (I get a bit excited and start speaking wayyy to fast) and they are much more direct, as in: "we need the following", rather than, "oh, anything will be fine". It really is a totally different culture. Whenever I get off the phone with them, I feel like such a Type A personality. Oh, wait a minute. I am a type A.

So this is what they said: the stuff that we sent in October is loooong gone, distributed pretty much as soon as they got it. They had enough lap blankets to distribute to all the new babies, the kids and then some, so they gave a few to the elders who are wheelchair bound to use as lap blankets. They have held back 10 blankets which they want to keep for new births - fine by me.

For the next campaign, we can send everything that we usually do but they would LOVE to receive lots of socks and sweaters, and they would be very happy if we could do some in the larger sizes.

3. The shipment to the Moosonee Native Friendship Centre went off and we are waiting to hear back from them that items have been received and distributed.

4. The website is now up, thanks to Carlene! Check it out at www.warmhandsnetwork.org.

5. The handwash dilemma is solved (well, partially)! We talked to Wool-aid and here is what we are doing: we are buying sew-on tags which we will sew into all blankets, sweaters and vests that are not machine washable (it would be great if you could attach paper tags letting us know if your stuff fits this criteria). We will attach the tags before we send the items out. According to our discussions with Moosonee, Pauktuutit, and Sheshatsuit, folks there are well aware of washing rules re wool, but its always best to remind (given that I have shrunk many a handwash myself).

So the September 2011 campaign looks like this:

1. We are once again shipping to Sheshatsuit for the Innu kids (and now elders too). Same parameters BUT things have changed up there, so we are adapting a bit as well:
- machine washable is preferred for sweaters and blankets. If your item is handwash, let us know and we will sew on a tag.

2. We are shipping to the Cree kids of James Bay. These items will be shipped up to Moosonee, and distributed through the headstart and pre-natal programs there. As well some boxes will go up to Keshashewan via Air Creebec.

If you have a preference for where your items should go, please give us a heads-up.

Deadline: September 30th as usual.