When you look around our world and see children cold and suffering in poverty, do you wonder, “What can I do?”
Author Debbie Macomber does. Learn how she’s bringing knitters together to make a tangible difference to help keep children warm.
Over the years, I’ve been involved in a number of charity knitting organizations and projects. I’ve found that knitters are by nature generous, and we often look for ways to give back and help others. We have been blessed to live in a country filled with abundance. When I look around at the needs of this world, it can be overwhelming — babies born in poverty, children suffering in the cold. I found myself asking, “What can I do?”
One answer that came to me, and many others, was that we could knit — a hat, a blanket, a sweater, a square. All of these are possible with a single pair of knitting needles. With a single scarf, I am making a difference in a child’s life. And I’m using my time in a productive way.
It was through my association with other knitters — hearing their stories, listening to their ideas as we sat and knit together — that I came to sense the hearts of my fellow knitters, which prompted me to start Knit One, Bless Two.
As an author, I’ve discovered that there is a link between the writer and the reader. It’s almost spiritual. As an example, I know that if I laugh while writing a scene, my reader will laugh too. If I cry, they will cry as well. If I put my heart on the page, it will link with my readers’ hearts in a way that is difficult to describe. I’ve seen this again and again in the times I’ve met with readers or read their letters and comments from my website.
This phenomenon also applies to people who knit and crochet. The knitted or crocheted items are far more than something created from a simple skein of yarn. The knitting links us with the recipient in a special way that I find nearly impossible to explain in words. As we infuse our time, our talent, and our money into an item, we also infuse our love. And while we may never meet the one who receives our gift, we benefit from knowing we have given away a part of ourselves.
As a result, they are blessed, and we are blessed.
This is leading to a program that is close to my heart, and that is Knit for Kids, which is run through World Vision. In the summer of 2014, I traveled to Kenya to help distribute sweaters, the very ones that generous knitters had supplied for children in need. World Vision recently let me know that there is a big need, and they are asking for — get ready for it — 36,000 blankets!
When I first heard this number, I gasped. Thirty-six thousand blankets for babies and children who are desperately in need to something to keep them warm. Something that comes from your heart to theirs. Blankets that will bless them, and then those blessings will stretch back through the miles to bless you.
So now, my friends, gather together your yarn and needles.
Ready.
Set.
Knit.
Be a blessing to children in need — and yourself — by helping us reach our goal of 36,000 blankets. Download a pattern here, and get knitting today.
