Fundraising – Knit-Spin-Quilt

Bag-making & sewing setup

It’s been a while since I’ve done a process post, so here goes.

First of all, a look at my current (extremely cluttered) workspace.

(I intentionally did not tidy up before taking these photos because I’m not an influencer trying to sell you a perfect lie. I’m human.)

Sewing table with thread racks on the wall behind it

My thread all lives on the thread racks on the wall, out of direct sunlight. The main surface of the table is covered in a 36”x24” self-healing cutting mat, and my main shop sewing machine, a brother nouvelle 1500s lives here 90% of the time.

To the right of the photo is a 4×2 ikea kallax unit, which holds bins of fabric, and my Eversewn Sparrow usually lives on top of it, close at hand for when I need a zig-zag stitch or a buttonhole.

To the left of the main sewing area is a small table topped with layers of cotton and heat-proof batting sewn in a cotton casing to make a small ironing board, and under that table are clear plastic bins of more fabric. Are we starting to see a theme, here?

I sit in the middle on an early 20th-century round (hardwood) piano stool, which allows me to spin in place and raise or lower the seat depending on what I’m doing.

Today, let’s talk about sewing a drawstring project bag, something I do a lot of!

Lining fabric laid out flat to be cut with a quilting ruler and a rotary cutter

Bag outside and lining, cut and ready to be sewn

Once I have the fabric cut to my specifications, I start the sewing process. This goes a lot faster these days than it did when I was first starting, but that’s largely because I’ve figured out how to assembly line cut and piece: sewing a single bag from start to finish takes nearly as long as it ever has.

Here are some process photos:

One part I particularly enjoy is top stitching the drawstring channel. It allows me to coordinate thread colors to bag top colors (in this case: black) but also rewards precision and accuracy, which I find soothing.

Video of the process of topstitching a drawstring bag, done slowly.

In the end, after adding drawstrings, I end up with a bag for the Halloween collaboration kit with the Periwinkle Sheep!

A purple mushroom print bag next to my brother sewing machine

As a reminder, these bags are available for a limited time only and come with a matching skein of custom yarn that looks like this:

Periwinkle Sheep yarn for the Halloween collaboration kit

You can get the kit on The Periwinkle Sheep’s website until August 20th. Kits will ship on or before October 10.

And remember: we will be donating 10% of kit sales to World Central Kitchen for their efforts to combat starvation and famine in Gaza.

Halloween Collaboration Kit

A Halloween-themed collaboration kit with the Periwinkle Sheep, featuring purple spooky mushroom print drawstring project bags and fingering weight yarn dyed to match!

I’m so excited to announce a collaborative kit with The Periwinkle Sheep!

Karin and I met at the Massachusetts Sheep and Wool festival several years ago. Karin is a knitter since childhood, a former yarn shop owner, and indie dyer of yarn for nearly 18 years. She holds a MA in English in feminist critical theory. As owner of The Periwinkle Sheep, she has brought us a wide array of colorways that want to jump onto your needles!

This year we decided to work together to bring you a Halloween-themed kit!

I picked out a few fabric choices and we settled together on a spooky purple mushroom print, for which Karin dyed up a custom colorway that matches perfectly!

The designer of the fabric (dotpatterns) was kind enough to re-scale it for smaller bags, so the print scales with bag size.

Each bag is made of 100% quilting cotton and lined with a black and white bats-and-cats print. The ties are 3/8” grosgrain ribbon.

The sock (medium) bag will hold 2 skeins of yarn easily; the shawl (large) bag will hold 4+ skeins of yarn; the sweater (xl) bag will hold 10+ skeins of yarn.

The yarn for the kit is a 100% superwash merino fingering weight (4-ply) yarn that is usually only made available to wholesale sellers! You can see how it works up in both knitted and crocheted swatches below:

In addition to the kit colorway, Karin has selected two other colors of yarn that coordinate (the black and yellow-green skeins above) and made them available as add-ons to the kit.

Pre-orders for the kit are open only until August 20th!

Order your Halloween collaborative kit here!

Once orders are closed, I will get down to work sewing up your bags, and the kit will ship on (or before) October 10th.

One last note:

We know the world is a scary place right now. That’s why we are donating 10% of the sales of the kit to World Central Kitchen, earmarked specifically for their efforts to fight starvation and famine in Gaza.

Both Karin and I feel strongly that we need not only to speak out against the horrors happening in Gaza but also to take action: we will post at the end of the preorder period about our donation total.

2019 Donations & Wrap-Up

Hello, everyone! It’s been quiet here for a while, because I’ve been keeping very busy.

I had a lovely three months in England from February 2019 to May 2019, and after coming back to the USA, I re-opened the shop, and was honored to share a booth with 1 Geek 2 Craft All at Indie Untangled.

In 2019, thanks to income from KnitSpinQuilt’s Etsy shop and show sales, I was able to donate $775 to RAICES Texas and $100 to Planned Parenthood.

Screenshot from PayPal confirming a $100 donation to Planned Parenthood from KnitSpinQuilt

Screenshot from RAICES confirming a $27

It’s incredibly important to me to be able to put my money where my mouth is: supporting issues of justice and equity for all persons, including and focusing on those who are marginalized by and victimized by our current administration’s policies and institutionalized racism in America, where I happen to live. So 2019 was the year I donated to migrant and refugee justice and to reproductive justice.

I’ll post again soon with plans for 2020, because my donations will be going to a new charity.

Best wishes to all as we move onwards into the future, no matter what it may bring.

Indie Untangled Countdown

I can’t wait for Friday — I’ll be sharing booth 23 with One Geek to Craft Them All and LexiCorp Knits at the Indie Untangled trunk show.

If you’ll be there, drop by and say hi!

Collaborative Kit Goes Live!

KnitSpinQuilt is branching out into collaborations with yarn dyers!

This very first kit is a project bag, yarn, and pattern collaboration with Yarn Over New York and Gannet Designs. Customize it and make it exactly what you want: you get a project bag, one or two skeins of yarn, a shawl pattern designed for this yarn, and a stitch marker.

The project bag – a medium drawstring project bag sewn by Alisa of KnitSpinQuilt – is made from a fabric whose pattern was designed by Naomi of Gannet Designs. The lovely, lovely yarn is dyed by Jessie of Yarn Over New York.

You get to customize the kit in several ways. We’re offering it in three different colors (green, blue, and purple) and two different yarns: Times Square Sock (merino/nylon) or Astoria (alpaca/merino). Choose your color, choose your yarn base. Finally, choose whether you want one skein of yarn, or two skeins of yarn.

The kit comes with a pattern for a brand new shawl: the Semiramis Semicircular Shawl, designed by Alisa of KnitSpinQuilt using Gannet Designs lace patterns. You can make a shawlette with one skein of yarn, or a large shawl with two skeins. You’ll also get a custom matching stitch marker as a little bonus.

ShawlGreenOpen
You can pre-order the kit at Yarn Over New York’s new website. Orders will only be open for two weeks, and the kits will ship by August 20. You’ll receive a Ravelry download code for the pattern as part of your purchase — don’t have Ravelry? We’ll print it and mail a physical copy of the pattern to you with the yarn — just make a note in your order.

Lady Astronaut-Inspired Bags!

One of my favorite authors, Mary Robinette Kowal, is releasing two lovely books in the Lady Astronaut of Mars universe: The Calculating Stars, and The Fated Sky.

I cannot wait to listen to the audiobooks of these books: Mary is an embarrassingly talented writer, and has been tweeting all kinds of amazing details about her research at NASA for the books.

So when I saw this fabric, I knew I had to make bags inspired by the books:

These bags are available in my Etsy shop, and as always, 30% of the ticket price will be donated to the Hispanic Federation.

Puerto Rico & Hurricane Maria, 2017

I usually talk about crafting on this blog, but I thought it would be a good idea to talk about why I choose to donate 30% of my Etsy shop’s proceeds to charity — and why I’ve chosen the charity I’m currently donating to. (It’s the Hispanic Federation and specifically their Hurricane Maria disaster relief efforts.)

Many of you will remember Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Jose, and Maria, all of which hit in 2017. There was a huge push for recovery in the continental United States, but the damage from Maria, in September of 2017, was worst in Puerto Rico — which is part of the United States, albeit not a state.

Now, nine months on, the recovery efforts are hobbled and struggling, federal funds aren’t being disbursed in a timely fashion, the estimated death toll of 4,600+ is more than double that of Hurricane Katrina, and Puerto Rico is still getting far less press attention and funding.

So here’s some reading, in case you’re interested in what’s going on.

The Guardian’s account of Hurricane Maria’s death toll and another article that details the fact that Puerto Rico is suing to get a more accurate death count — because the federal government is still insisting that only 64 people died, despite mounting evidence to the contrary.

A bipartisan commission is being called for to investigate federal disaster preparedness in the case of Hurricane Maria.

Even FEMA’s own records tell a different story than what is being pushed by the federal government. NPR says that FEMA is blaming the storm, rather than it’s own lack of preparedness, despite an appalling lack of pre-storm prep.

I chose the Hispanic Federation as my charitable recipient this year because of its strong record in working closely with communities on the ground, its good charity navigator score, and the fact that it has a history of working in Puerto Rico, which means infrastructure already in place.

Check out its work in Puerto Rico Disaster Relief here.

As always, I’m in graduate school, and I’m not stipended anymore. I literally can’t donate on my own, but I can turn my skill into money to donate, if you all help me out by shopping with me. I know there are a lot of options out there for stitch markers and project bags: more every day, it seems like, and a lot of really awesome makers to be discovered.

In case you’re wondering, I’ve done my first donations of the year through Network for Good — Google is matching donations to the Hispanic Federation right now at a 1-for-1 match.

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That $500 that you all helped me donate so far this year will be matched, and will be $1000 donated in total, because Google is matching up to $2 million, and as of the time of this post they’re not there yet.

And as always, thank you all for helping me put my money where my mouth is.

Summer Critters Update

Summer critters and news about Puerto Rico fundraising.

KnitSpinQuilt is celebrating the incipient summer of 2018 with woodland creatures! Hedgehogs and owls have simply stolen the show for this particular update.

hedgehogBoth Owl1

These prints — especially the hedgehogs — were really popular at the Moms and Makers Market on May 12 in NYC. If you’re a fan, check the shop out ASAP!

Each bag is fully lined with white Kona Cotton fabric, and each color of top is cut and sewn in batches of four (for the medium bags) or two (for the large bags). When each color of these bags is gone, it’s gone until the next batch is sewn up, so grab them before this shop update sells out!

OwlMarker1

As always, 30% of the purchase price for everything you buy from KnitSpinQuilt is donated to the Hispanic Federation for Puerto Rico disaster relief efforts, which are still sorely needed even after all this time: The projected deadline for 100% restoration of power in Puerto Rico has passed, and restoration of power has really not been achieved.

HedgehogMarker2

Celebrities such as Lin Manuel Miranda (author and star of Hamilton) have been championing this cause: I figure it’s the least I can do to donate a bit to the cause of helping people get their homes and everyday lives back. I’ll be posting an article about the situation in Puerto Rico later this week: keep your eyes peeled, because it’ll include other ways people can help out, as the next hurricane season approaches all too soon.