Your Team Leader is Karen Tumelty. Please watch here for details from her about this project.
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Another Edit: This is so amazing! People keep joining! It’s amazing!
We have a lot of posts (keep them coming!) so I think it would be a good idea for me to add some headlines to some of my posts. I’ll put them all in caps so any newbies can find them easily.
So far, I’m thinking HOUSEKEEPING (notes specific to the project), HELP FULL HINTS (feel free to use this if your sharing something that will make it easier for someone else to knit this patter, and READ THIS NOW (if anything really important comes up.)
I may add some more as we go along. Just look for the all caps at the beginning of the posts.
ETA: Wow! It’s Friday morning and Ann’s post has my email inbox jumping!! We have plenty of room here for anyone who would like to join up. There are people coming from all over to this virtual party we’re having! Leave a note here or drop me an email at kjt1211@optonline.net. If you don’t have to time to knit a square, we can always use some cheerleaders. All are welcome!!
Well thank you Ann! Last year, we had a very bad fire in a six story apartment building in Yonkers. The apartment above the one that the fire started in was owned and occupied by very dear friends of mine, Sara and Danny and their two children. Down the hall was my friend and colleague Mindy. A few doors further down was my friend and beloved mailman Paul. They all lost everything.
They are all in temporary housing now while the building is being rebuilt (which is taking forever!) and I would love to have blankets for them when they move back in. (I have some treats of my own in the my knitting basket.)
The pattern is Kay’s wonderful Mitered Crosses blanket.
The plan is to do three blankets (total of 36 squares). The yarn is Lambs Pride Worsted. Your palette is your own. Choose whatever you have laying around the house or pick some colors that appeal to you. If more people are interested than that, we can do a fourth blanket for the firehouse that responded. There are so many wonderful stories about what happened afterwards. One of the first firefighters on the scene was the brother of my friend Sara. His firehouse chipped in all their overtime from the fire to help them get back on their feet. They’re great guys!
Feel free to join in from wherever you are. I’m in Yonkers, which is just north of NYC (I have a view of the Manhattan skyline from the porch at my office). If anyone from NYC, Westchester County, Rockland or CT wants to get together for a sewing up party, I’m game! (If you feel like driving from from somewhere further away, we may have to have a prize for furthest traveled.) My apartment is small and shabby (for now–this is going to be the autumn of renovation) but there are lots of cool places we could go that would be happy to have us.
You can email me at kjt1211@optonline.net to sign up. If my name sounds familiar to you, I am not the political journalist Karen Tumulty (hmm…I wonder if she’s a knitter.) My last name is actually Tumelty. It’s a very, very common mistake. Edited to add: Oh Ann you’re so sweet. I’m actually very used to it and I generally don’t even bother with it. I was just concerned that someone might google me and end up thinking they were knitting with someone else.
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I’m happy to knit a block Karen, you’re a wonderful friend 
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Welcome aboard Nell! Do you need the pattern? Send me an email with your info so that I can start a group list.
It’s easy to be a good friend when you have good friends!
What is your deadline? I’m in test mode on a sweater, but if not a rush, I can do. Fire is so devastating in that you lose everything.
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I bought the pattern when it was first published, thanks. Emailing you.
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What a lovely reason to knit a square! I’d love to be involved, I’m sending you an email right now 
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Wow! I really didn’t expect such a quick and enthusiastic response. I’ve received your emails but thought it would be easier to answer everyone’s questions at once.
- I’ve only asked for your email so that I can send you my address to send your squares.
- Our timing is really fluid. I would like to try to get the first blankets worth of squares done by the end of September. Construction has been slow on the rebuilding of the apartment house (it’s quite big and permitting is slow) so we have some freedom.
- The only reason I’ve asked you to email me is so that I can send you the address to send the completed squares too. Unless you have a really personal question or want to share something that’s not for the whole group, we’ll do all our business here so that everyone can play.
- If we end up with people who are too far away to join a sewing up party, we’ll do an online potluck supper. Bring your best casserole recipe! Share your grandmas recipe for punch! It’ll be fun.
A few other things have come to me as I’ve been thinking about it today.
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We’re going to go with the expected gauge on the Lambs Pride Worsted which is 4.5 stitches to the inch. 18 stitches to four inches. I’m swatching tonight so I’ll let you know what needle size I end up on. But really, you do you! Whatever needle gets you that gauge in that yarn works.
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I’m seeing pallets everywhere. Please be prepared to pick give us all a paragraph or two on why you picked the colors that you did. You can rest assured that if the answer is “these were the remnants that I had in a random shopping bag in the bottom of my closet” the folks who are getting these will think that’s cool.
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Your square is your own. Want to make all four miters different colors? Have at it! Feeling a little monochrome tonight? Go for it. If we end up with a bunch of colors that make no sense together, we’ll go for an old school crazy quilt look and join all the squares with black. They’ll all be gorgeous!
I am so tickled that we’ve got such a good running start on these. And by tickled I mean delighted, touched and a tiny bit weepy. If only the rest of the world could take a cue from knitters.
More tomorrow along with email responses. It’s a bit late. I had a very good but very crazy week at work so I am going to watch an episode of MASH (Hawkeye was a knitter), knit my swatch and go to bed.
Cheers to you all.
xo
Karen
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I’d love to join in and contribute! I sent email - will have to pick up yarn as I don’t have any on hand. Now to choose some yummy colors…
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Okay. I’ll see how long my test takes, but should be fine for late September. Do yo want it all in that wool or any worsted? I don’t have lambs pride, but I have plenty of worsted.
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Welcome aboard @Misstquilts I’m so glad you’ve joined us! This going to be fun. I can’t wait to see your colors.
@sabograd I’m hoping to do it all in the Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride worsted because it has a pretty distinctive texture. That said, what have you got? I picked that yarn because it is a great blanket yarn (ridiculously squeezy and cozy), because it is pretty reasonably priced, and because a lot of people use it so are likely to either have some in their stash or the bag of partial balls that we all have laying around (that’s not just me, right?). There’s lots of yarns out there so maybe we’ll do the different blankets in different yarns.
Options!! We have nothing but options!!! The world is our oyster.
As far as timing goes, late September is fine. Any late or rogue squares can become lovely throw pillows! Stick around and keep us posted on how your test knitting is going.
A little housekeeping here–if your palette is inspired by something specific, post a picture. I keep seeing beautiful color combos all over my house. Last night it was a pale green lamp, a dark and light gray china cat and a bottle of yellow Windex on a dark brown table. This morning it was an old movie poster. A minute ago it was a Debbie Harry head in shades of bronze and green with rose colored lipstick in the middle. Pictures to come once the phone charges.
Next up, answering my emails and posting about my swatch. .
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Thank you. That is fine, I’ll just have to pick some up. That should not be a problem. Then I also may see what colors others have used.
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I forgot to tell you all something very exciting!!! We have a hashtag!!! #MDKTeamBlanket2
We’ll all be adding Instagram Sensation to our LinkedIn accounts before we know it!
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“Swatching is fun!” said no one ever. Got gauge on the first try. 4.5 stitches to the inch on a size 8 needle.
I measured this without washing and blocking it. Garter stitch is pretty forgiving as is the Lamb’s Pride so I am not concerned at all. Whoever washes and blocks first will have the honor of determining our finished size for the squares. Not a race so no prizes involved but bragging rights.
I’m probably going to cast on this afternoon. I have a hot date with the laundry basket but I’m sure I can sneak in a few rows.
P.S. Note to self, don’t swatch with black yarn. I don’t know what I was thinking.
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Karen, I would like to participate, too.
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@Diane Welcome! I’m so glad you’re here! Scroll through the posts for all of my ramblings from the past two days and drop me an email so I can send you the pattern and the shipping details.
This is so good!
Hi Karen, I am happy to join in this effort and I know I have some lambs pride stashed somewhere!
My email is erice5115@gmail.com
Do I purchase the pattern through you?
Thanks for leading!
-Libby
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Hello @Libby! I’m so glad you’re joining us. I am so amazed by our community of knitters. Good folk, all around!
I saw that you sent me an email. I’m going to pop over there in a few minutes and will send along all the details. In the meantime, take a little scroll this thread. Meet your fellow knitters. Check out our project details. The vast majority of our conversations will happen here in The Lounge. Emails are so that I can send you some details and for anything that we would prefer to keep private.
More to come. Stay tuned.
Good morning Beautiful Knitters.
After several ties, all of which involved a profound inability to count to 36, the first color of the first miter is done. This took 8 grams of Lamb’s Pride Worsted. The little ball has 28 grams in it so I should have enough to get to do the rest of them.
I’m at work now (shhh!) but will finish this first miter tonight and give you the weight on what that took.
I’m using leftover yarn from other projects right now. Hope this is helpful for anyone in the same boat.
P.S. My boss is highly unlikely to care that I am doing this right now. He travels a lot and sends me photos of yarn shops around the world.
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I hope that nice boss brings a souvenir skein of yarn from time to time 
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