Hey! Have you ever wanted to knit blankets for the animal shelter, for those poor animals? If so, then I am glad to tell you, that I have SEVERAL different patterns to make for those poor babys! If someone is willing to help me, and get someone else to join, working together, we can make many blankets to help those animals! Write me and tell me if you want to! PLEASEE!!! FOR THE KITTIES AND PUPPIES! :waah:
Kitty blankets!
I’m so glad you’re doing this. Our daughter has a charity for rescue animals. I make all sorts of things for the animals and also to sell as fundraisers. If you’d like to compare notes, send me a PM.
We just took in yet another black cat for our sanctuary location. He showed his appreciation by jumping up to the 4th shelf of the bookcase, where I was drying some catnip for the mice I make and . . . <sigh>
AWW! sooo cute! I’m sending u a Pm right now!
Hey thisisme, my aunty Merry and her group of eight ladies knit blankets for the animal. Last week they all made 15 blankets for kitty as well as dog.We’ll deliver the blankets to the different shelters this week, along with food and litter and toys.They will like if join with you and helps to make more blanket.
Ok, thats soo awsome. My art teacher makes dog beds, from like material not knitting, so when she delivers those dog beds to animal shelters, I give her the kitty blankets that I have made, and have her take them with her! I’m so glad that your aunt has a group of women who can help!
I’m 15 and I don’t have as much time as I would like to have, so I’ve only made like… 9 or 10 since I posted the first starting thread. I wish I could do alot more!
<3 from Moriah
I am willing to help.
Very nice idea, and kind of you!
…but: I have two cats and they don’t like knitted blankets to lie on…prefer towels or quilts. I think maybe their claws get sometimes caught in the knitting. I’ve offered them a garter-stitch blanket and they both rejected it.
but maybe not all cats are like these two fuss budgets!
Lol. I never thought of that. I’m hoping that the cats would rather lay on one of these then have to lay on concrete floors. (fingers crossed)
Try felting!
I know the greyhound shelter I used to volunteer at required donated blankets to not have open weave because the dogs could get caught/tangled in it. But felted items are thick, cozy, and durable.
I have never quite understood the “Felting” process… Could you explain it to me?
Especially for felting blankets, it’s really quite easy. Basically you have to have 100% wool (or alpaca, angora, etc.) that isn’t superwash. You knit up your item. It’s best to not use a really tight gauge, because what you want is for the fibers to rub together a lot when you toss it in the wash.
You put the finished item in the laundry, with hot water (and a cold rinse, if possible) and maybe a pair of jeans or some tennis balls for extra agitation. As the yarn gets agitated, the fibers kind of migrate into each other, and because of the rough outer surface on each hair, they get stuck that way.
If you are doing something that is sized (like a felted hat or slippers), you have to keep a closer eye on it, but for making felted blankets for animals, just keep in mind that as the fibers get interlocked, they pull closer together, so you have to knit your object somewhat bigger than you want its finished size to be.
For cat-sized blankets, you might experiment with this by going to a thrift shop and buying a 100% wool sweater (one that says dry clean only) and throwing it in the wash. When its felted, you can cut it into cat blankets or just donate it as is!
lol awsome! thanks!
If you have plenty of yarn that will felt, you can do the kitty pi. I’ve made several of these from stash ends for friends’ cats and dogs. http://media.wendyknits.net/knit/kittybed.htm
I’ve volunteered at a cat shelter. Knitted blankets are not a good idea, because cats’ claws will get caught and/or the blankets will get ripped up. I’ve had cats for 40 years and know them pretty well. The shelters around here always ask for old towels, and when they get ripped up, the shelters throw them out. Felted items still have the underlying stitches, but I have no experience with them, and my own cats gets their claws clipped every few weeks.
Did you ask the shelter what they need?
If you felt them well enough, felted objects are just as good as or better than the towels you mention. A welll-felted object no longer has the holes and knit stitches in it, really.
Then it sounds like a wonderful project. Curious–do they have to be 100% wool to be felted?
They don’t have to be 100% but the more wool, the better. You also don’t want whites or superwash… those won’t felt. Something with the lightening to make it white ruins the properties of felting in wool and superwash keeps it from shrinking or felting. You do want a fairly high percentage and avoid whites/superwash but the rest is pretty much fair game. If you’re not sure and your LYS doesn’t know (for some odd reason) just get a 100% non-white, non-superwash wool… that’ll felt really well every time. As for anything with knitting, there are some stuff you just have to do a test patch of. With felting, there’s no un-doing it and once felted, it won’t felt again, so felt it to what you want in the first place. In a washing machine, check every ten minutes… by hand, you have the chance to check any time you want… The main components of felting are: wool, heat, agitation and cold (cold rinse and heat/agitation to work it to felt). I have been able to successfully felt a natural off-white color really well, though. I was lucky to catch a wool that was light in color, really.
Just to be clear on the felting… http://www.woolcrafting.com/boiled-wool.html That page seems to say it all rather well. Read through it all and you’ll get a good understanding of the felting process.
I just noticed this thread - I’ve been knitting kitty blankies for my local shelter for the past year+. They LOVE them, and every time I take some in, the staff members are very happy. I do use acrylic - some that is donated to me, leftovers from other projects, or I buy cheap stuff on sale or use my Michaels/Joann coupons. I knit them approx. 24x24", on size 10.5 needles, using a double strand throughout.
Good job for those of you helping!
That’s wonderful. You can’t felt acrylic, so there were no complaints about the cats ripping them up?
You’re all inspiring me. We have many shelters in my area, and there will be more blizzards this winter…