Crafters Against Cuts - keep going guys!

Hi there knitters, crocheters, friends and anti-austerity fans. I haven't done anything for a few weeks as I sort of floundered after the success of the knitted banner and all the work everyone did. The banner went out again on Friday to protest the meeting and nefarious dealings of David Cameron and President Xi in the town hall, by the way. She (she is a she, I've decided) is still fighting away. Good old banner.

At the protest someone secretly attached a crochet poppy to her, I love this! The banner got yarn-bombed!

So. Although the momentum of crafting against cuts might have slowed a bit, I want to keep on going and I hope you do too, a bit.

I started making a blanket out of the leftover squares, here it is so far.

I went for a nice checkerboard pattern.

The blanket is about 110cm square at the moment so I need to make it a bit bigger. I still have a lot of red and white squares left over:

I can probably get 1.5 to two decent sized blankets out of these squares. I also have a few squares in other colours, that I made with the purpose of making blankets:

The original idea was to send the finished blankets to Calais for the refugee camp, and later on I also wanted to donate some stuff to the homeless camps in town. Now. 1.5 blankets isn't going to do anyone much good and I can't do this alone. The thing is that blankets take a fair bit of time to make, and while they are desperately needed, it seems slightly futile to spend ages hand-making blankets which will get ruined fairly quickly and quite likely discarded. So first, I thought maybe hats, scarves, woolly socks would be appreciated and quicker to make - depending on your level of knitting expertise, you could choose what to make. 

Secondly, if we do make blankets, or other things, I thought we could sell them and donate the money for whatever supplies the organisers of Calais trips, or homeless provision, need the most. That way we are making something beautiful that people can use, but aren't spending loads of time and energy when really things are needed fast, and cheap. The money made from a beautiful handmade blanket could buy several like this, or this. Yes, buying fast and cheap carries its own ethical burden... but I'm trying to think practically and do things that can help. I reckon we could set up an auction or something and all the money made will be donated.

So to sum up: I need knitters and crocheters. Again.

You can make whatever you want: hats, scarves, gloves, warm things... which we can send directly to Calais and whoever needs them.

Baby things are needed too and even quicker to make. Blankets, little hats, maybe even toys.

Or, if you're still into squares we can make a load of blankets to sell. Or you could make something else to sell. 

I admit I am not sure what I'm doing here so please, please get in touch if you disagree with my ideas, or if you've got better ones. I want to do the best thing I can, and all I can really do is knit :) I will set up a meeting for Manchester types so we can knit together again, that was nice. But do join in if you're somewhere else too. I will get in touch with other organisations like Knit For Peace that do great work and have a wide reach. I just feel so helpless in the face of all this unfairness and I want to do something, even a little thing xxx