Howdy, Knitters! Thanks for stopping by for another post on the Knitting Daddy blog. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Thanks for sticking around and checking in. One of the reasons the blog has been so quiet is that I’ve recently started a podcast — Unraveling With Greg And Joey. I’ll talk a little bit more about that in a bit, but let’s catch up on a few other things first, including a silly snapshot of Blueberry in some of my knitwear:

Pretty much as soon as I got home, Princess Blueberry grabbed my #DeadFishHat and #CrackerjackScarf and wanted to go outside.

A photo posted by Greg Cohoon (@knittingdaddy) on Jan 21, 2016 at 3:46pm PST

Scrappy Preemie Hat KAL

Last time on the blog, I introduced the Scrappy Preemie Hat KAL. I’m thrilled to report it was a great success! Head over to the Ravelry group to check out the chatter and all of the finished objects. As the KAL progressed, several other people generously offered prizes, and I’d like to recognize them here. We had a drawstring project bag from the Halcyarn Knitting Accessories Etsy shop donated by halcyarn Kris. We also had a pattern from the Ber Alcock-Earley Ravelry shop, chosen by the winner, donated by bee30 Ber. ArtByAna Ana donated a Mini Zip Project Bag from the Art-by-Ana Handmade Etsy shop, chosen by the winner. BostonJen Jen donated a copy of the View from the Charles pattern, which she designed. PrairiePiper Paula donated 3 prizes of a pattern of the winner’s choice from Paula Emons-Fuessle Ravelry Shop. All of these extra prizes made the KAL even more exciting, and I’m truly grateful for everyone who generously offered support. I announced the winners in the group, and they’ve all received their prizes.

It warmed my heart to see so many people knitting up sweet preemie hats to be donated to their local hospitals. A few people weren’t able to donate locally, so they sent me the hats they knitted up and I donated them to the Family Support Network of Central Carolina (FSNCC). It was also heartwarming to see a spike in pattern sales for the Scrappy Sock Yarn Preemie Hat, because all proceeds from that pattern are donated to FSNCC. Everyone at FSNCC is grateful for the support that is being generated for our organization through this pattern. Thank you all.

This KAL was a lot of fun, and I’m probably going to do it again this year. Stay tuned.

Here's a panorama view of all 320 #PreemieHats that were knitted and crocheted for the #IBKCharity charity drive I organized to support @fsn_cc. Thank you to everyone who participated!

A photo posted by Greg Cohoon (@knittingdaddy) on Jan 7, 2016 at 11:19am PST

Simultaneously with running the KAL, I also organized the October Charity Drive in the IBK Ravelry Group. For my charity, of course I chose FSNCC and I was collecting preemie hats. I was happy to accept hats from any pattern, knit or crocheted, not just from my pattern. And the hats came in! By the end of the drive, I had collected 320 hats, a blanket, a pair of bootie socks, and about a dozen board books. Several people made direct financial contributions to FSNCC as well. Again, everyone at FSNCC was blown away by the generosity of the knitting and crochet community. I’m signed up to host the charity drive again this October, so if you want to participate, feel free to start knitting some preemie hats and saving them up ’til October.

Here’s a video I made when I dropped off the hats a few weeks ago.

New Podcast: Unraveling With Greg And Joey

Unraveling With Greg And Joey

Friends, here is some exciting news. I am now co-hosting a podcast! It’s called “Unraveling With Greg And Joey” and, as the name suggests, is hosted by my friend Joey and me. Joey is joeygibson on Ravelry, and we’ve been friends for years. Last summer Joey suggested we should do a knitting podcast together. I’ve been wanting to start a knitting podcast for a while, but never made it happen. Having a partner to do the podcast was the answer to that, and Joey and I have been having a great time putting this together. We released our first episode in the beginning of October, and we’ve been aiming to release about every two weeks since. Mostly, we’ve been successful with that schedule.

https://www.instagram.com/p/-0NPXyl7rb/?taken-by=knittingdaddy

If you enjoy knitting podcasts, you’re definitely going to want to add this one to your listening list. You can jump in anytime and just go from there, or since there are still only a handful of episodes, you can go back and listen to all of them. I’ve even made it easy to get to the podcast from this blog — at the top of every page, in the menu bar, is a link called “Podcast” that will take you there. Additionally, the star icon next to the Twitter and Instagram icons will take you to the podcast as well. Come on over and give us a listen!

What does that mean for the Knitting Daddy blog? I’m not going away from here, but there will be some changes. We’ve already seen that the updates are getting less frequent. I’m going to try to ramp it back up again, but I doubt I’ll ever get back to posting a blog entry every week again. We’ll see. The content will shift some. One of the things I’m sure is going to shift is the podcast reviews that I’ve traditionally done. I still listen to a ton of podcasts, but if I’m not posting on the blog every week, too many episodes stack up and I just can’t keep up with reviews. I’ll still call out highlights, but I don’t see that being a big part of the blog like it was when I started.

This blog and my Knitting Daddy Designs Ravelry Group will continue to be the home of any design work I do. I’ve got a handful of ideas for some more designs in my head, and I’m hoping to get them executed this year. When I do, you’ll hear about them here or in my Ravelry group first. 🙂

Finally, Blueberry wants to say “hi” to all my knitting friends:

Hi, Daddy's knitting friends!

A video posted by Greg Cohoon (@knittingdaddy) on Jan 23, 2016 at 7:19am PST

Until next time, keep on knitting for the ones you love!

-greg