I think, like many people, I first became aware of p/hop through a stand at Woolfest.  I wasn’t too sure what knitting had to do with Médecins Sans Frontières, but I knew all about the pleasures of knitting, so this was something I was very happy to support to raise funds for MSF.

A few years ago my husband, an Anaesthetist, spent 3 weeks in a hospital in rural Bangladesh working with a visiting American surgeon.  Together they performed surgery on patients who otherwise could not have been treated, and far more importantly for the long term benefit of the hospital staff and the local community, they trained the staff in new skills and helped out with equipment.  After hearing about his experiences there and knowing what a difference trained medical professionals can make in situations around the world I tend to notice when MSF is mentioned in the media.

I recently had the opportunity to help with a flock of sheep in dire need of aid.  On Ravelry.com news spread about a flock of about 70 sheep, mainly Spelsau (an ancient breed of Nordic sheep), that were facing slaughter in Denmark after the Police had intervened when they weren’t cared for properly.  A lady with considerable experience of shepherding who lives on a farm in a remote part of Sweden wanted to rescue them and take them back to Sweden with her.  Renee has a group on Ravelry following her spinning adventures in Sweden and they decided to support Renee in financing the rescue of these sheep and transporting them 700 miles to her farm.  So, I became the proud adoptive mother of first one, and then two sheep from this flock.

The rescue sheep arrive at their new home. Photo courtesy of Renee Darley

Now is the time to make a confession about the size of my fleece stash – let’s just say it is contributing to the insulation of my home!  To be sent the fleece from my adopted sheep every year would be lovely, but might limit my other fleece purchasing.  The solution was obvious.  I help moderate a group on Ravelry that is full of sheep breed enthusiasts from all around the world – I am very proud of how international a group we are.  They love getting fleece from different breeds, I was faced with too much fleece and we didn’t have any sheep mascots for our Ravelry group.

So the solution was obvious – we could combine our rescued mascots, the international membership of our Ravelry group and another Raverly group that fundraises for an international organisation that provides medical care for people in need around the world.  We will be sharing out the fleece from our adopted mascots among group members who will in turn donate to p/hop.  I just love win win situations!

Photo courtesy of Renee Darley

Our adopted sheep are Blacker, a black mainly Jacob ram with the most amazing horns and Dagrún, a Spelsau ewe.  We now have their picture on our group page, along with some brief details of how they, as rescued sheep, will be helping raise funds through p/hop for those in need of aid from MSF.

Image courtesy of JaneKAL & the Blacker & Beyond group

It has been lovely to share the p/hop story with our international group members who weren’t previously aware of how knitters could fund raise for MSF.  Now that they do know all about p/hop, I hope that after donating when they share Blacker & Dagrún’s fleece, that they may also think of p/hop when they enjoy spinning and knitting the fleece.

At the end of January more than 50 knitters, crocheters and spinners enjoyed the second annual Sheddite gathering at the Bar Convent in York. Yes, I know that this sounds like a strange sect but please be assured that we are just an ever expanding group of friendly and enthusiastic fiberistas who have all met through the Yarn Yard forum known as The Shed on Ravelry.

One of the highlights of the weekend is our annual swap where we all bring yarn, fibre, books and tools that we no longer love and hope that they will find a new home with someone else. We then make a donation to P-Hop based on how much happier we are with what we are going away with compared with what we brought.

This year we had to book an extra large room to accommodate the swap which completely covered three or four huge tables. Imagine if you will, fifty excited knitters circling around like a pack of wolves (sorry!) eyeing up the particular item they loved above all others and hoping nobody else would snaffle it first. And let me tell you, the stakes were high – there was Wollemeise, Socks that Rock, Old Maiden Aunt and Yarn Yard to be had if you were quick and stealthy enough…

Mind you, I am pleased to say that everything passed in the most civilised fashion – I think we all went home a lot happier with our acquisitions and the best thing of all is that we raised well over £300 for P-Hop.

A few months ago, my friend Ankaret Wells self-published two books: The Maker’s Mask and The Hawkwood War. The books are part fantasy, part detective novel, part Regency romance and part cyberpunk, full of humour and populated with wonderfully vivid and three-dimensional characters. I particularly loved Ankaret’s heroine, Tzenni Boccamera, a shy, geeky engineer with a marvellously level-headed approach to problems and a great deal of determination, and I was inspired by a Twitter conversation to design some socks inspired by her.

One of the first things we learn about Tzenni is that she is scared of heights, and particularly of staircases, which puts her at something of a disadvantage living in a world of vertical city-states, or Spires. So I knew straight away that the socks would have to have a staircase-like stitch pattern. However, I didn’t want Tzenni’s socks to define her just by her fears when I had been inspired by her awesomeness. Fortunately her society has a complex system of heraldic devices, and Tzenni’s personal symbol is a rose-glyph, so I took the Rosebud Lace from the first Barbara Walker Treasury, charted in in Excel and then added a framework of purl stitches around the rosebuds to represent the staircases.

I’d never designed anything before, let alone written a pattern, but a few people on Ravelry asked if I was going to write this up, so I thought I’d give it a go. Once I’d made that decision I knew I wanted to offer the pattern to p/hop; I’ve had a great deal of pleasure from knitting p/hop patterns myself and I really hope that other knitters will enjoy knitting their very own Tzenni socks and knowing that they are helping MSF at the same time.

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Thank you Sadie. You can read more from Sadie on her blog, the Knitting up the Ravelled Sleeve of Care.