Over two hundred hand-knitted and crocheted beanies and other colourful knitwear were festooned along the front deck of the Harbour View Hotel on Saturday 14th June to celebrate Worldwide Knit in Public Day. The beanies and knitwear were available for purchase for a donation with all funds raised going to our local St John here in Raglan.
The members of the Raglan Knitting circle and the Raglan Crafters Group joined forces with St John volunteers on the day with some of the volunteers bringing their own knitting or crochet projects along with them. We were all quite grateful that the rain held off on the day too.
Members of the public had fun trying on the colourful creations and were very generous in their support of this local fundraiser. It was a tremendous success raising a massive total of $2345 for St John on the day. A further amount of $110 was raised by the crafters selling some of the remaining beanies at Indi’s on Saturday 12th July.
Jane Allen (Chairperson of Raglan Area Hato Hone St John) has indicated that “(the Area Committee) would put that money to use back into the community, in a way that will be visible and have real impact.” Jane also mentioned they “intend to use the money to fund rolling-out reflective numbers and ICE (in case of emergency) booklets. The numbers, placed on gates or letterboxes, are reflective so they are immediately visible to paramedics and ambulance crew in dark/rural areas, and the ICE booklets hold personal and medical information and are magnetic so can be placed on fridges for easy access for paramedics and ambulance crew.”
This annual event would not be possible without the generosity and months of hard work by all the amazing local knitters, crocheters and crafters who made all the beanies and other knitwear items that were donated for this fundraiser. We were also blessed to receive donated items from three other knitting groups this year – Whatawhata knitting group, Rototuna library knitting group and Elmwood Retirement Village, Manurewa. We would also like to thank the Harbour View Hotel for generously allowing us to use the front deck again this year.
New knitters and crafters are always welcome to join us. Raglan Knitting Circle meets every Wednesday 9am-11am at Orca Café.
The Karioi Quilt and Crafters group meet once a month on the 2nd Thursday of the month at the Old School Arts Centre 10am 2pm.
Further details are available on the Raglan Crafters Group Facebook page.
