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Your Responses

Thank you all for the responses and if you haven’t responded yet and want to do so, please do it. Several things surprised me. First, how many of you would feel strangled by a cowl. There are cowls that are tight but there are cowls that are basically like a circular scarf. Longer, looser cowls are great for wearing under a coat to keep wind and snow off your neck or from going down your shirt. They’re really no different from wrapping a scarf loosely around your neck to block the wind.

This is the one I made for Addie’s teacher. It can be doubled and still isn’t tight.

This is the colorwork cowl I recently finished. It isn’t tight at all and is easy to pull off over your head without messing up most hair.

Second, I was surprised that anyone who crafts would take a handmade gift to Goodwill. To each his own but if someone gave me something they made, I’d really try it before I donated it or find a friend who would use it. I can’t imagine seeing something I made for someone at Goodwill but again . . we’re all free to do what we want.

A reader wrote me and said she never thought she would wear a shawl but someone gave her one very similar to Hitchhiker and she said she’s worn it so much and loves it.

Shawls are quite popular. They’re one of the hottest items being knitted these days. The knitting magazines are full of them, and in the knitting groups on Facebook, it’s primarily shawls that are shown. I’d say most of the older knitters are knitting sweaters and socks while the younger knitters are knitting shawls. It may be because they take less yarn and aren’t as expensive to make as a sweater, the shawls are typically quicker to make and don’t have to fit so they make great gifts but they definitely are popular now.

This is a Hitchhiker I made 5 or 6 years ago and gave to my stepdaughter. I am considering making these but I’m also considering fingerless mitts. They are so great and anyone who hasn’t tried them should try them. They aren’t for wearing out to water the chickens when it’s 5 degrees out but when sitting in the house and it’s chilly, they’re great. It’s surprising how it makes my fingers feel warm when my wrists are warm. Also, even when I’m in MO and it’s really cold, I love the fingerless mitts because I can get in and out of the car, use my keys, pick up things in the grocery store, sign the credit card machine . . all without taking them off. I have been known to wear a pair of mittens over the fingerless mitts, then take the full mittens off while inside or when I need to use my fingers. No matter where most of us live, there are days when it’s cold enough that our aging hands need warmth but not so frigid that we need full gloves.

Fingerless mitts would definitely be faster and the recipients would receive them before winter is over whereas the Hitchhikers might not be finished for a few months.

I’m going to finish the Reflection Shawl before I make a decision on the gift knitting but I so much appreciate your thoughts.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. I would be so hurt if I found things I had made at thrift store. I work at a thrift store and am amazed at the handmade items that come in. I told my family if they give my handmade items to thrift store I will come back and haunt them. Ha, ha

  2. I would love fingerless mittens for the reason you gave. Gloves kind of get in the way. Loose cowls would also be great. I like others can not stand anything to touch the front of my neck but the back of the neck freezes. Loose cowls would work great. I am sure anything you make would be appreciated.

  3. Even if CA (no we are not all Baywatch warm) fingerless mitts come in very handy. They are great for driving because your fingers don’t slide all over the steering wheel. I have never given a handknit object to Goodwill. I have given them to charity though

  4. I love the cowl you made for Addie’s teacher & purchased the pattern to make gifts. Fingerless mittens are so nice on arthritic hands. I use them when using computer at work when the room is cool. Quicker projects are the ones I prefer for gift giving.

    • I use my fingerless mitts when on the computer and also when at my sewing machine. My fingers are free to do what I need and my hands stay warm enough to do it. Plus since I keep my heat down to save money they come in handy just around the house. I gave a set to my sister since she keeps her house colder than I do.

  5. As it’s -29F here at the moment I can’t even think of wearing fingerless mitts but I would think they would be good in a much warmer climate. I have given some handknit shawls and blankets to the homeless shelters but I too would be upset to find something I’d made for someone at Goodwill. I do like the idea of the hitchhiker shawl as a gift. It looks like it would be a fairly fast knit.

  6. Another gift idea for older folks is a small blanket. I was with my mom in a quilt store and she really liked a flannel panel, so I bought the panel and enough backing to make the lap quilt. It was great for being in the car or sitting in a chair. Enough to cover the lap and legs but easy to get up without tripping over any excess fabric. The same idea would work for wheelchair bound friends.

    Remember the quilt pattern with a pocket along one edge so you could fold the quilt into a pillow – I think the design was called a “quillow”.

  7. Personally not a cowl or turtleneck person as I do not have a “long” neck. While I love the look, for me I feel smothered wearing a cowl or turtleneck (even a mock turtleneck), however, I do enjoy wearing scarfs. For Christmas this year I gifted 29 adult scarfs and 5 for kids. Would be very disappointed to see them in a thrift shop. People who do not knit, crochet, sew, quilt, etc. have no idea how much time is spent in making the item that is gifted to them.

  8. I find homemade gifts in thrift stores quite frequently. i try to rescue them when i can. i have a lot of pottery…glassware…etc that were homemade gifts. it just seems wrong to find them there. i always get the quilts i find there.

  9. I am clearly not the norm compared to others, and to each their own; I do donate my handmade items to Goodwill as well as various other charities. It’s not just a thrift store – Goodwill Industries thru the stuff it sells raises the money to train disadvantaged people, helps find them jobs etc. I know how important this is first hand since I have several friends with special needs children who have been trained and placed in jobs they love so they can be more independent. Anyone who happens to buy one of my handmade items at the local Goodwill will likely think they found a great bargain and appreciate it, so its all good.

  11. I am with you, Why in the world would anyone take something that was made for them to Goodwill??? They certainly don’t appreciate workmanship or the person who made it for them. But that is just my opinion. I guess I should not be surprised by what people do and say, but some things really do make me wonder.

  12. I love fingerless mitts, they leave my fingers free to play Pokemon! I don’t like tight cowls and prefer loose cowls or scarves/shawls. I’m half done binding off the shawl that is my daughter’s Christmas present, I gave my DIL a Hitchhiker shawl that I added a row of eyelet lace on the 8th row of each repeat.I loved it, I hope she did! Have you ever done a Russian bind off? That’s my new thing I learned this month…it was suggested for this scarf and I didn’t want to do a picot bind off like I did on the first one of these I did..I love this bind off and I learned something new!

  13. Hmmm, “feel strangled by a cowl” – or any other item wrapped around the neck – that’s me. I think it goes back to some strangler of young women in California, when I was a teenager. I cannot have scarves around my neck very often. They look good when you are slim, but when the big bust arrived, I felt it added to the bulk.
    In Dana White’s De-Cluttering books, one of them talks about how “she had LOTS of scarves in her closet, even though she cannot stand them around her neck due to possible strangulation by a stranger.” That’s when I knew it wasn’t just me.

  14. I also was surprised at how many people feel “strangled” by cowls. My cowls are all long since I don’t want them tight around my neck if I’m wearing it as an “accessory”. If I want it for warmth with a coat, I wear a tighter one. I also like fingerless mitts for work, because my mouse hand gets cold. I am not a hat person, because it makes my hair go totally flat. It is good to know general preferences of the intended recipient, but I would be fine with someone re-gifting something if it just isn’t their style or color. I do think it’s good to try to make things with their color preferences in mind, since it is something for THEM not me. (If I went with my preference, everything anyone received would be purple…) LOL

  15. I love Cowls, those that are fitted and those big. But my hang up is shawls…I love shawls…I have many but still have more planned! lolo I also like the Fingerless Gloves..but hats…don’t wear those!

    At the present time I am making my first crochet sweater, well 2nd if you count the one I make in the 1990’s that was so huge! It was large diamonds in black on a bright blue background. It was a pretty sweater, pullover but I was so green I didn’t do a swatch! lolo So you can imagine what it looked like!

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