Knit to keep kids warm
By: Helen Grafton, Contributing Writer
A pair of knitting needles or a crochet hook is all you need to join a new group on campus. Project Tiger Cubs is a club that aims to create gifts for kids at local hospitals through the arts of knitting and crocheting.
With assistance from English professor Michelle Chester, the club was made official by the Student Government Association over winter break. The founding members have been working since the fall 2014 semester to get the club up on its feet.
“I’m a member of TU Reads, which is a book club, and at all the club meetings we sit around going, ‘Man I wish we were knitting during book discussion.’ So we were like, ‘OK, let’s start a knitting club,’” founding member Amanda Carroll said.
The new club held their first official meeting on March 4 in the Liberal Arts building.
“Our meetings are structured as just a free knit that will have knitting books, knitting or crocheting YouTube videos that people can polish their skills and then work on their projects at the same time,” Carroll said.
The goal of Project Tiger Cubs is to make anything from blankets, booties, hats, scarves and gloves to just anything you can make with yarn, according to Carlysha Isaac, the club’s president.
All of the projects they make will be donated to newborns, premature infants and children in local hospitals. Although they have not chosen a specific charity yet, they would like to keep the foundation local by donating to organizations such as Johns Hopkins Children’s Center or the Ronald McDonald House.
Although many of the members already know how to knit or crochet they said that new members do not need to know how to do either of these to join the club.
“We were planning on having a social-type thing where people just bring their projects, learn, get help or just sit here and knit, or crochet, with each other,” Carroll said.
One member, sophomore Emily Whetstone, even has her own Etsy page where she sells some of her completed projects. One can find crocheted hats, beanies, blankets and headbands for sale in her Etsy shop, “EmCrochets”.
For more information on how to get involved in Project Tiger Cubs, visit their page on Involved@TU. Project Tiger Cubs meets every other Wednesday at 5 p.m. in room 3202 of the Liberal Arts Building.