A plug for Help_Pakistan

So, I know a lot of people are cash poor, I certainly am. I also know that there are a lot of people who want to help when simply awful things happen, like the flooding in Pakistan.

Sometimes people come together and make a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Help Haiti did that. It raised over $115,000 in just a few weeks. All by matching up people with goods or services they could donate and people who wanted to buy them.

Help Pakistan is trying to do this. It's a new LiveJournal community hosting an auction for flood relief efforts. No money ever changes hands between offerer and winning bidder. Everything goes directly to the aid organizations which can be selected off a master list.

I'm offering up two "swap" boxes of fibery goodness. I did one for Help Haiti and it went over well so I decided to offer them again, this time with the option of spinning fiber. It's all the fun of getting a swap with no risk. My listing can be seen here: Yarny Fibery Swap/Mystery Boxes

This was my Help Haiti swap box (less a knitted tea cozy that was still drying when I took the picture).

The recipient and I overlapped in Harry Potter interest, so I was able to add lots of little doodads to the box to give it character.

Help Pakistan is taking listings starting today, and on Monday the 23rd it opens up for bidding. People can still list new offerings once the bidding has started, the few days lead time is just so the offerings can build up a bit. ETA: They've opened bidding early. Listing new things will be open through the 27th, and bidding ends the 28th. Delivery of offerings is expected by Oct. 1. end ETA

I hope you'll take a look. These auctions are usually lots of fun to browse; the scope of the offerings can be astounding. And please do spread the word if you can. It takes a critical mass of interest both in offering and in bidding to get these things really rolling.

There are a lot of disasters right now. The flooding and landslides in China come to mind, too. It's not on the same scale as Pakistan, but it's still horrible. It's hard to say "I can't help." I have a roof over my head and all the comforts of home, but my reality is that I can't spare the cash. But I can spare the stash, and the effort, and some base yarn or fiber to dye up something custom. So, this is what I'm doing.

Thank you!

Boxen!

A tale of two boxes!

After waiting in much anticipation, I received my Phatfiber Unbirthday Swap package today, and it was well worth the wait!  It's a fantastic selection of delightful things and I cracked up repeatedly when I opened it. It's not just what I wanted, it's also charming and full of character. Oh, what am I saying, I should just show off the haul:

click for even bigger

The first thing that met my eyes was the little trash can, and I had to laugh. It's got a little black "trash" bag in it that's filled to the brim with all sorts of crispy crunchy snack foods liberally covered in chocolate. It's brilliant and I love the tin. I can just imagine using it to store things, perhaps yarn scraps, once I'm done with the candy.  I've been on a chocolate kick lately, so I imagine it will be emptied faster than usual for me.

Oy vey is mir, my samples they are sent

I really have to get better at working on my Phatfiber samples in a timely fashion. It always becomes one of those races to the finish where I have not enough sleep and too much caffeine. This is even with my mother's considerable help in assembling the things.

One would think that having them done a week in advance is more than early enough, but I know to my sorrow that the USPS's "2-3 days" is just a best case scenario. So, today was the absolute latest to get April's samples into the mail so they have a reasonable certainty of arriving in time for the video.

This is perhaps why it's laughable that I hope to get two months done next time. I'm really hoping to switch over to sending two sets of samples every other month. It saves on shipping and the craziness is half as often. ... Well, we'll see.

The theme for April is All Creatures Great and Small, so I sent 12 Widget stitch markers with my yarn samples. The yarn sample colorway is Tigers, which I have dyed up in the 6oz and the 4oz sizes. I sent some samples in each and labeled as such because the dye interval is different between the two due to the skein size.

A 5g sample of Jackrabbit in the Tigers colorway, from a 4oz skein.

Then, because I had time, I pulled together my Phatfiber Unbirthday Swap package. To anyone who might be following along from the PF Rav group, this post will totally give away who isn't getting my box, but since not that many people read this blog, I figure it's safe enough.

Now that it's safely on its way, I do have some thoughts about this swap as a swap. For anyone not interested, there's a picture further down of the actual contents.