The Lead up to Christmas...

Readers who have been following the blog for a while would remember that each year about this time my thoughts turn to mini Christmas stockings. It would have been 2014 when I discovered that the founder of Knitting for Brisbane's Needy and her husband were spending hundreds of dollars of their own money on buying sweets to fill the mini stockings that the group members would make each year. Various community groups who work with the needy would distribute these little gifts; often to recipients who would get no other gifts except these humble offerings. What started out as a few hundred little stockings grew to a mind-blowing several thousand. Last year K4BN distributed 6500! 

So in 2014, I asked friends and relatives ( and other K4BN members) for help to provide the mountain of sweets needed to fill 3000 stockings. ( that number has certainly crept up over the ensuing years) The lovely Sunday Stitchers group continues to help each year without my even asking! 

These are some of the sweets donated by Sunday Stitchers this year...

Susan and Lynda also make stockings; the next photo shows the 50 felt stockings made by Susan this year. That is a lot of cutting out and stitching up there and it's really appreciated Susan.

As part of my plan for sourcing the best lollies' buys, I went to Costco that first year. My lovely sister and brother in law who are members, took me as their guest. 

The bucket on the left was a great buy that first year as it contained lollipops and wrapped sweets. 

The following year, that bucket of sweets was still available but these last 2 years it's not been at Costco. Each year, I check out and compare lolly prices at various 'bricks and mortar' shops, as well as online. Costco seems to be the best value for the lollipops. 

Last Tuesday, DsD2 who is a member of Costco took me and DsD3 there as her guests. I had been given money to help buy sweets for this year's stockings. In each stocking we place a lollipop and a few wrapped sweets. I planned to buy some of the packs of 100 chupa chups/lollipops...It would work out to be 19 cents per lolly. In shops the unit price of this popular brand is anything up to 50 per lollipop. 

But then I saw these! 

That's a tin of 1000 chupa chups...unit price 17 cents...but boy that tin was heavy!!!

DsD3 to the rescue!

So that was Tuesday night...next day there was a K4BN Knit and Natter...and knitting/crocheting was put aside as the ladies got to work packing stockings. 

We ran out of stockings before we ran out of lollies! We filled 267 stockings that morning. One member quipped that we just had another 6000+ ones to do by the beginning of December! 

Since last Wednesday I've been alternating between sewing stockings and knitting them. I had been working on stockings on and off for a few months but had only made a pitiful 12 which got filled at the Knit and Natter. 

Thankfully my output has increased! 

Another member dropped off 70 stockings last Friday...

Next Tuesday we have plans to fill more stockings...on a bit of a roll here! 

Lollies, lollies and more lollies!

As someone who has chosen to avoid eating foods which contain sugar, I've certainly been handling a lot of sweets/lollies/candy lately!

But it's all in the name of charity. 

For a few years now, Knitting for Brisbane's Needy members have provided mini Christmas stockings filled with sweets, to the various community groups who distribute them to the needy. This 'tradition' has grown from a few hundred to well over 2000 in 2013. Last year, the founder of the group, and her husband spent over $400 of their own money buying sweets for these stockings. After hearing how much of their own money went on buying supplies, I decided then and there that there had to be a better way. So I asked for help...from family and friends.

My wonderful friends, the Sunday Stitchers brought along a big lot of lollies at our October meet...

While doing election training a few weeks ago, a handful of sweets were placed on each work station...the others ate their pile...DH and I brought our booty home...this was one day's worth. They gave us more to bring home on the second day! Lol

Other friends and DH, cousins and in laws have also donated sweets. 

Then I tackled the issue of the packaging...the knitted stockings take a while to knit, so as I needed to increase production output, I trialled other ways of packaging these gifts. 

Simple felt ones...pinked edges...so easy and quick!

Mark 2... Felt with a ribbon decoration, and some Christmas fabric stockings...also pinked edges :-) 

Then I started thinking outside the square so to speak...I had leftover sweets cello bags from the 'making sweets for the church fete' days...and some bells left over from teaching days...

Then I wondered if we could package up the sweets in party treat boxes...Christmas stickers also left over from classroom days :-)

So last weekend, I played around with ideas and packaged up 81 gifts of sweets...

 Three friends had given me some stockings too. 

On Monday I took my filled containers of sweets to the Scarborough Knit and Natter...and you'll never guess...the ladies were filling Christmas stocking there too! 

A bag of empties waiting to be filled...

Busy busy...

We packed over 500 yesterday!

Last week at Zillmere over 200 were handed in...

Including the mini lollipops with the Santa hats!

I love the crocheted stocking in the photo above...crocheting is generally faster than knitting...mmmm...might just give that a go I think. :-)

(It looks like we need to provide 2500 of these stockings, bags, boxes judging by the requests that have come in. Including one from a former student who is a Uniting Church minister. There were huge bush fires this year in her parish in north eastern Victoria; she wanted something to bring a bit of cheer to her parishioners. Another of my students works/runs a mental health inpatient unit on the GoldCoast  with 21 beds; she has requested 21 stockings for her patients) we try to help as many as possible)