Obama Knitting and a Contest

I've been knitting as many hats for Obama as I can, but I've started to burn out a little. It seems that a few of us are experiencing burnout after making a blue million of these guys. So, I decided that I'd have a contest to help us chug through the final few states.

We still have primaries in Puerto Rico, South Dakota and Montana left to knit for. (The mailing dates have already passed for Kentucky and Oregon.) For every hat or bib that you knit for any of these three primaries, your name gets entered once in the drawing.

I realize that we don't all support the same political platforms, and I support anyone's decision to chose another candidate. However, this charity drive is to drum up positive support for Obama's campaign and to show that we've taken Obama's message to heart. Seeing hundreds of baby caps being donated to a local hospital is a change that we all can believe in!

Sign me up! How do I enter?
If you're on Ravelry, sign up for Knitters for Obama. There's a thread that discusses all the ins out outs which will help you get started. You can knit either hats or baby bibs. Just make sure you use soft fibers which are machine washable.

Just send either knittinggurl or knitnic a private ravelry message with the number of hats/bibs that you'd like to donate. When it gets closer to the mailing date, you'll get a ravelry message with the address to send your goodies. The moderators keep up with the tallies, and I'll put you in the drawing based on the number of donations that you have pledged.

Don't have ravelry? No problem! Email me at goldendomer [at] gmail [dot] com and tell me how many hats you'd like to donate. I'll make sure your name gets put in the hat!

Where do I find patterns?
There's so many free patterns out there for you! Here's just a few suggestions:

Bibs:
Simple Baby Bib

Hats:
Caps for the Capital
TLL Hat

The TLL Hat is my go-to pattern:


How soon do you need things?
The primaries are coming up quickly. We try to get the donations mailed to the contact person in each state 10 days beforehand.

Puerto Rico - Primary 6/1 **Mailing date will be very soon
Montana - Primary 6/3
South Dakota - Primary 6/3

The contest will end after the mail date for the last primaries!

Enough of this Babbling! What do I win?
I decided to go stash diving to see what I could come up with, and I remembered some Artyarn Regal Silk that I got on sale a few months ago. It's hard to part with this because I love it so much, but it's for a great cause!

The prize is for two skeins, 163 yards each. It's 100% silk and uses a recommended needle size of 7. The retail price of this yarn is $22 a skein, and you can get it for free for just donating a few hours of knitting time to a great cause.

Knit On!