Some weeks can be rather frustrating. I have a drawer full of half written blog posts (that'll be a mental drawer) but no time to write. And if I say frustrating, it's relative. The week has been good, time for blogging has been short. I'm not moaning, just saying hello I'm still here but there may not be any sign of my mental posts becoming real ones because sometimes we juggle with too many balls.

At work, I've been to a few really exciting events which I'd like to blog about, but preparations for our big weekend trip down south plus lovely visitors in the evening who keep me company while hubby is away in Wales mean a certain postponement.

I've also been very busy putting together a photobook of Cubling's first year with Blurb, who kindly agreed to give me a voucher and another one to run as a competition on this blog. So watch this space for the competition and the review of Blurb - hopefully the book will arrive soon and I'll tell you all about the booksmart software Blurb uses and the results of the print. For now suffice to say that I spent much more time on it than I had intended, trying to make it a perfect book. I also spent more money on it than intended, simply because the first year book has to be the best it can be.

As to my charity book project, I've had a useful critical comment from a fellow knitter on ravelry, pointing out that people who would download an ebook on knitting are likely to be internet savvy and on ravelry, where you can get lots of free patterns. Also charity knitters usually are long standing knitters who use the same (simple) patterns again and again and are unlikely to buy such a book. Of course there may still be people who would buy such a book, still, time for a bit more thinking and market research. It's a lot of work, and I don't want it to be a failure.

Tomorrow we'll make our way to a wedding in the Cotswolds. That's a 350 mile car trip methinks, and the first time we'll do such a journey with Cubling. I'm rather apprehensive, especially as advice goes to try and get past Birmingham before lunch. How on earth we can make that I don't know. It's a long way to Birmingham and somehow I don't see Cubling sitting happily in her car seet for 4 hours non stop.

Not that I feel like weddings. Or like birthday celebrations. It's a strange tension of feelings which all boil down to the wrongness of things. We should be happy to celebrate Cubling's birthday or her grampa's special birthday or even mother's day. Yet all that I can see is the empty chair that isn't even there. The huge and impossible loss that feels so much more real on days of family celebrations. It also brings back how my mother is missing out by having left us too early, how much she had longed for a grandchild. When Cubling was finally there, she no longer was, and she would have loved her so much. This grief for her is no longer very present for me, the grief for what was withheld from her still lingers after all these years. Of course the kids are oblivious to all of this and enjoying themselves. This is good. It feels right among all the wrongness.

Still, I don't want to let the clouds take over. This week, I've been very happy for my friend J and her now officially healthy bump, and I'm counting the weeks until I'll be an auntie again (that'll be 20).

Here's a brief update on my Big Idea. Maybe not brief because a lot has happened. It will be the short version of events, even if that's not going to be short in the strictest sense.

To recap, Save the Children's Knit One Save One campaign was a shocking success. It involved knitting a baby hat and sending it with a message to Gordon Brown about our responsibility to do something about so many million children not reaching their 5th birthday due to entirely preventable conditions that cause their untimely death. The target of the campaign (in the UK) was 50,000 baby hats. We've now received over 650,000 and they keep coming. There is no money left to send them abroad, to be honest, we don't know what to do with them. Well, we do, they will go to other charities so the knitting wasn't wasted!

What the campaign illustrates is that a) you can sometimes capture people's imagination b) unexpectedly and in much bigger ways than anticipated c) knitters love knitting for charity d) there are many more knitters than anyone would expect.

I've been going about pondering how this creative potential could be engaged further. I found the website www.craftivism.com, joined charity knitting groups on www.ravelry.com. I talked to people. Save the Children will be 90 this year and during a brainstorm on how to use this anniversary to raise awareness of Save the Children's work and maybe even fundraise for the organisation, I came up with the idea of a book. The 90 recipies from 90 countries Save the Children works in was well received, the alternative of 90 knitting patterns less so, but I'm just too curious to find out if the knitting theme can pull off another surprise.

So I'm going to publish a book for the 90th anniversary of Save the Children with a knitting theme.

Now to the technicalities. I investigated www.createspace.com where you can self publish. They print on demand, they have a transparent pricing overview. The drawback is the actual production cost - a knitting book really needs colour, and colour books are expensive. The actual profit for Save the Children wouldn't be great. More complex is the issue that they pay by bank transfer into a US bank or by cheque only - no paypal option. So either I need to find a way to open a US bank account, or link up with my US colleagues, or bite even more into the profits by cashing foreign currency cheques (they carry a significant commission). I also learned that there's tax to be considered - any product sold is taxable income, createspace being a US company, this would be taxable in the US. There are ways to offset and reclaim, but it all means hassle and declaring it as personal income when really the profit goes to Save the Children.

So I returned to Lulu. Lulu offer payment by paypal. The also offer e-book publishing - this means that I can publish the book as a download and avoid all book production cost. The only cost to the downloader is that which I set as a "royalty" (read donation), minus 20% commission which Lulu takes. The drawback is that there's no real book, the plus is that this is the best way to create an affordable book without any initial outlay of costs. Of course, Lulu also offers real books by on demand publishing. The price is comparable to createspace, with the only difference that I personally can buy a bulk order at a cheaper unit price and sell on locally in shops / amongst friends. I can do both the downloadable version and the real book version. Tax implications remain but as Lulu's services have always been international, there is lots of information and it doesn't look quite as daunting.

So for the moment I'm inclined towards Lulu. I haven't found any other online on demand book publisher that doesn't require an initial outlay of a significant sum before a book is published, although I'm still open to look at other providers if they do exist.

Encouraged by the cheap option of a downloadable book on Lulu, I sent out my first request on the Ravelry charity knitting group, asking people for patterns they would be prepared to share for this project. So far, it seems that I'm asking the wrong people. While supportive, charity knitters seem to use free and simple patterns, they don't tend to design their own that they can give away. So I may have to go the route of asking pattern designers if they want to get involved, or going around charity knitting websites that offer free patterns. While this is more work, it's also exciting and gives me new ideas. I'm even thinking that the book could be on charity crafting and portray initiatives, what they do, and become a resource of charity crafting.

This was only the first approach to charity knitters, there are many doors that I plan to knock on. However if anyone who reads this has ideas, knows an interesting website on this subject or even has a knitting / crochet / sewing pattern they would like to contribute to this book, please do get in touch! Comment box is below, alternatively send me an email: knit @ cartside dot co dot uk (as ever, remove the spaces, and replace dot with and actual dot).

Did I say it was a brief update?

The week before last I got enthused by an idea that I had and an email reminded me that this idea was noted and Cartside had been signed up to actually make it a reality.

The international children's rights charity Save the Children will be 90 this year. Throughout the year, there will be celebrations and activities to mark this special year, all with a view to raising the charity's profile (which is particularly needed for their UK work which is little known) and raising funds.

I'll be contributing to this by publishing an online book and looking into a 90 second video competition. The book idea will take priority because it seems easier to implement. The original idea was to collect 90 recipies (maybe from countries Save the Children works in and with a bit of information on what the charity does in that country), although I'm also considering the idea of collecting 90 knitting patterns with ideas of knitting for charity, maybe with pictures of 90 of the 550 000 baby hats that UK supporters of Save the Children knitted for the "knit one, save one" campaign. Considering the generosity of knitters and the international knitting communities that could be linked into, it would be interesting to see if this idea would sell well. Above all, I'd like explore avenues of charitable giving connected with knitting. Recipies are a safe bet, I don't like the idea as such so much because it's been done a lot of times before, although I like the thought of linking country of origin with information on Save the Children's work. Above all, I want this book to make lots of money, so whichever of the two ideas is making that happen will be made into reality.

As to the technical side of things, so far I've looked into online book publishing sites. Lulu is the one I knew of anyway and my own book is published there. However, it's not clear if Lulu is the best choice - with the pound losing in value, and Lulu being US based, it may mean that UK customers have to dish out more money for a book and wait longer for delivery. I assume that most buyers would be from the UK. A quick internet search came up with two other sites, createspace and booksurge, both subsidiaries of Amazon. They seem to be roughly one company, and offer the option of marketing the book through Amazon (with a higher percentage of the sale going to Amazon of course) so that may be useful. I like the forum of createspace, and the name of the service, so for the moment I'm leaning towards them.

I take the process of publishing a book for charity as a learning opportunity which I'd like to share on this blog. Have you ever published a book online, and if so, which platform did you use and what did you think of it?

What are your thoughts, should I go for a 90 recipies book or a 90 knitting patterns book?

I've blogged many a time about how refugee children in Glasgow really don't get the best start in life. For all their parents try, money is more than short, housing is anything but encouraging safe outdoor play, and access to eductional nusery provision (which is a statutory right for 3 and 4 year olds) is often not available to asylum seeking children in Glasgow. One thing is for sure, toys are in very short supply.

As every year, the Glasgow Campaign to Welcome Refugees launches a toy appeal for the festive season. So if you have toys that are in very good condition or new (the campaign prefers new toys because refugee kids deserve new toys like all of us and shouldn't only be given the throw away things from our kids. However, as someone who believes that there are enough plastic toys making the rounds already and we can do with a bit more reusing instead of endless consuming, I'm very happy to call for slightly used toys as well, if they are in nearly new condition), or a donation to the toy fund, please do get in touch. It will be so much appreciated in a family who lives nearer to you than you may think.

What kind of toys? 
Well, it's simple really: educational and fun toys for babies and toddlers, baby essential packs (wipes, nappies, cream, bath toys ...), items for older children, like trendy clothes, games, toys, sports stuff, gift tokens for books/music shops. Last year there was a shortage of gifts for teenagers. Basically, the kind of stuff you would give your own kids.

How and when?
Last gifts to be received by 11th December. I'm happy to pass on toys so just contact me and I'll arrange pick up / drop off. Just email me on toyappeal at cartside dot co dot uk (substituting "at" with @ and "dot" with .). If you can't figure out the email address, leave a comment with your contact details.
If you prefer to contact the campaign directly, you can do so on glascamref at hotmail.com.

Why not tell your neighbours, friends, family and colleagues and collect toys and goodies from them to pass on, to make this December really special for refugee kids in Glasgow.

While I'm still pondering how those with charitable intentions can use their knitting or other creative skills to help others, today I'd like to tell a wee story of a group of knitting mums.

Part of my work involves organising parental support groups (we call them mums and toddlers groups), aimed at asylum seeking and refugee mums of children under five, but open to anyone interested who has preschoolers. The reason for setting up these groups is that asylum seeking parents face very specific challenges. They are often isolated and take care of the children, nevermind the impact on their physical and mental health that the circumstances that led to them fleeing their countries has. In Glasgow, they are housed in high rise flats in areas which are not safe. The children hardly leave the flat, neither does their mum. Dad (if around) may attend college. Asylum seekers are not allowed to work and get only 70% of income support, so money is short. Children lack outdoor play, social play with peers, activities which may cost money. They are also often unable to attend nursery education (which is a statutory provision for 3 and 4 year olds but due to different access procedures for asylum seeking children and other barriers, there are children who never attend nursery education before they start school - this of course disadvantages them especially because they start school with very little English skills). The parental support groups are there to get mums together, out of their flats, children together, give both some space to play and do something positive that recharges batteries, gives ideas, helps make contacts with other mums, helps with everyday problems and generally makes everyone a bit happier.

These groups are extremely enjoyable. There is a creche, a weekly activity for parents, a drop in baby clinic where health visitors answer questions and weigh babies. We organise, encourage those who are reluctant at first to come along. We signpost if parents come to us with problems that cause them headaches - in almost all cases, these problems can be solved easily but for someone who doesn't speak much English and doesn't know their way around, they can be very daunting indeed. Of course there's great satisfaction in being able to help with practical issues. Over time, the group also helps themselves. New friendships have been formed, parents helping each other out when they struggle, informal babysitting, welcoming newcomers by those who've been there a while. Mums who were shadows of themselves, crippled by fear and depression, have laughed and are reconnected with who they really are.

The activities we organise (in consultation with the mums who attend) range from crafts to stress relieving massage, beauty treatments, exercise, tips on parenting and ideas on how to play with children to cooking and having parties. I've learned as much as anyone else, there's a true spirit of sharing.

Most recently, we started knitting "classes". Well, it's not really a class. We do have a tutor, a volunteer even, who is a passionate knitter, retired, formerly community educator and local resident. I'm there to demonstrate a few stitches too, as is my colleague. When we started, about half of the group had no idea of knitting. After 90 minutes, everyone had knitted a square. Those who already knew how to knit, had become what is fancily termed "peer educators": out went the supportive: you're doing great, keep it going, doesn't matter if you lose every 3rd stitch, in came the: gimme that, lets unravel it and start again. Mind you, not in English, but in Somali, but the nonverbal communication was pretty international. And sure enough, one mum taught the two sitting next to them, and me a few things about knitting. We had fun, real fun. The joy of making something with your two hands and a couple of simple needles and simple yarn, something that may become a scarf or a baby hat or a cardigan. Something to be pround of. Something to show around. Something to sparkle in a very grey flat on the 16th floor. We'll be knitting for a few weeks to come because everyone, whether a longstanding knitter or a first timer, got into the spirit of it.

One week, I visited one of the mums. In her bare livingroom, on the shelf above her simple gas heater which served as the mantlepiece, in the centre of  this little shelf beside her family photos, was a decopatched vase which she had made in one of our meetings.

There are boxes filled with handknitted baby hats piling up in our meeting room, awaiting to be sent to London and from there, on to international programmes across the world. In total, 600,000 handknitted baby hat have been received so far, 100,000 of these are filling a London basement because, frankly, there are more hats than can be reasonably distributed at this moment in time. I would estimate that there are at least 1000 hats in our meeting room, with more coming in each day.

The response to the "knit one save one" initiative, part of the child survival campaign of Save the Children, has been overwhelming. There are uncountable people out there who put their two needles and yarn together and started knitting. One small parish alone, in a small town northeast of Glasgow, collected 1,100 baby hats. The aim was for 50,000 hats, just to put things into perspective. There was no sense at the scale of support that this campaign would get, and yes, we were all more than a little bit awestruck by baby hats everywhere. The idea was: one person one hat one message to Gordon Brown. The reality is more like: one person twenty hats no message to Gordon Brown. People don't feel comfortable lobbying and writing to politicians, even if all it takes is one short message on a postcard. They do like to make things for the less fortunate ones in our world.

The problem with the quantity of hats is that it actually costs money to send them to the countries where they are needed. To reduce these costs there is a policy that they are to be taken in the luggage of workers posted out to international locations where they are needed. There are many more hats than luggage space at the moment, so I'm sure lots of hats will have been sent by post, and those that are surplus to requirements will continue to accumulate in offices for the moment. In panic we are shouting out - please no more hats! In delight the knitters ask, what can we do next?

Even if we currently have more hats than needed, are drowning in them and cracking jokes about the hats invasion, and the hidden costs that are ignored (like me picking up hats 20 miles away, a 90 mins return trip by car, our postage costs, the staff costs of sorting the hats and distributing them), the campaign more than anything achieved to engage people who may not have the means to donate money or the inclination to write letters to men in suits - which is of course what Save the Children really needs and asks for to make a lasting difference. Of course, baby hats alone don't save a child's life. Of course what we really need is free health care, free education, stable and uncorrupt governments, working democracy and fair trade so that child mortality can be tackled in serious. Yet my heart is touched at the enthusiasm of the knitters; the sheer number of people who are jumping at the opportunity to do make something that will physically connect with a child born in some other and less fortunate place. I know all too well how special it is to knit something with the person in mind it is for. It is a beautiful thing, a special connection, and not one to be taken lightly.

So the question of the knitters remains, what can we do next? I'm not sure but maybe Soulemama may come up with a few answers in the next few months. She's just started a project called Mama To Mama. For the moment, it's about mums sewing baby hats for mums in Haiti. I'm watching the Mama to Mama space with a sense of anticipation. I've experienced how much creative fervour there is and it would be great to create more opportunities, creative outlets, real connections.

Last week was one of those not to be repeated experiences. Thanks to my impending redundancy, I had applied for a few jobs over two months and luck had it that I got two interviews in the space of two days, followed by a trip to Pitlochry to run a training workshop for two local Amnesty groups, and followed by organising, presenting and facilitating a seminar. It's all done to use Cubling's favourite phrase and I'm shattered. The interviews also required a presentation each and submission of a written document and I don't think I've ever spent that much time preparing any previous job interview.

Cubling was rather bewildered at the unusual mummy movements and has taken to protest. I don't blame her, I didn't particularly enjoy being sat in the car for the 4.5 hour return drive to Pitlochry myself. For interview number 2 I had to leave her with J, K & A, and boy did she pull off a scene. I almost cancelled the interview. Clearly, she won't be left without mummy with someone she doesn't see on a weekly basis. The funny part was that A's 3rd birthday party happened the following day. She went there with daddy (to be joined by me after return from Pitlochry) and must have had a deja vu when he left her upstairs to go back down the stairs for buggy/bags. What a party crasher. Well, eventually she did enjoy the party and lasted longer than I did, the idea of putting her to sleep there to allow us to party on, which had sounded like a reasonable plan, was ludicrous on the night. Cubling is not one to sleep when there's a party going on. Some babies/toddlers may play along, but not her. I remember a certain wedding in France when she was 4 months and managed to stay awake for a full and straight 12 hours to finally conk out at 11pm.

Anyway, back to the interviews. They went reasonably well, second better than first, and I didn't dissolve in the rush of adrenalin and my nervous alter ego. It's good to know that I'm pretty good at predicting interview questions, now I only need to improve how I answer them rather than going blank or giving a second class answer. I don't have a job out of them yet but still in the run for one, so we shall see. I'm happy about the delay as there's no rush for the moment. I would still really do a job that deals with refugee/asylum issues because that's what I'm passionate about, but it's not looking good. The irony of it all is that the redundancy occurs in the only permanent job I've ever held. All those years of fixed term flipping contracts and they were more secure than this one.
Oh dear, what a boring post. Sorry. Must catch up on sleep. Good night then.

I once was an advocate for free university education. Took part in demonstrations when student fees loomed and all that. Why? Because I was at uni, and it suited me. And I thought great education is the be all and end all for everyone.

Well, I'm able to learn and fortunately university hasn't messed me up fully. The problem with higher education is that it benefits few, is expensive and doesn't do much to tackle the real problems society faces. What are those? Disadvantage, inequality, violent crime, substance abuse, poverty. Unhappy people to put it simply.

The thing is, there may be a magic formula tackle all of these problems. It goes under the name of early years, that is the time from conception to 5. Why?

 

The key to breaking the cycle of violence and antisocial behaviour as well as poverty and inequality lies in the first years of a child's life, even the very first years. Violence develops by a combination of an external trigger and personal propensity to violence, the latter develops primarily from wrong treatment before age 3. Wrong treatment means neglect, abuse, or severe discipline combined with a primary carer who doesn't listen to the child. The ability to empathise prevents violent crime, but empathy can only develop when the primary carer attaches and attunes to the infant. I.e.: we need good parents/carers. 

 

The UK severely underperforms in ensuring child well-being in a European comparison. There is a clear link between child well-being and availability of affordable childcare and a more flexible approach to maternity/paternity leave for new parents. Give at least a year of maternity/paternity leave and subsidise good child care for children from one to school age. So invest in early years and you have happy children. Have happy children and you get economically productive and socially responsible citizens.

 

Early years work is crucial in tackling poverty. Research has shown that for every pound spend in early years, the return for the individual and society is £17 (made up of crime reduction, improved health, improved economic activity and earnings).

 

The gap in attainment between children from different backgrounds widens with formal education during the school years. Education, free schooling, thus fail to bridge the gap. However intervention in the form of support for parents and enriching child-care provision which reaches children before they start school does bridge the gap of attainment between rich and poor, disadvantaged and advantaged. If society focuses on free education only, this inadvertently contributes to increasing social inequalities.

 

“Disadvantaged children particularly benefit from pre-school provision.” “For provision for over threes, the evidence is consistent that pre-school provision for this age range is beneficial to educational and social development of the whole population.” Quality provision increases this benefit for children. So investing in the early years benefits all of us.

 

The problem is that in spite the recognition of the importance of early years work, it is undervalued, underpaid and severely underfunded. If we are serious about wanting to tackle poverty, crime, health, substance abuse, inequalities and worklessness, we need to redress this imbalance.

 

What we need is this:

• nurturing and stimulating home environments available to every child
• development of parental capacity pre and post birth
  
• availability of affordable high quality child care for all children and
• communities which provide a supportive environment for children and families.

Germany is drowning in rain, Cubling is ill, Cartside is very tired (as is the whole house or at least our immediate neighbours left, up and down if I'm allowed to guess) so the time is right for some recommendations for rainy day internet browsing.
I've added a few new links to my blogroll, and to be honest, there are too many by now. So I thought I'd introduce some of them.

www.bookmooch.com is a great site for bookworms like myself. A bit like www.readitswapit.co.uk in that you can give and receive books. While readitswapit facilitates book exchanges person to person (and in the UK only), bookmooch has a different system: for listing books you are happy to give away and for actually giving away books you get points. With these points you can get any book in the inventory, so you don't have to find a suitable book from the inventory of the person who wants to swap, but you can wait until a book you really want becomes available. It's also great because it works internationally - to make up for higher postage costs, you get more points for international swaps and there's an option of setting some conditions, e.g. for international requests, two books have to be requested before you agree to give anything away. I love it because I can get rid of books I no longer need and someone will get them who actually values them. Better than www.bookcrossing.com (where you don't know if the book will land in the bin). The listing system is hassle free (much easier than ebay) and the guy behind it also facilitates support for charities. The only quibble I would have is that the database could do with some tidying up, as the same book may come up as 10 ever so slightly different listings and it can be a bit tricky to find out which is the correct one. Of course, if like me, you're looking for books that are popular and rarely given away, you may end up accummulating points and not getting any books. Still, I love giving my books to people who actually want them.

www.etsy.com is like a niche-ebay. They host online shops of stuff that people have made themselves. And everyone can set up their own shop. Which I did. Now I only need to make things myself that I could sell. The fee structure is nicer than ebay, as it gives you a few months for each item, more suitable to crafty stuff than the 10 day on ebay. They use paypal, so it's pretty international, although of course there is the issue of postage fees which will be added (and most shops are located in the US from where this site hails). Still, a great idea and resource for special presents.

If you're interested in a green blog, this is for you: Not new year, from a family trying to survive without buying anything for a full year. A fabulous challenge, which I know I couldn't do, as much as I wish I could. It'll make you think but also gives you lots of ideas. As a long standing freecycler, I'm intrigued by the idea of Wyecycle - the town (village/hamlet/city, delete as appropriate, I'm a bit ignorant when it comes to the south of England, really sorry...) of Wye has a sort of fleemarket where everyone brings the stuff they no longer need, and it's all free, so you drop your stuff, and pick up other people's things. I quite fancy something like this in Glasgow.

Finally, Save Pollok Park is an initiative by Weegies (Glaswegians) to stop our big and lovely Pollok Country Park being turned into an ape amusement arcade. The park was donated by the Maxwell Stirling family for the people of Glasgow, not for profit making companies who let people play at monkey for a couple of hours. The family themselves have objected to the park and I applaud the Glasgow aristocracy for that. Incidentally, that's the park that would be just so perfect for a forest/nature kindergarden.

I spent some of my time in May and June working on this with the P7 pupils at Carnwadric Primary School.
It's a short clip about the 8 week activity we ran with puppeteer Shane Connolly of the Scottish Mask and Puppet Centre. This is the second time we used the medium of puppets and a puppet show, and I'm an utter convert. It's fun and gets amazing stuff out of kids, they never cease to impress me. You can also view the actual puppet show.