MANY a keen knitter or crocheter will tell you that they cut their craft teeth by producing squares out of spare balls of wool.
It taught a lot about tension, stitches and patterns, with many a resultant, cosy rug or blanket for the bed.
When Sandy McDonald saw a new use for this age-old idea, little could she imagine that it would become a major philanthropic movement involving 55 countries. A global craft army swung into action immediately.
Ms McDonald's aunt had come to visit her in Melbourne from South Africa in 2008. She'd been buying cheap blankets to hand out to abandoned, orphaned and abused children who were living on the side of roads.
"I was shocked. But, when I did the research, the scale of it was beyond comprehension," Ms McDonald said. "There were an awful lot of cold kids."
A marketer herself, Ms McDonald had just attended a seminar and put out the feelers for who might be willing to knit pure wool squares that could be sent to her aunt and sewn into life-saving blankets.
Many of the children were not only cold, but battling illnesses, including AIDS.
She did a lot of networking to find knitters. But, the connectedness of the international craft community went into action. An American yarn company put the request out to a million people on its data base and Ms McDonald had a juggernaut to manage.
The willing hands just kept coming on board – groups, individuals, schools, aged care facilities – ranging from a 99 year-old determined to produce something each day so deprived children can have something pretty and useful at least once in their lives, to clever inclusions by some of letters and numbers in the squares.
The project has also linked rural, regional and city crafters across the globe.
Knit A Square (KAS) has taken on a life of its own. Ms McDonald said the World Health Organisation estimates that by 2020 there will be 40 million children worldwide living in poverty, with the majority in sub-Saharan Africa. The need will only grow.
KAS also started to think outside the square and now, each child receives a wool hat or scarf and a toy to go with their blanket.
While that is heartwarming, the production of over a million knitted goods has to reach its destination and be distributed. Production isn't a problem, but the logistics are.
Ms McDonald had to involve wider community efforts to raise the funds for such a large logistical exercise and after years of running KAS solo, she has now appointed a board in Australia to look at the growing needs and to expand into other parts of the world.
They are also seeking to get freight companies and airlines on board.
"The resurgence in craft is huge worldwide. In the 1000 schools that have adopted the programme, they are seeing not only the benefits of teaching craft, but also philanthropy and geography via the story of where their efforts go," she said.
Aged care facilities worldwide have also embraced the project as it provides valuable therapy for residents and an enormous sense of achievement that they are making such a difference to young lives.
Craft groups have also sought to expand into other areas, such as some remote Aboriginal communities and a group of Turkish knitters are keen to supply Syrian refugee children with the warmth of wool.
"We've come to call our squares a currency of hope.
Many of them are their own little works of art with letters, numbers, flags of the world and pictures in them. Where the children have carers available, they can start to learn," Ms McDonald said.
Many of the groups involved are running their own projects within KAS in what Ms McDonald calls a 'self-empowered creative endeavour'. There is also a worldwide quest to knit enough squares to reach from the bottom to the top of Cape Town's Table Mountain.
The quest starts at the Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen, Denmark, and will work its way to Cape Town.
