The first batch of skint skeins that were part of #operationsjw were posted at the start of the week, and I know that three of them have arrived. Life feels like it’s got more challenging for everyone, so it’s great to know that there will be some happy cast ons.

We’re delighted to be able to confirm that that lovely folk at Laxtons have kindly offered us some extra yarn to give away. These skeins might have come back from a show without a bag, or there’s been an extra skein at the end of a run. They might be something that’s been discontinued. So it’s gorgeous yarn. Andrea from Laxtons has kindly labelled every skein she’s sent so we know exactly what what everything is.

For those that don’t know Laxtons they’re a Yorkshire company who specialise in spinning beautiful yarns. Many of our yarn bases come from them including our much loved BFL Masham. They’re great folk to deal with, and for any dyers who are looking for bases I can really recommend them. For transparency we should say that Laxtons were happy to give us yarn without their name being mentioned, but we wanted to let folk know they were offering this help and where the yarn was produced.


As we’ve ended up with more yarn than I was expecting (thanks Laxtons!)
we’re going to reopen applications for a skint skein.


If there’s anyone you know who would love a skein of hand dyed yarn but can’t afford them please let them know that we’ll be opening the list up tomorrow. We’re not taking applications from people who want a skein for a friend – if someone chooses not to apply we’d sooner accept that choice.

As before these skeins will be available for anyone who would like a skein of hand dyed yarn but can’t afford one. We don’t need or want an explanation. If you tell us that’s your situation we believe you. Simple as that.

When you apply we need you to tell us 3 things

  1. which yarn base you would like
  2. if you’d like the rainbows and dark days colour or if you’d prefer a silver
  3. where in the world you live.

We need to know which base you want to make organising the draw easier.

We need to know which colourway you want so I can write a dye schedule on Sunday evening and get dyeing on Monday.

We need to know where you live because we’ll prioritise getting overseas yarns posted as fast as possible. Delays because of COVID-19 seem inevitable, and getting things posted fast is the best way to beat this. We expect to dye everything on Monday and be ready to post on Tuesday – but we want the option to get overseas skeins out first if we’re going to struggle to get it all done.

It will make our lives so much easier if we can have all of this information in one place. We’ll try to come back to you and ask for missing information, but if the numbers get too high it may mean we don’t enter you into the draw for a skein.

You can enter via Instagram (send me a message – I’m @theknittinggoddess) or by using the Contact Us form . Duplicate entries will be disqualified.

Good luck. We’ll close entry on Sunday 22nd March at 1800 UK time. Names will be drawn at random and we’ll notify winners later on Sunday evening.