Designers’ Dogs: Anne Hanson and Cardigan

We are so excited to be sharing our Designers’ Dogs collaboration with you today! Please check out all of the posts here: https://knittedwit.com/category/designers-dogs/.

The collaboration can be found on Ravelry: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/sources/designers-dogs. You can purchase the entire collection for $33 through 4/4/20, or you can purchase individual patterns from each designer. 

10% of each skein sold will be donated to the Oregon Humane Society, which is one of the best humane societies in the nation.

And now, without further ado, let’s meet Anne Hanson…

Knitspot owner and designer Anne Hanson, a life-long knitter with a background in the fashion and graphic design fields, teaches and writes about knitting, spinning, and designing at her blog, knitspot.com. Anne lives and works in Ohio with David, who loves wool, too; together they are the owners and creators of the renowned Knitspot yarn clubs and the Bare Naked Wools yarn label.

Anne’s design work has been featured in Interweave Knits, Brooklyn Tweed Wool People, Knitty, Sock Knitting Master Class, The Knitter’s Handy Book of Top-Down Sweaters, The Knitter, Twist Collective, Sock Club, Brave New Knits, and My Grandmother’s Knitting. She has produced popular instructional videos with both Craftsy and Interweave Knits. Anne’s complete catalog of patterns is available for purchase in the Knitspot Pattern Shop and on Ravelry.com.

CARDIGAN’S GOTCHA STORY (click here for complete blog post):

I first saw Cardigan two days after Christmas in 2016 during a snowstorm; as I was returning home, she ran out from behind our garage, where she had taken up residence atop our compost pile, probably dumped there by a previous owner or breeder. While curious to check out all activity in our busy back alley, she did NOT like to be approached, and refused all invitations to come in from the the wet and cold. Over the next three months, we befriended her from a distance; I put a blanket on the leaf pile and left food each day, luring her closer and closer to the house; she watched me carefully as well. We set up a video cam to record her frequent visits to our yard, all the while trying to entice her inside. Each day she roamed the neighborhood and each night she curled up in her compost burrow, safe with us. By spring, we were very close; she was eating food tossed from a short distance and considering the open back door.Then the dog warden got her on St Patrick’s Day and a series of unfortunate events landed her in a rural town 20 miles away, once again running scared—this time in completely unfamiliar surroundings. I volunteered to help search for her and enlisted a local rescue expert to help. It took 10 days to locate and rescue her, though a humane trap was necessary. FINALLY this dog was coming home—and the real work began. Rehabilitating a feral, completely unsocialized dog has been an incredible experience—the mutual trust and respect required is both intense and heart-swelling. It has been the honor of my life to work alongside this beautiful dog, opening our worlds one step at a time. March 27th will be the anniversary of the day she came home.