Ideas to help a person with dementia enjoy wool crafts

[HarrietD]

In our June/July magazine, we shared some ideas to help a person with dementia enjoy wool crafts - anything from knitting, and crochet to amigurumi and yarn hair braids!

Do you have any tips about enjoying wool crafts that we could share in the next issue? This could be helping someone to adapt the kinds of knitting they do as their dementia progresses, or how a person with more advanced dementia can enjoy feeling different yarns and rummaging through crochet kits.

Dementia together is our magazine for all our supporters and anyone affected by dementia.

Feel free to comment below if you have any tips. Our magazine team would need responses by 5 July if possible. Thanks everyone

 

[Bunpoots]

I devised a really simple way of making pompoms while I was working with young children. Just wind the yarn round and round your fingers (not tightly) until you have enough to make a pompom then slip the yarn off your fingers and, using a cut piece of the same yarn, tie the middle of the pompom ( first wrapping yarn round a couple of times) as tightly as you can - the youngest children always needed help with this stage. This gives you a figure of eight shape so you then cut through the loops and fluff out into a very scruffy looking pompom which then needs trimming into a round shape.

It uses more yarn than threading round a cardboard loop but is a lot quicker and easier for people who struggle to concentrate.

 

[Helly68]

I would say, whatever you are doing - knitting sewing etc, adapt the task to the level of the person, and don;t get too hung up on what they can do. As long as they are enjoying themselves, the end result may not matter as much as it once did.
Eventually Mummy enjoyed watching me sew, and seeing the results when she was no long able to sew or knit herself. Like @Bunpooots, we made PomPoms, by a variety of methods, including using a pompom maker, available at craft shops. As long as the person with dementia isn't bothered by this, simple patterns and techniques designed for beginners or children can be used, but not if this causes frustration. I also make braid using the historical version of a Dolly Bobbin, which some members may remember from their childhood. Techniques like this and darning, can be of interest to PWD as a memory of something they did, which has largely fallen out of fashion. It can spark reminiscence. Mummy also liked opening and looking in my tin of sewing bits - under supervision in the later stages because of needles and pins. Button boxes (common in the 40s and 50s) can also spark interest.

 

[jennifer1967]

untangling wool can be good if not too complicated or putting material wool and others with different textures into a box where they can fiddle with maybe good

 

[HarrietD]

Some brilliant ideas so far, thanks everyone!

 

[motherlily]

In our June/July magazine, we shared some ideas to help a person with dementia enjoy wool crafts - anything from knitting, and crochet to amigurumi and yarn hair braids!

Do you have any tips about enjoying wool crafts that we could share in the next issue? This could be helping someone to adapt the kinds of knitting they do as their dementia progresses, or how a person with more advanced dementia can enjoy feeling different yarns and rummaging through crochet kits.

Dementia together is our magazine for all our supporters and anyone affected by dementia.

Feel free to comment below if you have any tips. Our magazine team would need responses by 5 July if possible. Thanks everyone

Hi Harriet, You can buy a cone of wool and have people wind it up into balls for others to knit squares that another could sew together to make small blankets for animal shelters. Cones are cheap to buy. Many people living with dementia enjoy watching someone knitting...and not only ladies! One man who sat next to me watch attentively, said it reminded him of his wife 'clicking away' in the room where they sat before she passed away. It was lovely to see his smiles when I gave him the yellow socks (his favourite colour) especially as he spent time at the activity group 'catching' the ball as it flew around him in my haste to finish his socks! Lol! Others enjoyed sorting out my basket of colourful wool with different textures...it brought about so many memorable conversations about people in their lives who used to knit, still knit or how yarn is prepared, to make the wool we use and what we can use it for.

 

[motherlily]

W

Hi Harriet, You can buy a cone of wool and have people wind it up into balls for others to knit squares that another could sew together to make small blankets for animal shelters. Cones are cheap to buy. Many people living with dementia enjoy watching someone knitting...and not only ladies! One man who sat next to me watch attentively, said it reminded him of his wife 'clicking away' in the room where they sat before she passed away. It was lovely to see his smiles when I gave him the yellow socks (his favourite colour) especially as he spent time at the activity group 'catching' the ball as it flew around him in my haste to finish his socks! Lol! Others enjoyed sorting out my basket of colourful wool with different textures...it brought about so many memorable conversations about people in their lives who used to knit, still knit or how yarn is prepared, to make the wool we use and what we can use it for.

We also made pom poms to adorn our christmas tree at the activity centre

 

[Birdseed]

I wonder if the 'French Knitting' as we used to call it would be suitable, especially of the person remembers doing thst when younger. It involved an empty wooden cotton reel, with 4 nails banged into the top (health and safety update needed? ) and the wool was looped round and pulled over the nail. The end result is a thin tube that could be sewn together to make a spiral, coaster, snail, etc. I think I have seen children's kits for this, without nails! Or just simple knitted or crochet squares that can be sewn together to make a blanket. The gentlemen might like to give it a try, or they may have already done so.

 

[jennifer1967]

I wonder if the 'French Knitting' as we used to call it would be suitable, especially of the person remembers doing thst when younger. It involved an empty wooden cotton reel, with 4 nails banged into the top (health and safety update needed? ) and the wool was looped round and pulled over the nail. The end result is a thin tube that could be sewn together to make a spiral, coaster, snail, etc. I think I have seen children's kits for this, without nails! Or just simple knitted or crochet squares that can be sewn together to make a blanket. The gentlemen might like to give it a try, or they may have already done so.

you can get childrens kits, my grandchildren have had them in nice primary colours. and pom pom makers. what about those sewing cards of an object with holes in and you just weave through the holes of the cardboard with wool.

 

[Dee Tom]

My Mum was an experienced knitter but now only manages scarves. There are a lot of holes these days and she gets cross when she realises they are there. We have a method to ‘celebrate’ them! Either with a contrasting colour of wool or, sometimes, a piece of thin ribbon, we create a little bow which closes up the hole and adds character. We love it!

 

[HarrietD]

I'm loving all these great ideas - thanks so much everyone!

 

[Thomasina]

Any ideas on how to find things for men to do? It will be very useful as we enter the longer nights.

 

[jennifer1967]

Any ideas on how to find things for men to do? It will be very useful as we enter the longer nights.

maybe sorting nuts and bolts or screwing nuts on bolts. anything that he can fiddle with. my husband did light sanding, small piece of wood sanded while sat down. it depends what he is able to do