Making use of recycled wool, buttons, doilies and embellishments she has crafted 99 rugs for people all over the world needing warmth.

Betty has just 13 squares to knit to finish her 100^th rug.

“I’ll keeping knitting them until I can’t knit any more,” Betty said on Friday from her home in Laurieton.

“I don’t know what I’ll do if I can’t knit, though. It relaxes me. [Knitting rugs] it’s a duty of mine now. Where ever I go the knitting comes with me.”

Betty began knitting squares for her first Wrap with Love rug in 1992.

“I was playing bingo at North Haven and met a lady called Mary Opdam who was looking for people to knit squares to be made into rugs,” Betty said.

“She talked about Wrap with Love and how the rugs are given to people in Australia and overseas.”

Wrap with Love distributes rugs to aid agencies for donation to people suffering due to extreme cold weather. 

'Cold humanity is our concern, people caring about other people' is the group’s motto.

Since ‘casting-on’ in 1992 Wrap with Love has sent close to half a million rugs to 75 countries thanks to its dedicated volunteers like Betty and Mary – the two have remained firm friends since.

“Mary is now in her 90s and can’t see very well. She doesn’t knit anymore. I tried to help her when her sight started going and she would feel for the holes in the knitting but her hands started to go and she eventually had to give up. It’s sad because she was always into helping other people. She feels a bit lost now.”

When Betty started knitting squares, using donated wool or yarn salvaged from an op-shop jumper, Mary’s daughters would sew the squares together.

“I would tie the squares together in the pattern I thought they should be sewn in.

“Sometimes I would go to the op-shops and buy a cardigan or a jumper and undo it. I soaked the wool in water then wound it around a bottle and put it outside to dry. This would get the crinkles out of the wool so I could knit it into a square.”

Sometimes squares have patterns knitted into them, or Betty will sew on flowers, doilies, buttons and other decorations to add a special touch.

“I try to make every rug different. I can knit a square a day without any trouble.”

Betty and her husband Arthur lived on their dairy farm at Black Creek, near Kendall, for many years raising their family of five children. Family members have also received her hand-crafted rugs.

Knowing her work is bringing comfort to people – men, women and children – is satisfying. What would be the icing on the cake for Betty, she said, would be to receive a note from someone who loved receiving one of her 99 Wrap with Love rugs. 

In the meantime, with the help of Peg’s Place craft supplies in Laurieton, the Courier will deliver a few balls of wool to keep Betty’s nimble fingers flying.