Linda Colman (second from left in photo) gave her downtown neighbors a yarn lesson with a purpose Thursday: “knitting together the community.” Colman runs the store Yarn at 55 Whitney Ave. She went around the corner to the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven on Audubon Street to teach 23 staffers (including, from left, Denise Canning, Laura Colman and Amos Smith) how to knit. Each staffer made at least one scarf to donate to Life Haven, the shelter for homeless pregnant women and women with young children.