How to support your LYS - without spending money

Photo by K8 on Unsplash

When we think of supporting our hard working local yarn stores it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that this must involve spending large amounts of cash on yarn. But in reality there are other, cheaper things that we can also do - especially if, as we head towards the end of January, money is a little tight.

The success of the Just A Card campaign stemmed from the comment by a closing art gallery that if everyone who had visited the shop had bought ‘just a card’ they wouldn’t have had to close the business. Businesses don’t become a thriving success because of occasional large purchases (although obviously, that doesn’t hurt) but it is the continual drip, drip of small things - regular small purchases, visits, reviews, recommendations - all count.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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With that in mind, it's worth considering all the ways you can support for LYS (or fav indie dyer) without spending any money:⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
1. Leave them a review (on FB or their website)⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
2. Mention them when talking about what you are making - tag them on social media or tell a friend about them.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
3. Offer to review a product for them, knit a shop sample or lend them something you have knit, for display⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
4. If they have a newsletter, sign up to it and share it with friends⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
5. Bear in mind that an LYS is also often able to fulfill online orders - when recommending places to buy online don't forget the small indie businesses at the expense of the 'big box stores'⠀⠀

Can you think of any more? Please do let me know in the comments, and let’s help to share a bit of LYS love this January.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

How to knit a Temperature Blanket - and why...

Far too much dithering over colour choices

January 2021 Update: You can find the update and the completed blanket at this post

And you can find my Temperature Blanket e-book here:

I swore that I would never do a Temperature Blanket and yet every January I would be smitten with gorgeous finished objects, fantastic visual representations of the past year in woolly form and be tempted. This year finally got the better of me and I decided to embark on my own.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about a Temperature Blanket is a year long project (usually) where you work a row or two every day.

You decide on a temperature scale and have a different colour to represent each category on that scale. For example I decided to work on a scale of 0-30 degrees Celcius, with the scale in 3 degree increments.

The important thing to note from the outset is that this is your project and you set the rules. There is no standard pattern, although others have published their projects for inspiration and education ultimately your choice of yarn/needles, your selection of colours and scale will make this project completely and utterly unique. That’s the beauty of it.

However, like all epic projects it does require some planning at the beginning. It won’t have escaped your notice that 365 days is 365 rows (or 730 for garter stitch). That is a lot of rows and in chunky yarn (or crochet) you could well end up with something the length of a hallway runner rather than a usable blanket if you aren’t careful.

Scale

Another consideration is the selection of your scale. This is obviously highly dependent on where you live. Based here in the UK we are blessed with a pretty moderate climate without significant extremes. My scale therefore can be in relatively small increments. Doing it in increments of 6 for example might result in too few colour changes to look visually interesting. Many days in summer here can be in the range 18-24 for example.

Colours and yarn

Pick a yarn you love, obviously and that fits your budget. It’s also worth bearing in mind that you might need to buy more if your estimates are off, so pick something that’s readily available and easy to obtain. It sounds obvious but you don’t have to go for the traditional blue = cold red = hot colour scheme. I’ve seen some brilliant ones where the colours are neutrals (greys or shades of natural yarn) for example that look absolutely stunning.

Time

How you pick and record the temperature is also entirely up to you. I decided to go for noon at our favourite place in the Lake District - I check it daily on a weather app. You could also access a historical weather record site for your area and do a retrospective blanket - based on a significant year for you, for example.

My blanket

After seeing some lovely knitted and crochet corner to corner blankets I opted for this style - mainly because the thought of a super long cast on did not fill me with enthusiasm. 

Yarn: West Yorkshire Spinners 4ply Signature Sock Yarn

Needles: 3mm

I cast on 3sts and I’m increasing 2 sts every right side row, until the midpoint when I’ll start the decreases. I’m knitting 4 rows (2 garter ridges) for every day.

If you are interested I’ve linked to my Ravelry project page and I’ll be doing updates once a month or so - as I’d hate to spam you with the thing. But I’m hoping that a monthly update will keep me accountable and stop the blanket from languishing in a corner.

Wish me luck. In the immortal words of Antarctic explorer Lawrence Oates “I may be some time”

Knit for Yourself this Christmas

In the past I've written about both a minimal knitters Christmas and also about gift knitting - and specifically about giving without constraints or expectations - “If you knit something set if free”

But it occurred to me that there's another aspect to gift knitting - primarily whether folks are worth knitting for in the first place.

I don't mean that in a negative or derogatory way at all. But rather, unless someone has at some point expressed an interest in or a desire to have a hand-knit item, they why would you assume that they want one.

If someone has expressed a desire for a warm woolly hat for example then by all means - all speed to your needles. Knit with a passion, a love and a burning desire to keep that loved one's head warm. If they haven't, why not save yourself the time, trouble and possible anguish and just buy them one? They won't know the difference and you will saved valuable time - and yarn

Let's face it, knitting takes time and effort and it's a deeply personal thing to do. It's an expression of our love and obviously as knitters we see that. But the average person with little or no appreciation of handcrafts might not, almost certainly will not.

You have to weigh up your time - after all that’s the most precious resource here. Even the simplest of knits can take a few hours to make and most items - scarves, shawls, cowls etc can take considerably longer. That’s time you can’t get back. Time you could spend knitting for someone you know will really appreciate it - YOU

Wovember...already?

A woolly pile of potential. 1000m Wendy Ramsdale wool

I had such grand plans for Wovember this year. I was going to Knit All The Things. I was going to write a series of wonderfully witty and entertaining blog posts to accompany it. Did I do any of these things - no I did not.

Never mind though, as I was consoling myself with an entertaining rummage through my stash - my favourite way to cheer myself up - I came across nearly 1000m of a long discontinued Wendy Ramsdale 100% wool.

It was clearly A Sign that a woolly cast on was needed.

I haven’t decided on a project for this yet - options range from a simple sweater to a lap blanket but I thought I’d host a very loose and informal KAL for this over in the Everyday Knitter Facebook group. No rules and no knitting police. Just pick a project (or a WIP) and join in with your 100% wool project.

See you there maybe?

A motivational pep talk

Do you ever do that thing of giving your motivation a bit of a pep talk?

Just the cuff of sleeve one to finish and then power down sleeve 2 -and then I can cast on my new autumn stripy sock project. I bought this skein of “Witchy” self-stripe sock yarn from London House Yarns a few weeks ago and I am determined to cast it on while I am still feeling all the autumnal vibes.

Do you ever find yourself lining up the next project as a sort of incentive to crack on and get something finished? As an added incentive I will even wind the yarn and install it ready in it’s project bag along with needles and other notions.

The one thing I can’t do is cast on though. I know what I’m like. One minute it will just be - “Oh, I’ll just start the toe”. The next thing I’ll have a sock and a half knitted - and the sweater will still be sleeveless.

Sweater knitting at speed

I know that it's Socktober and I should be cranking out the socks with the best of them but I've been struck by the urgent need for a new slouchy sweater in my wardrobe. Whilst shopping recently I saw a few comfy, oversized sweaters for sale and in the time honoured traditions of knitters everywhere thought “I could make that”

So I dug around in my stash and found a few skeins of The Fibre Co. Cumbria yarn, a lovely plump worsted. I had a single skein of a few different colours and had struggled to work out what to do with them.

Using the numbers from the Flax sweater I decided to split each skein into a 50g ball and 2x25g balls - one for each sleeve.

I had a colourblock sweater in mind rather than stripes and am just knitting with each colour until it runs out - so far I'm really liking the effect.

And yes, the use of the 12” needle for the sleeve is a cunning plan to avoid sleeve boredom. When I sit down to knit I have to do at least a few sleeve rounds first before cracking on with the body.

As cunning plans go, so far it's going well and I have the bit firmly between my teeth