• Creative reuse - Crochet - Hats and scarves - leftover yarn

    Bespoke winter gear

    July 30, 2026 - By 

    Too often, I have leftover small balls of yarn that I want to use without buying more of the same yarn if it doesn’t have a dye lot. Instead, I have been making an effort to create unique looks with stripes or gradient colors that coordinate and aren’t too garish. Taking marled or color striping yarn and combining it with a solid – oatmeal/aran, gray, or other neutral is one way of doing things, but taking similar yarns with subtle shade variations can create an appealing set and also use up yarn.

    The lack of stores that carry washable, budget-friendly yarns you can try in person has made me more creative about trying new ones. Several months ago, I got a few different yarns at a yarn swap during World Wide Knit in Public Day. I was happy to score a ball of yarn that I wanted to try, but didn’t want to pay $10 shipping for yarn that I might or might not like. Now that I’ve tried it, I found that an online shop that I purchase from frequently, which has free shipping with a threshold that I would meet from other purchases carries the yarn.

    There are still containers of larger remainders – half skeins and balls as well as a basket with assorted colors of tiny balls – in my stash that I can’t bring myself to toss. Though I haven’t been on a yarn buying hiatus, I have become more intentional about what I want to buy, try and give away. There is a lot of yarn that I don’t want to go to waste which I am making into eye-catching one of a kind sets!

    Drumroll, please… I have completed 72 sets this year. That’s right six dozen and my goal is 85 for 2026! I might need to change the goal or start on some other projects. Stay tuned…

    Happy crocheting!

  • Creative reuse - Hats and scarves - Mystery balls

    Revisiting the past

    March 7, 2025 - By 

    A few years ago I made some mystery balls and had a plan to create an afghan. One, twice, three times I started an afghan and one is currently in progress. The project is in time out. While I was working with yarn that a friend gave me I thought I could use a mystery ball that I made to create a set. While the colors wouldn’t carry over in both pieces, having similar stitches would make it more artistic. A design house that is affiliated with Prada, Miu Miu, sells high end items with unmatched colors for thousands, so why not? People try to replicate the designer look. I chose to design my own with a twist.

    Here’s what I started with…

     

     

     

     

     

     

    First I started with the hat…

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Then I created and finished the set…

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    There was a large section of color that would have made the scarf too wide, so I cheated and then finished the scarf with a chain of black. I’m ready to start the next one.

     

    Happy crocheting!

     

  • Creative reuse - Crochet

    Back to Basics

    February 8, 2023 - By 

    I like using openwork stitches that work up fast. My favorite is the Granny Stitch. The term loosely lumps many fan or shell stitches together when they are worked in a square or other multi-sided work. The Granny Stitch isn’t the warmest to use for hats or scarves, because of the spaces but is wonderful for blankets.

    Bulky yarn isn’t my favorite but I was gifted two giant balls and figured why not make a lapghan in a granny rectangle? It’s working up nicely and bulky yarn gives an almost immediate sense of accomplishment. A lady asked me about blanket yarn when I was buying yarn in a large store and I said I had an idea for a project, but it’s not my favorite. The yarn was gifted to me.  It’s soft, feels like velvet and  is not too difficult to rip out, if necessary. It’s just not something I would choose, it’s looking nice so far.

    After a few false starts, the afghan I started making using one of my mystery balls has taken off! This time I started a using a rectangular Granny Square. The mystery balls are composed of leftover yarn wound up with black between colors. Same stitch, different yarn: Fun happy project. The bold, irregular sections of color are offset by the black. It has been almost three years since I completed the last mystery ball, and there are five. Each one is roughly the size of a small bowling ball. Now that I found the right stitch to showcase the colors, I’m enjoying the project immensely.

    Lapghans aren’t part of this year’s goal, but I miss making Granny Square afghans, and lapghans work up quickly and they will be donated. The use of Granny Stitch, especially in the blanket yarn will yield warm and cozy blankets similar to thermal blankets. I miss making afghans, which I used to regularly make and donate but stopped when I switched to smaller projects. Making lapghans using the Granny Stitch is a happy medium and allows a lot of variety and flexibility. Depending on how large I make the lapghan, I might be able to make four or five from the mystery balls.

    The fans in the motif don’t use as much yarn as others, so I should be able to make a few colorful pieces, all while using my favorite stitch.

    I’ll keep you posted on my lapghan progress!

    Happy crocheting!

  • Creative reuse - Crochet - leftover yarn

    How do you use your leftover yarn?

    May 19, 2022 - By 

    For me, one way of using up leftover yarn is to make oddball hats.

    There is never the right amount of yarn for a project. When you buy something just as when you guy a carton of eggs and only need 3 for a recipe, you will have some left over. Depending on the style of the hats and scarf I make, there may be yarn left over. Knowing this, I purposely set aside the yarn that I have just to make some hats to donate to an organization. Some hats can be made with less than 150 yards of yarn while others are quite thirsty and require 200 yards or more. A good rule of thumb is to have about 200 yards of yarn to make a hat. A crochet swirl hat or a half double beanie (or toque) won’t take as much as a hat with front/back post ribbing or cables.

    As I complete some sets, I put the remaining yarn into a bag. Since I’m beyond the halfway point of 100 sets and it’s May, I’m taking a few days to just make hats. Even after making a couple of hats, I have some yarn left and will combine those with gray or brown and use the them to make hats with accents. If you haven’t figured this out yet, I don’t like to waste yarn. When it gets to a very small amount <5 yards, I add it to a mystery ball.

    Making hats with a limited about of yarn is fun because there are constraints… almost like yarn chicken in every hat. Ok, not really. I save the bands for yarn and some will give a yardage. If I have unused full balls, or I can rewind the partially used ones to give me a better estimate of how much I have. I could weigh the yarn to get an idea of how much I have. That’s more accurate, but not as much fun. Instead, I reach into one of the bags and see how much I have, then go through the hat patterns that I have committed to memory and begin.

    I’m impressed with the end results – warm hats.

    There’s still a bit of yarn left in the bag and hopefully I’ll make a dent in the bag once I make 10 hats or so. Then I’ll go back to making sets and continue to add to the bag. It’s an ongoing cycle. Unless I put the remainder back into my working stash because I bought a large quantity on sale and will use it later. There’s always a plan, even if I don’t know what it is when I begin. That’s the creative part.

    Happy crocheting!

  • Creative reuse - Crochet - Odd balls

    Pre-planning yarn chicken

    May 20, 2019 - By 

    I have two yarns I want to put together and I was trying to maximize the size of the scarf based on the amount of yarn that I have. I was pre-planning with avoiding yarn chicken if you will and this fear of not having enough yarn combined with the desire to not buy a jumbo skein just to complete a row was at the forefront of my mind. I started with a pattern in mind, then I realized that I wouldn’t have enough yarn to do that, so I started again, realizing I wouldn’t have enough yarn for that, I started a third time and thought of possibly adding a third yarn to the scarf to stretch it, but then realizing I didn’t like that, I put the skeins away with the hook and the portion that I already started and began another scarf knowing that I had more than enough to complete the project.

    I didn’t want to set myself up for failure and despite that box of yarn that arrived at my house last week, I am trying to use up yarn that I have by making projects with interesting stripes and color blocks. One of the yarns in a partial skein and the other a partial cake. I have an idea how much is in the cake. The partial skein however…. I think if I wind it up into a ball I will have a better idea of how much yarn I have.

    I wound both of the partial skeins into cakes and I don’t have enough for what I wanted to do, for now both skeins will have to wait until I discover more yarn in my working stash that will work with this. I put the skeins aside and decided to work on something else. In other words this yarn hasn’t spoken to me yet…