This is a little story about some yarn…

I arrived home from a tough day at work to find a squishy brown package on my doorstep. Could it be?! It was!

Each year I participate in the RedditGifts Yarn Exchange — it’s basically a global secret Santa for yarn lovers to swap fibres. Obviously, that’s right up my alley.

Well, this year, my yarn Santa sent me a beautiful array of yarns with a pattern to knit socks — I’m a beginner knitter so this was very exciting! The colours are so vibrant and I couldn’t be more excited to get to work… but wait. It gets better.

The other exciting thing for me was that the yarn comes from Custom Woolen Mills, which is a textile museum in Alberta, Canada. This place grows (on sheep, of course) and processes wool on machinery used back in the industrial revolution. That pretty amazing and special — wouldn’t have had the chance to work with yarn like this without the exchange!

I’m also really interested in the history of fibre arts, so I was extra excited to receive this package.

I’m not sure if I’ll actually make the socks that the pattern suggests, of if I’ll whip something else up… stay tuned.

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie

Ooh, that trendy yarn. Caron Cakes and I have a complicated relationship. I bought a bunch of them.  I love the colours. But I really don’t like the abrupt colour changes. They bother me.

Caron Cakes:

Still, one project that I’ve really enjoyed making and wearing  (!) has been the Pineapple Peacock Shawl whipped up with a 5.5 mm hook in the Key Lime colourway. It’s a great free pattern and the cake it the perfect length for this piece!

It’s been ages since I made something for myself. Quite pleased with this one!

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie

Everyone knows I’m a sucker for an owl — making this one was a hoot.

(Wah wahh. I’ll see myself out.)

I just made this little guy up to match the Eva blanket. So, I have no pattern. That is, except to say that I used the african violet pentagon pattern, from Heidi Bears.

Still, I couldn’t resist showing off my fine feathered friend!

“It looks like a tie he’d wear.”

That was my favourite comment about this blanket, which I made for a highly fashion-forward co-worker and his new baby girl, Eva.

It’s a corner-to-corner pattern made with Snuggly Wuggly yarn and a 4.5 mm hook. Easy as pie, but so satisfying to make. The border is rows of HDC, and then a shell border of 5 DCs. I did the border right over all my stray ends, which saved me having to weave them in (my least favourite task.)

I loved this blanket — it was almost hard to let go… until I met sweet baby Eva!

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie

Christmas time with the in-laws in Pennsylvania calls for U.S. yarn shopping and some cozy nights in the corner of the couch. (With Shelby the cat!)

This was also what I made after I completely failed at planned pooling… Ugh. #neveragain

Here’s the pattern from Yarnspirations.

Who me!? Just a sweet little pinafore here.

I really wish I’d taken a few more snaps of this pretty little pinafore made with Isaac Mizrahi Craft’s Little Red yarn (made by Premiere Yarns).

It was so soft and sweet. It went to the baby next door. Baby Isla! Welcome to the world!

The little scalloped sleeves rippled nicely, and I included a couple of white pearly buttons at the back to close the neck. Just too cute!

The pattern came from this video, and I added a little grey stripe at the bottom for extra flair.

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie

Autumn! The season of Pumpkin Spice Lattes and Turkey Time. (Okay, I made that last one up…) It always feels like the beginning of fun and family time.

We celebrate Canadian and U.S. Thanksgiving in our house, so there’s plenty to feel festive about. And the season also marked a year since we bought the house — another thing to celebrate!

I made this wreath by wrapping Lion Brand Homespun yarn around a foam ring (from Michaels, or any craft store) and securing the end with a pin. That’s important, because it will let me undo the wreath and reuse the foam and yarn next year, if I want something different.

(Call me cheap, but I think those rings are ridiculously expensive, given that they’re basically packing foam!)

I had fun scouring Ravelry for leaf and flower patterns for my wreath. I made them with scrap yarn, and also secured them with a straight pins. I actually found a pack of pins with pearly coloured ends at the dollar store, which was great because they add a bit of shine.

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie

I bought a grab bag of yarn from a woman through Craigslist — her stash-bust, my stash benefit.

There was a lot of nasty acrylic, but buried at the bottom were these iridescent balls of blue and green baby yarn. I knew they were meant to be a blanket.

It took me a while to work out that I needed to double up strands to equal the thickness of the Snuggly Wuggly yarn I had leftover from my last blanket. So I used one of each, and the result was this sort of shiny, fish scale effect. Perfection.

This simple granny square pattern (just keep going around — no pattern needed here) with picot edging was a little tedious to make, but I was thrilled with the simplicity and elegance of it.  The resulting seafoam-y colour would have been suitable for either a baby boy or girl, which made it the perfect gift for a coworker who decided not to find out what she was having.

Surprise — it was a girl! It’s simply my lot in life to be surrounded by beautiful baby girls. 🙂 And so I named this blanket after its new owner.

So, what did you make this week?

xo Jacquie