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What Are You Doing for I Love Yarn Day?

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i love yarn dayOct. 12 is officially the second I Love Yarn Day, which is a holiday made up by the Craft Yarn Council to celebrate all things yarny. It’s not just about knitting, of course, but we knitters can certainly get in on the action by knitting (naturally), preferably in public, visiting our local yarn shops or otherwise supporting the yarn industry and the community of designers that provide so many fun things for us to knit and crochet through the year.

Speaking of designers, check out the design inspiration for I Love Yarn Day if you want to knit something special to wear on the big day (like Nicky Epstein’s cabbage rose) or a quick project you can knit on that day.

Knowing me, I’ll forget there’s anything special about that day and will just be knitting like mad trying to finish things up for my book.

How about you? Any plans to do anything special, or is every day I Love Yarn Day in your world?

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Comments

  2. Every day IS I love Yarn Day but it’s cool there is a specific day for it. I’ll be knitting up a Hallowe’en wig for a friend who has lost her hair to chemo treatments. Knitting it up in her school colors so she can wear it to football games.

Have you read?

Knit a Great Button Down Shirt

Just about anything you can make in fabric you can make in knitting, but there are some styles that you just don’t see that often translated into knitting. 

For example, a button down collared shirt. This is a classic design, of course, and it looks great in a knit version, but it’s just not something you see much of. 

Noma Ndlovu’s Guglethu shirt is the pattern to try if you want to knit your own button down shirt. This one is inspired by cashmere tops (though the sample was made out of yak yarn, not cashmere, and uses two strands of lace weight yarn held together) and includes lots of high-fashion details like double-knit cuffs, collar and shoulder seams. 

It has a patch pocket on the front and 10 buttons including the button band and the cuffs. 

The designer says you can also use a DK weight yarn held singly if you’d rather, and that the shirt looks good in a variety of yarns. There is another version on Ravelry that uses Berroco Remix Light, which is a mix of nylon, cotton, acrylic, silk and cellulose fibers. It has a more relaxed look but it still really pretty. 

The pattern has 12 sizes, with a full bust measurement ranging from 32.35 to 72.25 inches, or 82 to 183.5 cm. The designer suggests 2 to 6 inches, or 5 to 15 cm, of positive ease when you pick your size. I could totally see knitting one that’s even bigger to wear more like a jacket, because I do that a lot with button down shirts I already own.

I love all the details on this shirt, which isn’t necessarily difficult to knit, but might introduce you to some things you’ve never knit before (like those cuffs with the plackets, or a shirt collar like this). 

To learn more about this shirt and grab a copy of the pattern for yourself, head to Ravelry. 

[Photo: Noma Ndlovu]

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