Easy Knit Gift: Asymmetrical Knit Shawl

I’ve decided that I’m going to be knitting a lot of scarves this year for the holidays, but it occurs to me that a shawl is quite a lot like a scarf, but a little more fun to knit and to wear.

And there are a lot of easy shawl knitting patterns out there that won’t necessarily take a lot longer to knit than a big scarf would, but they look a lot more impressive than a scarf to the cynical knit-gift recipient (who maybe shouldn’t be on your knit-gift list, but still).

This Asymmetrical Knit Shawl from Yarnspirations is a great example. It’s worked from the tip out, starting with just 2 stitches, which makes it easy to customize to the amount of yarn you have. As knit it only uses two balls of yarn, less than 500 yards, so you’ve probably got something in your stash that would work (and then you can imagine it’s a gift that didn’t cost you anything, right?). You could also do it in stripes, or in a heavier weight of yarn, working to whatever size you want.

It’s a Garter Stitch shawl so it’s super easy for knitters of all skill levels, it just requires a bit of increasing to make the shape work. It couldn’t be easier or more versatile.

[Photo via Yarnspirations.]

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Looking for more amazing shawl patterns? Check out these Knitting patterns we found on Etsy.

For the past few years I’ve taken part in a Christmas in July blog hop that encourages people to get a jump on their making for holiday gifts.

I love to use yarn I already have for these projects in the hope that people will consider what they already have that they can use to make projects for themselves or to give as gifts.

This year it was a couple of knit baskets made using partial balls of yarn left in my stash from other projects.

They use the same basic pattern but the first one is made with two colors of bulky yarn, and the second used two strands of worsted weight yarn held together, which made the gauge about the same, but I cast on fewer stitches to make a smaller version.

The bottom of the basket is square, though you can make them rectangular if you’d rather. Then I just knit up the sides in rounds until I was about to run out of yarn. This gave both baskets rather short sides — maybe more like a tray than a basket — but you can keep knitting as long as you like to make the sides of your basket as tall as you want.

They’re worked in seed stitch, which keeps the edges from curling and adds a nice texture to the baskets.

Of course this also allows you to use even more odd balls from your stash. I’d love to make a big one someday combining lots of different yarn. I mean, I’d probably use it to store more yarn, but that’s a fine thing to do.

As it is, these little trays are great for sitting on your desk or bedside table to hold little things that always seem to appear there. I like to use one to hold the supplies for whatever project I’m working on, things like little scissors, my tape measure, a crochet hook, etc.

And they would make good gifts on their own or as a container to hold some other goodies if you like.

You can find the free pattern for these stash busting baskets over at Our Daily Craft.

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