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Great Tips for Putting a Project to Bed

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use project cards to keep your ufos in orderWe’ve all had times when we knew we were putting a project in time out. Usually that is accompanied by frustration and getting the project out of our sight as quickly as possible.

But we really should be kind to our future selves and take a moment to write down some things about the currently offending pattern in the hope that some day we’ll want to deal with it. This is also good advice when you’re putting a project away for a while even if it hasn’t been behaving badly (say it’s the dead of summer and you can’t stand working on that stranded knit sweater any longer).

Ashley Little from Crafty’s knitting blog has some great tips for taking notes on a project before you put it away. She says you should note what the pattern is and where it came from (yes!), as well as where you are in the pattern, what yarn you were using, needle size and the size of the garment you were making.

I’m sure I’ve forgotten all of these things about a project I put into hibernation at one time or another — sometimes more than one.

This is such great advice! Check the site for a link to a cute download (those project cards pictured above) that might help you get your UFOs a little better organized, too.

[Photo via Craftsy.]

Comments

  1. This is a great idea!! I gave a knitting project a little “time out” a few months ago. I have the yarn and pattern all tucked away together, but have three sets of needles in the project bag. I plan to get back to this project soon, but I can’t for the life of me remember why I put three different sets of needles in with this sweater (?!?)

    Oh well, I guess I’ll be swatching again 🙂

Have you read?

Beyond Basic Pumpkin Knitting Patterns

Over the years I have shared a lot of pumpkin knitting patterns, and I’ve knit and crocheted a lot of pumpkins myself. But it feels like there are always more fun things to try with knit pumpkins, so this year I wanted to look a little more beyond basic stockinette or ribbed pumpkins and share some pumpkin patterns with cables, bobbles and colorwork. 

In the cable collection we’ve got these cute little basic cable and ribbed pumpkins from Elly Bear Knits. There are two sizes that make a wide, flat pumpkin and a taller round pumpkin. Both are worked in the round as a tube that’s cinched top and bottom when you’re done, and they use bulky weight yarn. 

Another cute cable pumpkin knitting pattern comes from Gray Bear Akswokrat. This one is knit flat and it looks like a chunky yarn but you could use other weights to make pumpkins of different sizes. This one also has an I-cord stem and uses yarn to cinch up the sections of the pumpkin, giving it a more natural look. 

Add some bobbles to your pumpkins with this design from Autumn Shelter Makes. Also worked in the round in a tube, it features a repeating pattern of bobbles and uses yarn wrapped around the outside to make segments. This one looks like worsted weight yarn to me. 

Of course there’s nothing that says your pumpkin has to be a single color, so let’s throw in some colorwork. I love the look of the Cozy Fall Pumpkin knitting pattern from South Stitch Girls. The little leather loop adds a rustic touch but you could also just add a stick. These pumpkins have five colorwork options and are worked in worsted weight yarn in the round. 

There’s also the Autumn Fair Isle Trio pumpkins pattern from Equestriann Style, which has three different sizes of pumpkins with four colorwork designs. They are worked in super bulky yarn in the round and look good with high contrast or more muted color combinations.