Pattern Tip: Start with the Sleeves

Here’s a great tip from the knitting blog over at WEBS: when starting a new pieced sweater pattern, knit the sleeves first.

If you’re trying out a new technique, want to see how colors work together or just want to skip swatching (not that I’d recommend that!) starting with a sleeve gives you a quick way to see if you like the pattern or want to change something. And of course if your gauge is off it’s easier — meaning less heartbreaking — to rip out a couple of inches of sleeve rather than a couple of inches of body.

Speaking of WEBS, their annual anniversary sale is going on right now. It runs through the end of May, but there are some specials that are only available this month, and you’ll want to stock up early to get the best selection. This sale is the reason I have so much Cascade 220 in my house; it’s on sale for $5.59 a skein down from $8. There are tons of great yarns on sale form Berroco, Debbie Bliss, Rowan, Plymouth and WEBS’ own Valley Yarns, in addition to some needle sets. Check it out.

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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