Supporting Independent Artists

The Winter 2007 Happily Handmade giveaway will begin accepting entries on February 12th. You can only enter the giveaway through the fabulous Independent Artist sponsors. This [tag]giveaway[/tag] is sponsored by a group of [tag]independent artists[/tag] who are promoting their shops with this giveaway.

2/12â€“3/31: Winter 2007 Giveaway entry period
4/2: Winter 2007 Winners announced!

History of the Giveaway

-Quoted from the website â€“â€œThe idea behind the [tag]Happily Handmade Giveaway[/tag] began in the Spring of 2004 from a brainstorming session among a handful of indie artists. Each time we organize this event, it grows larger and more successful. During an event, our participating Indie Shops will create a sign-up form on their respective websites where you may enter the our participating Indie Shops will create a sign-up form on their respective websites where you may enter the Happily Handmade Giveaway drawing to win one of these fabulous gift boxes.

You may enter the drawing by visiting one, two, or ALL of the Indie Shop Sponsors. Feel free to enter through all of the Indie Shop Sponsors for more chances to win! Items included in these wonderful gift boxes may vary from clothing and handbags to bath & beauty products and jewelry. While you are visiting our Indie Shop Sponsors, please take a peek at what each talented artist has to offer. You’ll be glad you didâ€.

The Rules are simple, visit the sites, you may enter the giveaway through each individual Indie Shop Sponsor page. Each sponsor will have their own requirements for entry. It is your duty to complete these requirements as instructed. Please read all the rules on the rules page for more information.

Please help support these wonderful independent artists and you just might win a nice gift!

As I write this, it’s probably time to start thinking about winter knitting if you haven’t already. And it’s definitely time to think about gift knitting if you have any of that you plan to do for the holidays.

The Dreamy Waves Scarf from Knit Picks, designed by Stacey Winklepleck, would be a great project to go in either category.

It uses two different multicolored yarns and a simple repeating wave pattern to make a project that looks a lot more complicated and dramatic than it is. The gradient look happens naturally just by switching which yarn you’re knitting with.

This pattern uses worsted weight yarn so it’s a pretty quick project even though a scarf is large and this one is pretty wide. It measures 8.5 inches (21.5 cm) wide and 63 inches or 120 cm long. Of course you can make it longer or shorter as you like. As written it takes one ball of each color so it’s a pretty economical project, too.

It’s rated for intermediate knitters but if you know how to do various increases and decreases you’ll be all set. The pattern uses knit 2 together, make 1 left and right, centered double decrease and slip slip knit. All of the stitches are explained in a glossary in the pattern so even if you haven’t done all of them it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out.

The pattern also includes tons of options for different colorways in yarn that Knit Picks sells, so you can see how different combinations knit up before you buy the yarn. That’s such a great idea!

Of course if you already have two multicolored yarns with long color runs on hand, you can absolutely use them, too. It might also be fun, but would give you a totally different look, to use a solid color and a bunch of scraps or one multicolored yarn to see how the different colors play together. So many options!

You can grab this free pattern and check out all the color options at Knit Picks.

[Photo: Knit Picks]

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Have you read?

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