Treat Yourself to a New Bag in the New Year

I have a lot of bags, and a good number of knitting bags, but it seems like I’m always throwing my knitting into any old shopping bag that is handy when I leave the house.

But when the thing inside is so nice, shouldn’t it be carried in a nice bag, too?

Maybe we should all resolve to use real knitting bags when we carry our projects, to give them the respect they deserve.

I was recently sent a Knit Hobo Bag from Great Useful Stuff, and its a nice basic starter bag if you’re looking for something to try. It looks like a mom purse, and is big enough to hold your project if it’s not too big and all your other stuff, too.

It has a large interior and an outside pocket that has a sort of rubbery mesh panel that’s intended to help keep your yarn from getting tangled if you knit with your ball in the bag.

There’s a small interior pocket with a zipper for holding your phone and keys, or knitting tools if it’s a knitting-exclusive bag. It has a single short strap and a removable, adjustable shoulder strap so you can carry it however you like. The full dimensions are 13.5″ x 12″ x 3.75″ (main body). The fastened handle has a 7″ drop, and the removable and adjustable shoulder strap drops up to 21″.

I love the little yarn cutter charm that’s attached to the loop that holds the straps but is also removable so you can add it to your keychain or wherever else you’d like to keep it handy.

The Knit Hobo bag retails for $20 and is a good investment in keeping your knitting in good order in the new year. Thanks to Great Useful Stuff for sending a bag for review.

Next Pattern:

I’ve been enjoying knit amigurumi animal patterns lately (see also: this adorable knit pigeon) and of course being a knitter I love llamas.

So when I saw this little llama pattern I knew I had to share it.

The appropriately named Llama patter from Annie Ahn calls for fingering weight yarn, and it uses two colors for the body and three for the little blanket. The pompom can be made to match or in another color. All of these parts take tiny amounts of yarn so you can use whatever scraps you have left over from socks or other projects and change colors whenever you need to.

It might also be fun to use some mohair or other fuzzy or textured yarn on this one to give your llama a different look. In all the project uses between 100 and 150 yards, or 91-137 m, of yarn and the llama comes out about 10 cm/4 inches tall.

The body of the llama is worked in one piece, so this project is suited to intermediate knitters or those who have comfort working in the round and with all those little pieces.

This one is made to be small so you can carry it around with you (it would be super cute on a keychain or as a zipper pull) but I think it would be a lot of fun to knit this in larger yarn, too, to make a bigger llama. You could even make a whole family in different sizes just by using different weights of yarn and corresponding needles.

The details are so cute, from the shaggy hair to its little accessories, but you could make it plain or change it up by knitting a tiny scarf or even working a little fair isle pattern on the legs or body. So many fun possibilities!

The pattern is available on Ravelry in English and Korean.

[Photo: Annie Ahn]

Next Pattern:

Have you read?

Leave a Reply