I had to downsize my craft space which resulted in me cramming my yarn stash into two large-ish drawers which is a pretty tight squeeze right now. Thus I am on a mission to destash and use up what I got. The biggest portion of my stash that needs to go is acrylic yarns - I don’t really use them much unless I’m crafting for kids or for something that needs to be hardy. A large portion of these yarns are being used currently in my future Halloween costume (hopefully this turns out like I’m envisioning), but I had one ball of white acrylic yarn left over, and decided that I could pair that with a bunch of scrap balls to make gift bags for future gifting. Also it’s a great opportunity to practice new stitches or patterns.
My first bag was pretty boring - just alternating stripes of the white yarn, and then 2 strands of green yarn I had in my scrap ball stash, knitted into a long rectangle that I folded over and sewed up the sides. I made a cord to tie it off with, but will probably use some red ribbon for contrast.
The 2nd bag was a little more exciting as I was using (say it with me) the white yarn again but with a small ball of Lion Brand landscape (?). The color transitions definitely make this more exciting to knit up. Because I knit this in the round, all I had to do to finish was stitch the bottom closed. Crocheted a tie and done. I used the Simple Fair Isle Learning Cowl pattern.
Next I wanted to try real cables. Again the white yarn makes it’s appearance, paired with 2 strands of scrap yarn. I wasn’t following a pattern here - I just went on youtube to learn how to cable and then figured out the stitch count. Again the body is made from a long rectangle with the sides sewn up, with a crocheted cord for the tie.
This next one went off the rails a bit. I had a bunch of small balls of yarn that were all sort of in a similar color story but I couldn’t settle on a pattern to show off the yarn to the best effect, so this is what happens when I completely wing a project. I was holding about 3 yarns as I worked which gave the total weight equivalent to about an aran or bulky weight yarn. But when I introduced the white yarn, which is a light worsted weight, it caused the colorwork portion of the bag to get really tight and wonky. The whole thing is kinda hot-mess-express but as you can see, when you cinch up the bag, it’s not so bad. So I’m moving on, and those yarns are out of my stash!
Next, I wanted to use up some yarn that wasn’t technically scrap, but I had in my stash for so long and had fallen out of love with the colors so I didn’t know what to use it for (it’s a knitpicks brand but I can’t remember the name of the yarn itself). So I decided to use the Able Cable hat pattern to knit a bag in the round. I did this until I thought it was long enough, transitioned to a 5x5 rib for the top, crocheted a cinch cord, and then sewed up the bottom.
Last bag (for now), I used the Windmill Drawstring pouch pattern as my inspiration. I had intended to follow the pattern as is, but realized it made a much smaller pouch than I wanted so I increased the stitch count by 30 in length. In retrospect, I probably should have made my strips wider too, but to compensate, I made 6 strips instead of 4. The biggest pain in the butt about this pattern was having to weave in all the ends. But I think it turned out ok.
And now I need a break from making gift bags. I think I have enough for now lol.
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