Thursday, January 10, 2008

"Momento Bowl" & Beautiful Yarn Storage Ideas

We've come across a great book, "Weekend Knitting" by Melanie Falick. I highly recommend this book if you appreciate the beauty in the medium that we work with as knitters and crocheters. The pictures are heartfelt and warm, the ideas are great and the little tid-bits throughout the book, capture the rythmic, homely essence and pure beauty of knitting.

From this book, comes an awesome idea ~ We call it our "Momento Bowl." While our bowl is still a work in progress, it is still pretty and inviting. As we finish projects we will begin adding smaller sample balls of yarn and prettier needles. But for now, the simplicity of what we have works both as a beautiful storage solution and a Momento Bowl to share and create memories with friends for a long time to come!

Weekend knitting describes it best:

"Inevitably, if you leave knitting projects or pretty yarns or knitting books around your house, some of your guests are going to want to knit while they're visiting. To be ready for such situations, try setting up a quests knitting bowl or basket. In it place a small piece of knitting (just a few rows worked on a set of pretty needles) and yarn leftover from finished projects. When quests ask to knit, invite them to add on to the knitting you've started with whichever yarn they like best from the bowl. After a while (months or years, depending on the industriousness of your guests), you'll have a long, colorful ribbonlike momento- a memory quilt of sorts - of creative time spent with friends and family. You'll see the inevitable holes created bu the knitters who learned to knit on this ribbon as well as the complicated stitchwork of the experienced knitters who have stopped by."

-- Weekend Knitting, P. 129

Speaking of storage solutions -- do you see my nifty little yarn ball winder? Oh, I absolutely love! See how neat my balls are? (you should have seen them before!). On the storage front, this book has some great ideas for decorating with yarn (I've starred [*] my favorites!):

"

  • Place pretty colors together in clean wooden bowls*, natural baskets, or other creative holders. Scour yard sales and antique shops for unusual choices. Casually combining an assortment of colors often leads to new discoveries about how colors play off one another.
  • "Dress" a vintage dress form in yarn. Drape yarn across it's shoulders, or around it's neck or waist.
  • Drape yarn around the back of a chair or on the door of a cabinet or armoire.
  • Fill an armoire with yarn and leave doors open to display.
  • Use a hank of yarn as a curtain tie-back.
  • Hang different colors of yarn on the pegs of a coat rack.
  • String an assortment of yarn on a cord and hang form a wall hook. *
  • Line up cones of yarn on a shelf.
  • Set up shelves and cubbies along an entire wall and arrange the yarn in a pleasing sequence of colors and textures. While some knitters will do this in a storage or workroom, it can also work well in a more public space.
  • If you like to paint, draw or take photos, consider using your yarn as a subject for a still life. "
-- Weekend Knitting, P. 41

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