Stashbusters - Granny Stripes and Granny Ripples

Now that you have all of your holiday gifts made, you probaby have some extra yarn lying around.  If you're like me, you have a PILE of yarn stuck in the corner just asking to be used up.

I keep an ice cream bucket or large pretzel jar to collect those tiny scraps of yarn that would otherwise drift to the bottom of the stash or unwind to make a huge tangled mess.  These small scraps make an excellent source when you want to put together a traditional granny square afghan or one of its variants like a hexagon granny.

 
Photos by Lion Brand Yarn

If your balls of leftover yarn are a little larger, you could use them up by crocheting a granny stripe or a granny ripple afghan.

Granny ripples are easy and look fancy.  You can use any combination of colors in any order.  You might want to organize the colors or just be random.  Both ways work beautifully.

Granny stripes are even easier.  You simply work the double-crochet clusters in a straight line.  You don't even have to count groups between peaks and valleys like you do with a ripple pattern. 

There are several good patterns for both types of afghans (and many others) on www.ravelry.com and www.crochetpatterncentral.com.

Happy stashbusting,

Kathi Linz

New Book in the Library

Hot off the presses, the library received a copy of Crocheted Afghans: 25 Throws, Wraps, and Blankets to Crochet by Melody Griffiths. 

Many of the blankets shown can be made of odd balls of yarn.  However, almost any of them can be made with your chosen color scheme, so these would be great ideas for gifts, home, sale, or charity. 

I found several patterns that I would like to try -  once the heat breaks.  One of my favorites was a yo-yo afghan pattern.  It's called Puffs Baby Blanket in the table of contents. 

Some other eye-catching patterns were  -  well, they all were eye-catching!  You'll have to pick up this book and see which ones suit your tastes.

Happy crafting,

Kathi