Pare Down Your Yarn Stash with Style with Knitless

As a yarn crafter, I know I am not alone in the problem of having too much stash, yarn kept for someday projects that might never happen.

And while fall and winter are great knit-like-crazy, use-all-the-yarn-you-can times, I know it’s probably still not enough to bring my stash down to reasonable proportions.

I’ve come to grips with the idea that I have more yarn than I need or want, more than I can use in the foreseeable future and some I flat-out don’t want to use.

A full-scale destash is on the horizon, but in the meantime I can find as many ways as I can to use yarn, whether in knitting, crochet, or other craft projects.

That’s where the book Knitless by Laura McFadden comes in. Subtitled 50 No-Knit, Stash-Busting Yarn Projects, it aims to give crafters of all sorts plenty of inspiration for using yarn, whether one skein at a time or a whole bunch at once.

Projects are divided into four categories: for the home, wearable accessories, yarn art and stationery and gift ideas. There’s a wide range of projects, from adding pom poms to a purchased throw to making tassels and adding them to a necklace, making circles out of yarn and paracord to form a funky rug or stitching a picture into a frame for a dramatic, almost-floating look.

None of the projects require knitting or crochet skills, and most of the skills involved in general are pretty basic. But the finished projects are really cute, and you’ll probably find yourself thinking I could make that and I would want to make that about a lot of the projects here.

I found looking through this book to be a lot of fun, and while I haven’t yet had a chance to dive into the projects I’ll bet you’ll see some things inspired by this book soon.

There are lots of techniques covered here including yarn wrapping, braiding, rug-hooking, embroidery, making pom-poms and tassels, string art and sewing. And while projects suggest a particular type of yarn (fingering weight metallic for an updated friendship bracelet, for example, or super bulky for a scarf) you can certainly use whatever you have in the general weight category to give the project an individual look.

This book is a lot of fun and would be great to keep on hand for inspiration for art and home decor projects. There are some things here that would be fun to do with friends (and you’ll use more yarn that way, or invite friends to bring yarn and host a swap) and many that would make great gifts, so keep this one handy with the holiday season coming up!

Knitless Blog Tour

We are almost the last stop on this book’s blog tour, but if you want to check out what some of my fellow crafty bloggers thought, visit their sites:

• 9/15 Pretty Things
• 9/17 She Shoots Sheep Shots
• 9/18 Knit and Nosh
• 9/19 Knitty Gritty Savings
• 9/20 ZakkaLife
• 9/21 Lorelei’s Blog
• 9/22 CraftGossip Knitting
• 9/23 Wendy Knits
• 9/24 Cut Out + Keep
• 9/25 Think Crafts!
• 9/26 Our Daily Craft
• 9/27 The Crafty Princess Diaries
• 9/28 Delia Creates

Do you ever craft with yarn other than knitting or crochet? I’d love to hear what you make!