If you’ve been knitting for awhile, you’ve probably amassed a large and eclectic collection of leftover yarn – little balls that didn’t quite make it into your project.
These little orphaned balls sit, completely ignored, in the deep corners of your closet or with the dust bunnies under your bed.
It’s a dark and shameful secret that no one tells you:
Knitting basically turns you into a hoarder. A yarn hoarder, that is. Tweet This
This collection of leftover yarn is what the knitting community (knitelligencia?) fondly call “your stash.”
The drug reference is undeniable. Buying yarn is an addiction!
The Braided Headband is a very useful way to “stashbust” (aka. use up your leftover yarn!).
It uses very little yarn (perfect for those orphan Annie yarn balls) and makes a chic and useful headband.
You can wear it Olympic-athlete-style across the forehead, pushed up against your hairline like a traditional headband, or even down around your neck like a statement necklace.
They also make excellent last-minute gifts!
Materials & Notes
Yarn:
- use any yarn you like! A sock weight up to a worsted weight yarn will work nicely. The thicker the yarn, the thicker the headband, and vice versa. A headband will use approximately 23-35 yards of yarn
- Malabrigo Sock (hand-dyed yarn) in color Ochre (similar to headband that model wears)
Recommended Needles: double pointed needles or circular needle that is slightly smaller than recommended needle size for yarn
Materials:
- one or two good-quality hair elastics
- tapestry needle
- scissors
- tape measure
Instructions
Using DPNs or circular needles, cast on 3 sts (or 4 sts if using sock weight yarn).
Knit an i-cord that measures 15.5” and cut yarn, leaving a 7” tail. Secure the i-cord by weaving yarn through stitches on the needle.
Make two more identical i-cords for a total of three i-cords.
Knot the three i-cords together and braid to end. Knot the end to secure the braid.
Attach both ends to hair elastic(s), making sure not to twist the braid.
Enjoy!
Refer to the video tutorial up top for instructions on how to knit an i-cord and how to neatly attach the braided i-cords to the elastic.
You can download the pattern as a PDF file below. For best viewing, save and open the file in Adobe Reader or Preview (for Mac users). Scroll down the page to download the pattern PDF.
Thanks for the awesome post! I have so many random, loose pieces of yarn lying around, and I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with them. Sometimes I’ll use them to make little collars for my cats, despite them never being too keen on the idea! However, I think this will be a great project to try!
“Sometimes I’ll use them to make little collars for my cats, despite them never being too keen on the idea!”
Oh my goodness! They sound adorable! I can see it now: grumpy cats in cute collars. Ah, the meme-worthiness of this is incredible!