Once Upon a Cheerio

Yarn for a Good Cause

The most wonderful time of the year is here!

Do you try to give back to your community during this magical season? Many people start taking up volunteering during this time of the year at like soup kitchens, etc. And if you don't have time to volunteer, I have a friend that regularly donates blood to give back to her community.

If you love crocheting/knitting, do you ever craft for a good cause? Well, guess what? Yarn Canada wants to know your story and help you out with some yarn for your good cause!

They've partnered up with Bernat Yarn and Patons Yarn to give 12 individuals and groups a total of $2000 worth of yarn to use towards your good works.

This is open to Canadians and Americans and here's what they will be giving away:

1 x $500 of yarn to a Canadian group who knits or crochets for a good cause
1 x $500 of yarn to an American group who knits or crochets for a good cause
10 x $100 of yarn to Canadian or American individuals or groups who knit or crochet for a good cause

Deadline to apply is December 31st, 2019.

For more information, click here.

Blushberry Plaid Tartan Wrap Crochet Pattern

I've been a fan of tartan and plaid since I was a teenager. I owned plaid skirts, scarves, handbags, etc. So why wouldn't I attempt to crochet something with a plaid pattern?

I've seen some crocheted blankets and scarves made using the gingham plaid style and while I like the look of them, I can't imagine doing all the colour changing.

More recently, I encountered tartan/plaid blankets made using techniques where you weave in the vertical colours. While these techniques are great for blankets, I always wondered how I could adapt it to make something a little more delicate and wearable.

Recently, I got a chance to try out some yarn from Good Loops Yarn. I fell in love with their Nurturing Fibres bamboo blend yarn. To find out more about my first impression of this yarn, click here.

I attempted to use their sock-weight (superfine-1) yarn Eco-Lush to recreate this scarf that I once owned. The final product turned out perfect. Not too heavy or thick and it had a beautiful drape.

Wanna make your own Blushberry Plaid/Tartan Wrap? Read on!

What You Need / Materials

### Most of these items can be purchased through our affiliate links. Purchasing items through these links will not cost you any extra money. Please see our disclosure policy for more details.

Eco-Lush Yarn from Good Loops Yarn: 4 Seashell, 2 Cobblestone and 2 Vanilla (Buy your kit here!)
4.5-mm Crochet Hook
Yarn Needle
Scissors

Stitches & Abbreviations

st/sts - stitch/stitches
ch - chain
dc - double crochet
fdc - foundation double crochet
csdc - chainless starting double crochet

Pattern

Starting with the Seashell colour...
Row 1: 95 fdc (95 sts)
Row 2 and beyond: Turn, 1 csdc, 94 dc across (95 sts)

Follow the colour changes below:

10 rows of Colour Seashell
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
10 rows of Colour Seashell
1 row of Colour Vanilla
10 rows of Colour Seashell
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
10 rows of Colour Seashell
1 row of Colour Vanilla
10 rows of Colour Seashell
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
3 rows of Colour Vanilla
3 rows of Colour Cobblestone
10 rows of Colour Seashell

Once you are done, you should have something like the following:

Weaving

The next part of the pattern is to weave in the vertical stripes! When you get to this part, it's pretty exciting, but the task is a bit tedious. I thought I was going to give up partway through, but luckily I didn't and the results were well worth it!

What you want to do is start off with a strand of yarn that is twice the length of your wrap plus some extra length for the fringe. Thread it through a yarn needle and fold the piece of yarn in half. You want to weave in 2 strands at the same time between each double crochet stitch.

When you weave in the next strand, make sure that it alternates the "under" and "over" rows to give it that woven appearance. Try not to pull the yarn too tight to avoid bunching the wrap.

When you get to the other end, cut the closed end of the folded piece of yarn to release your yarn needle.

Tip: I purposely weaved in my vertical stripes on top of a carpet so that the carpet could help me "grip" the crocheted piece well enough so that it wouldn't move and shift around as much.

Repeat this process between each double crochet stitch with the following colour pattern:

13 columns of Seashell
4 columns of Cobblestone
4 columns of Vanilla
4 columns of Cobblestone
4 columns of Vanilla
4 columns of Cobblestone
13 columns of Seashell
2 columns of Vanilla
13 columns of Seashell
4 columns of Cobblestone
4 columns of Vanilla
4 columns of Cobblestone
4 columns of Vanilla
4 columns of Cobblestone
13 Columns of Seashell

Pretty soon, you'll see the plaid pattern evolve.

Once your wrap is complete and you've made sure there's no bunching in the weaving, you can fasten the ends of the yarn to create the fringe.

Grab your 2 strands of yarn. Insert your hook between the two strands of yarn. Wrap both strands of yarn around the hook. Pull up a loop. Wrap both strands of yarn around the hook again. Pull through.

Grab your 2 strands of yarn.
Insert your hook between the two strands of yarn.
Wrap both strands of yarn around the hook.
Pull up a loop.
Wrap both strands of yarn around the hook again.
Pull through.

Did you make your own Blushberry Plaid Tartan Wrap? I'd love to see it! Please share it with me on Instagram and/or use the #onceuponacheerio hashtag.

This is an original pattern written by Juli Anne of Once Upon a Cheerio. Please do not claim this pattern as your own. If you wish to share this pattern, you may link to this blog post but please do not reprint it on your site. You may keep a copy for your own personal use but please DO NOT sell the pattern or distribute it.

You may sell products made from this pattern, but please clearly credit the design to me, Juli Anne of Once Upon a Cheerio and provide a link to my blog www.OnceUponaCheerio.com. Permission is NOT granted for mass production or factory manufacturing of any kind. Thank you for understanding!

#HappyMail from Good Loops Yarn

This post contains affiliate links. Please see our disclosure policy for more details.

So about a month ago, I got some happy mail from Good Loops Yarn.

Good Loops Yarn is a distributor of Nurturing Fibres Yarn in the US. If you've never heard of Nurturing Fibres, you're not alone.

Nurturing Fibres is a yarn brand from South Africa, and because the founders of Good Loops Yarn love them so much, they've made them much more accessible for those of us who live in North America!

Nurturing Fibres has yarn made from the usual materials like cotton and merino wool. But what really caught my attention was that they have yarn with bamboo blends as well!

I've heard many things about using bamboo yarns, but have yet to try it out myself. From research, bamboo materials inhibit bacterial growth, making it anti-bacterial. It is also hypoallergenic, which makes it a great alternative to those who love working with natural fibres but allergic to wool.

Nurturing Fibres has two different blends that contain bamboo and cotton (Eco-Fusion and Eco-Lush) and then a yarn with just 100% Bamboo (Eco-Bamboo).

Eco-Fusion in the colours Vanilla, Orchid and Sandstone

Eco-Lush in Seashell and Pickled Ginger

For first-timers like me, you might get Eco-Fusion and Eco-Lush confused a lot, because that's what happened to me. So here's a little table to compare the two.

	Eco-Fusion	Eco-Lush
Cotton	50%	60%
Bamboo	50%	40%
Yarn-Weight	DK	Sock
Yarn Length	125 m	200 m
Price	$6.50	$7.50

Of all things, just remember that one of them is a sock weight yarn whereas the other one is a DK weight. The 10% in the blend of cotton/bamboo might not make that much difference at the end of the day.

When I first received it, the cakes look really similar in size and I could barely tell the difference between the weight of the two different yarns. However, after working with them for a while and making different swatches, there is definitely a difference between their DK and sock weight yarns.

Eco-Fusion vs Eco-Lush (DK vs sock weight)

I was told that projects made from 100% bamboo yarn can get quite heavy and stretch so it's better to use a bamboo/cotton blend if you are planning on making wearables such as sweaters.

Also, bamboo yarn that doesn't contain any cotton blend can be kind of slippery as well, so it doesn't help with the stretching when teh stitches move/slip around. However, also because of this quality, projects made with bamboo yarn tend to have a beautiful drape to it.

Yarn with bamboo also tend to have more shine to it. It might be hard to tell from the photos, but when looking at the Eco-Cotton and the Eco-Bamboo, Eco-Bamboo definitely has nice sheen to it.

Eco-Cotton in Raindrops and Eco-Bamboo in Emily

The Eco-Bamboo yarn cake was the smallest of all of them, but it also weighs 50g and also containing 125m like Eco-Fusion (DK weight) does.

When looking at the thickness of the yarn, it's not quite sock weight, but also not quite DK.

Eco-Lush vs Eco-Bamboo (Sock vs DK weight)

Eco-Fusion vs Eco-Cotton (both DK weight)

This yarn is so beautiful and soft. Also, have I mentioned that it also smells like a dream? This yarn makes for perfect sweaters and garments as it's very breathable and feels so natural against the skin.

What are your thoughts? Do you wanna give this yarn a try? Visit Good Loops Yarn to purchase your selection of Nurturing Fibres yarn.

Special thanks to Stephanie of Good Loops Yarn for sending all these lovely Nurturing Fibres yarn for me to try out! Make sure to keep in touch as I will be coming up with a pattern soon using some of these beautiful fibres!

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