***This giveaway is now over - thank you so much to everyone who entered! I wish I had so many more to give away. Congratulations to my two winners, Pascale Evans and Beth Elderton - I hope you both enjoy your new knit & weave loom kits from Martha Stewart Crafts and Lion Brand Yarn!***
This is my second time writing about the Martha Stewart Knit and Loom kit, probably because it’s my favorite crafting tool that I own. To begin with, I'm just an insanely huge fan of anything Martha Stewart. She's my crafting idol. She's made a career doing what I do for fun, and I have so much respect for that.
I’ve had my loom kit for about 2 years now, and have pretty much used it nonstop since I received it. I've been using it a lot this winter, making blankets and a variety of scarves. I've convinced so many people to buy this kit - I even have a student who asked for one for Christmas after seeing me use mine!
When I first got this kit, I used it primarily for weaving. The first thing I made with it was my 4 x 5 heart blanket, which I posted about here.
Since I had just gotten the kit, the squares were taking me about 2 hours each to make. I wouldn't say this was a fast project, but the results were stunning. I should note that the blanket that has held up really well, 2 years later.
This year, I made a 3 x 3 blanket for my niece, Chelsea. With experience, I've gotten it down to about an hour a square, with a little more time needed for the cross stitching.
Really though. Is she not the cutest?
I'm currently working on blanket number 3 - I haven't decided how big it will be, or how I'll arrange the squares. The blankets are quite easy to make - I keep the loom on the largest size and weave up my square. Once I have several made, I use like colored yarn to sew them together (I usually don't even use a needle, I just push the yarn through the edges.) It holds together perfectly!
This year, I decided to actually try changing up my configuration to try loom knitting. Basically, the loom kit contains a bunch of little pieces that can be configured in a variety of ways. When you want to weave, you build the loom into a square, the size that you want your blanket squares to be. To knit, you just switch the loom around to a rectangle. Easy!
I didn't really know where to start with this, as I had never loom knit before, but luckily, Lion Brand has some great how to videos, which I followed diligently until I felt comfortable with the process.
I made a couple of infinity scarves for myself:
And of course, made a little cowl with flower for my niece as well!
Basically, I love this kit. I haven't even really scratched the surface of what it's able to do. There's an entire circular configuration that I haven't even attempted yet. What could the circle be for!? Probably hats.
I decided to do this review about a month ago, and figured it was worth a shot to ask Lion Brand if they would be able to provide me with a loom kit so that I could run a giveaway with my review (because, really, what good is a gushy review if there's nothing in it for the reader?) To my huge surprise, they wrote back right away, agreeing to send me some goodies. So without further ado...
Lion Brand was kind enough to send me TWO kits, with 4 balls of yarn each (huge thanks!) That means that there will be two winners for this contest! Each winner will receive:
-1 Martha Stewart Knit and Loom Kit
-2 balls of Lion Brand wool roving (blue and cream)
-2 balls of Lion Brand yarn (red and navy)
There are a couple of ways to enter:
- For one entry: Leave a comment and let me know what you would make if you won the Martha Stewart Knit and Loom Kit.
- For a second entry: Post a link to this giveaway on your blog, twitter, facebook, etc., then come back and post a link in a separate comment.
This giveaway is open to anyone in Canada and the United States. The approximate value of this giveaway is around $70 per prize (but can you really put a price on all of this weaving and knitting fun?)
The giveaway will run from now until Thursday, February 14th at 8:00pm, when I will randomly select a winner using a random number generator.
PLEASE CHECK BACK to see if you have won! I will comment to your comment, and also update this entry. Sometimes people don't get notified about comments to their comments, so please be sure to check back! Alternately, if you leave an email address in your comment, I will simply email you if you have won!