Anyone else out there find January and February to be kinda depressing months? The rain, the cold, the lack of sunshine, the holidays are over, just back to the daily grind… Ok, I’ll stop, I don’t want to induce depression if you aren’t already there. 😉

One of the bloggers I follow, Shay Shull, has this great idea she does in the fall — a scarf exchange with her girlfriends. I love this idea, you can read about it here! The basic premise is that they meet at a Starbucks, and everyone brings a wrapped scarf. They sip coffee, chit-chat, and do a traditional “white-elephant” type exchange. Again, simple, easy, and no one has to clean their house!

So a co-worker friend of mine and I decided to host a scarf exchange of our own to help beat the winter blues. We set the date, picked a local coffee spot, and decided to create invites to remember! Yes, that means I knitted mini-scarfs for each invite. Naturally.

Materials:
Coordinating scrapbook paper (we used white and a few fun prints)
Coordinating yarn
Knitting Needles
Crochet Hook
Exacto Knife
Envelopes (we used 5×7)

Knitting the Mini-Scarfs:

1. This was just too much fun! I cast on 5 stitches (check-out this post for help casting on).
2. Then I knitted until each mini-scarf was 15″ long. And cast-off (again, see this post).
   
3. Next for the fringe, I cut 16 pieces of yarn around 6″ long.
4. Then I used a crochet hook to thread the yarn between the stitches on the ends. Two pieces per.
     
5. And tied like so…
    
6. Continue, trim, and done.
   

 Assembling the Invites:

1. Meanwhilst, my friend took the pertinent details and designed the text. The fonts she used were Novecento and Halo Handletter. You can find these for free online.
2. She printed out the details on the white cardstock, and we cut down this piece to 6 1/2″ x 4″.
3. We then cut out the printed scrapbook paper to 6 3/4″ x 4 3/4″.
4. We lined up the two pieces of paper and cut slits to thread the mini-scarf through.
   
5. Next, I simply tied the scarfs on.
6. My friend is great at calligraphy, so she addressed all the envelopes.

The result, totally unique invites to our super simple scarf extravaganza!

Oh and BTW, we all had a great time!

–h