Stuck for what to buy the yarn addict in your life? You're in luck because crafty/creative/yarny people are easy to buy for - it doesn't take much to keep us happy! Whether their (or your) thing is crochet or knitting, or neither ..yet.. (!) we've got loads of lovely gift ideas for you. Similarly, if you've been given an Eden Cottage Yarns gift voucher, why not use it to buy yourself one of our gift ideas?
We've started by creating a special gift collection/category on the ECY website HERE, so that should help you with a starting point.
Here are some of the things we'd suggest - this is coming from us as yarn addicts so it's things that we'd love to receive as gifts ourselves. ;)
1. Subscriptions to our monthly yarn club, The Potting Shed are currently open (at time of writing) and are the gift that keeps on giving. Choose the length of subscription, three- or six- months and the recipient will receive a box each month containing a skein of beautiful yarn, a luxury skincare product (e.g. soap, hand cream, body lotion etc) from The Cosy Cottage Soap Co., and a postcard with the yarnspiration in photography form and more info about it on the back.
2. Our branded useful things (loot? stuff? accessories?) make ideal stocking fillers. We've got Pin Tins which are really handy - they've got hinged lids, and contain lightbulb pins which are useful items for both knitters and crocheters; we've also got Notions Pouches - these are big enough to contain a pin tin, as well as other useful little things that knitters/crocheters need (like scissors, tapestry needles, etc). So those are particularly useful, and the illustrations on the front are Victoria's own drawing, plus they're limited edition.
3. Bags! Knitters and crocheters love bags - we use them a lot and like to collect them! At ECY we have drawstring cotton project bags - big enough for a project up to the size of a large shawl (e.g. something that takes three or four 100g skeins of yarn), and we have big cotton canvas tote bags too - these are the kind of size that you'd use for yarn shopping or for putting several projects (in project bags!) in. You can choose pink or black handles, and our current design is Victoria's merino drawing, so they are also limited edition as we'll switch to a different drawing for the next batch.
4. Kits make a great gift as you know you're giving the person everything they'll need to complete that project (apart from the time and patience; we're not that good). In a recent poll we ran, 99% of participants voted for 'yes' kits are good gifts. Ours include the yarn, the pattern (most of our printed patterns come with a digital download code too), an aforementioned project bag, and a sachet of Soak, which is no-rinse wool wash. For a lot of our kits you can choose from a wide range of colour options as well so you can tailor what you buy. We've recently added our lovely Laverton kits which would make a good gift as you get three different yarns in them and it makes a really cosy, snuggly treat of a shawl.
5. For a more carefully-tailored kit option, if you know your recipient well enough, you can choose the yarn required for the project, then also buy the 'add on kit' and we will make it up into a kit for you.
6. For those buying for a yarn fan who would prefer to choose their own gift, we have gift cards available in values between £10 and £100. The digital gift card will be sent out to the purchaser by email and can be redeemed against any purchases either online or in person at shows. We don't have a time limit on them, either. (FYI: we used to sell them as printed physical cards but demand for digital ones was much higher so we stopped doing the physical ones!).
7. For those who have an idea of the type of gift they would like to buy but maybe don't have the confidence to choose themselves (which is ok by the way - it's nothing to be embarrassed about), we do also have our Gift Selection service. There are several price bands to suit any budget and if you can add any relevant information to the order eg. favourite colours, craft preferences etc then the ECY elves will put together a bespoke selection. If you're able to provide a Ravelry account name we will even go stalk their Ravelry page to try and get a really good idea of what they'd like!
8. For the person who really does have everything: We have stunning hand carved wooden sheep from Yuki of Wood Works Crando. We only have three Manx Loaghtans left at the moment - they're all completely individual and obviously very limited in numbers. They are made from rosewood, white dogwood, Japanese bird cherry and mahogany, with an oil finish on the legs and body, and beeswax finish on the head.
9. Yarnlings! If you're just looking for something small (a stocking filler - well a project bag filler, if we're honest) these are such great little cuties. They're useful for making small things (so toys/bits of toys), stripes in projects, fairisle colourwork, modular projects (e.g. sock yarn blankets), embroidered embellishments, or quite frankly just to sit there looking cute. We have some left that are in these clear plastic boxes, but we have a new form of Yarnling packaging coming very soon - I'll update this when that happens.
10. If you're happy to choose your own selection of things for the yarn addict in your life, a few loose suggestions would be:
- a skein or two of chunky yarn plus a pattern to go with them. You can filter patterns by yarn weight required, so you could look at the chunky patterns category first, choose a pattern, then choose the chunky yarn to go with it (chunky is good because its cosy and quick to knit or crochet with).
- a book plus yarn - for example you could get Lazy Sunday Socks and a skein of sock yarn (from the sock yarn category), plus you could get a Nateby 4ply mini skein for the recipient to make sparkly heels and toes with.
- yarn, a tote bag, a pin badge, and a notions pouch or a pin tin (all directly linked to further up) - so yarn to use, a big bag to store it plus other projects in, a pin badge to stick on said bag, and a useful smaller thing that would just round it all off nicely.
- a yarn pack plus associated pattern off Ravelry - over the past couple of years there have been a few key pattern releases that require three, four, five, or six colours of yarn. To help folks to decide which colours to put together (it can be hard when buying online) we have put together yarn packs for them. These are patterns that we don't sell so you would need to buy the pattern from Ravelry, but that's easy enough. They're generally pretty big projects so if you want to get something that'll really keep the recipient occupied this is a great way to do that!
Finally: please remember that unless you specifiy, we will put the piece of paper with the order totals on it into the parcel! If you're ordering something to go straight to someone else please do tell us so that we can leave out the invoice.