Kreate-a-lope® {Product Review}

Creating your own custom envelopes is a cinch with the Kreate-a-lope® envelope template! Nick Romer, the creator of these handy templates, sent a couple of sizes for me to try out and review. I received the A2 standard invitation size and the A7 size template. You can check out the Kreate-a-lope® Video for all the details on how to use this product.

I gathered together some of my favorite papers so I would have a variety to experiment with including: light-weight scrapbook paper, handmade paper, a page from an old atlas, vintage sheet music, vintage dictionary paper, and a couple of discarded road maps.

In the end, the vintage sheet music and the atlas page turned out to be my favorite envelopes! I’m especially smitten with the map envelopes. They would be ideal for a travel-themed wedding and could be customized to feature the couple’s home city or state, the wedding location, or even the honeymoon destination!

Over all the templates are very easy to use, and provide a great way to upcylcle all those pretty papers you’ve been collecting! Shown above are my top 5 tips for using the Kreate-a-lope® based on my own experience. I am so happy to have a way to put that vast pile of papers in my studio to good use. Many thanks to Nick Romer for sponsoring this post and sharing such a great product. Don’t forget about the Kickstarter campaign for Kreate-a-lope® and be sure to check out our giveaway of the product here at DIY Weddings! 6 readers will win an A2 standard invitation size Kreate-a-lope®. Click this link for all the details and to enter the giveaway before midnight CST on May 20th, 2013.

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Stitch dictionaries are a fun way to learn new-to-you knitting stitch patterns or to take a deep dive into a particular technique. Debbie Tomkies offers 100 cable stitch designs and thoughts on how to incorporate them into projects in her Cable Knitting Stitch Dictionary.

Each stitch pattern is shown in a large swatch photo and with written and charted instructions. Any special stitches are included on the page. The stitches are rated on a difficulty scale of 1 to 3, and the pattern notes also indicate how many extra stitches you should add to a project if you’re going to work this cable (since cables pull the fabric closer together you need to compensate for that) as well as how many stitches and rows are in the repeat if you want to design a project yourself.

The cables are arranged into sections: classic cables, combinations, all-over panels, creative cables, motifs and panels and cabled edges and borders.

It’s fun to flip through the designs to think about projects you can add a single cable or two to or make with an allover cabled design. Or you could make swatches of different cables and sew them together into a pillow cover or a throw.

At the back of the book there’s a section on general cable knitting techniques, reading charts, working swatches and avoiding errors (though it mentions working the wrong number of rows between cable turns, it doesn’t share how to count rows between cables to avoid this mistake).

It also talks about how to design your own cables, combine cables in a project, choose the right yarn and needles and determine how many more stitches you need to cast on when working cables instead of stockinette stitch. There’s also a glossary of symbols and abbreviations you may find in cable knitting and other patterns.

The book provides a good overview of things you can do with cables, as well as some fun things you might not have tried like infinity cables and horizontal cables. It’s a great book for a designer who likes to work with cables or a knitter who wants to play with different stitches in their projects.

About the book: 176 pages, paperback, 100 stitch patterns. Published 2024 by David & Charles. Suggested retail price $26.99.

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