Need the best printing and printer advice?

We have done a very basic non-scientific poll within our family and friends to bring this post.

I don’t know about you, but our humble printer has taken a beating since we have entered lockdown 3 weeks ago. I have had to print out a lot of documents for offline reading (how long can you read long documents on the screen?), the kids have assorted lesson plans for home schooling needs, and our whole household wants to try their hand at different games, recipes and all sorts of fun activities which can only be printed. I say all this is good news – as much distance away from a device for an offline activity is good.

There is, of course, a down-side to all of this. We have run out of not only printer paper, but printer ink. Twice! And our humble printer is showing signs of bulking against this onslaught of work. It never expected to bear a brunt of a whole household trying to use it 10x more than what it was intended for.

So we went searching for the best possible, most cost effective way to keep our printer running keeping in mind running costs and paper. At the same time, we wanted to find out what would have been the most economical printer. Here are our results, based on polling 25 of our friends and families and, of course, our own research.

So here are our poll favourites:

Most economical printer:

HP DeskJet 3755

Why? Compact, cheap and does it all. “It seriously does everything.”. – said the kids’ grandfather.

Second place:

Canon Pixma TR4520

Why? Not as compact, but faster than the HP. “I love the sharp colors it prints.” – said my brother in-law.

Most economical paper:

Face it, you don’t need to be printing reams of good quality A4 paper for every little recipe or project. These are the best recycled or throw away papers as voted by the quorom.

Buying bulk? Try the Hammermill 2500 sheet pack. “Best value for money.” – as ordered by the big family of cousins across the country.
Buying a small amount? Try the Xerox 500 sheet pack. “I don’t need much.” – said our lovely neighbour.

Do you want other ways to save on printing? Follow these tips from the group:

Only print when you need the most!
Print both sides – make it a default setting.
Print in draft mode.

This post contains affiliate links. If you buy something from those links, we get a small commission.

Looking for ink? Check out Cartridgepeople.com for the best online ink deals.

I’ve kind of fallen into a loom knitting rabbit hole lately. Long story short, I got burned out a needle knitting, so I figured loom knitting would be similar but not the same, and I am enjoying it, although it is slower than knitting with needles for sure (that might also be a good thing right now).

Most people start their loom knitting adventures making a hat (Marching North has a great basic beanie pattern that’s sized from preemies up to large adults, depending on the size of loom you use) or a scarf, where you just knit in rounds until you have a piece long enough to be a scarf, the sew the ends closed.

But there’s a lot more you can do, even as a person who is new to loom knitting, so let’s check out some more fun loom knitting patterns.

The first thing I made when I picked up a loom again was a couple of knit pumpkins. This is a super simple and fast project, and if you know me, you know I can’t get enough pumpkins (they are everywhere in my house this time of year!).

If you want to add a little cuteness to your loom knit hats for kids, check out the fruit hats from 5 Little Monsters. These don’t include a pattern but you can use your regular hat pattern and add the details.

Knitting looms are typically used in the round, which makes a stitch that looks like stockinette stitch, but you can also work flat and use a purl stitch to make fabric that looks like garter stitch. I want to try this garter stitch scarf from Loom a Hat (which I’m sure has lots more great projects you can try!).

And once you know how to purl you can also knit ribbing, so you can make projects like this loom knit coffee cup cozy from Good Knit Kisses. It reminds me of my Halloween coffee cup cozy, and since it’s knit flat you could duplicate stitch a face or anything else you want on there.)

Another easy flat knit project is this twisted headband from Marching North. It’s worked flat then joined into a loop, twisted and seamed. There are good photos in the post to show you what to do. And because it uses super bulky yarn it works up super fast.

Every time I went looking for loom knitting patterns I would run into this loom knit pickle pattern from One Little Project, so you have to see it, too. This would be a fun one if your family does a Christmas pickle ornament, though it’s worked with blanket yarn so it comes out pretty big.

Have you read?