Three pairs into my 24 pairs of socks for my husband’s advent calendar already (well… only 21 pairs of size 47 to go, ha! Easy peasy… *WHAT WAS I THINKING????*) and guess what arrived today?? A box full of incredibly colourful, insane and beautiful yarns from Opal in Germany! Thank goodness my one year of yarn diet last year was such a success… Now I’m probably back to where I started.

I guess I have never been more excited about picking up a package from the mail office!

29 balls of pure happiness! I can’t decide which one to grab and squeeze first! Which one would you pick??

These are all colourways that are about to be released this year! So I’m incredibly excited to show you all these mouthwatering colourways during the course of this project. If you want regular updates and see more detailed pictures please follow me on Instagram @MumpitzDesign and subscribe to my newsletter here

So here are my first three pairs that I made until now and I only have 21 more pairs to knit until December 1st! (youcandoityoucandoiiiiiit!)

For the next pair I combined two colourways. The cuff is knit in k2 p2 ribbing, knits in green, purls in orange. I really love this pair!! (Hope my husband will, too!)

If you want to join me knitting 24 pairs of socks for your dear ones (or for yourself!) come and visit my group on Ravelry (we’ll be in the Adventscalendarsocking thread for this project).

Let me tell you a little more about the yarns.

Opal has been my all time favourite ever since I started knitting. I just couldn’t walk past their colourful skeins! It is a family owned business that  in its 30 years of work has achieved many incredible feats, not the least an entry to the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest line of socks (1289.8 meters of socks!) Imagine knitting 245,24 kg of sock yarns into so many socks?! (I think I’m good just knitting these 24 pairs this year…)

Oh, and there are free patterns on their homepage too (all in German, I’m afraid)

Did you ever wonder how they make and dye their yarns? Then watch this! Another childhood memory of mine, I used to love this tv-show where all things were explained in a child friendly way.  Follow the way from sheep to skein here:

I love this company not only because of the beautiful colours,, but also because they start up initiatives of my own heart, like supporting the Save the Rainforest project with their very own yarn collection in unique colourways. For 12 years now they raise money from yarn sales and private sponsors for this initiative. In 2017 they raised 187.000 €! Well done!!

These will be the new yarns for 2018 for the Rainforest collection that will be released on July 3rd 2018. Can’t wait to get started with these!!

They are even more beautiful in real life!!!

My pick for the first pair (or rather nr 4 for the advent calendar) will be Sascha, the Sommelier (how cool is that name??) I’m impatient to see how it will look knit up!

Another cool initiative is called Schafpate, the sponsorship for local sheepherders who tend to their animals in the old fashioned way and move around with the herds. You can see more pictures here

Since the start of the project they were able to collect 89.000 € from yarn sales and private sponsors.

This year Schafpate will celebrate it’s 10th anniversary with the release of these beautiful colourways (available from 28.9.2018). I’ll show you more pictures of the live yarns during the course of this project!

With all of these great examples I feel in good company and am really motivated to create more patterns to support the WWF now! Just last week I adopted another animal from them. If you would like to support this, you can find the patterns here Scrapyphant, knit a whale and Patty the Penguin

100% of the revenue from the pattern sale go directly to the
WWF (World Wildlife Foundation)

So now I’ll better be off and cast on the next pair of socks from this trove of yarns!!! Arrrrrrgh can’t wait to knit them ALL!

Happy knitting!

Don’t forget to follow me on Instagram for more pictures @MumpitzDesign