One of my favourite parts of starting a scrappy project is pulling out all the leftover yarn and seeing what’s there. I rarely begin with a perfectly planned palette. Instead, I start with what I already have and let the colours suggest where the project might go.

That’s part of the pleasure of making with scraps. You’re working with remnants from other projects, odd little balls of yarn and colours you may never have deliberately put together before. And sometimes those unexpected combinations end up being the ones you love most.

My current log cabin blanket has taught me exactly that. There are colour pairings in it that I don’t think I would ever have planned, but seeing them sitting beside each other has made me look at them differently. I’ve already made a few mental notes for future projects.

Whether you’re knitting a blanket, crocheting a shawl or adding stripes to a sweater, a little bit of structure can help all those scraps feel connected. But I think the trick is to leave enough room for surprise.

Start with what you already have

Before deciding what your palette should look like, pull out your scraps. Spread them across a table or the floor so you can see everything properly. At this stage, I wouldn’t edit too much. Just look.

You might notice that you already have lots of greens, quite a few neutrals, or perhaps more warm pinks and oranges than you realised. Often the beginnings of a colour palette are already sitting in front of you.

Rather than deciding on an exact colour scheme and then trying to find scraps to fit it, start by asking:

What is already here?

From there, you can begin building.

Sort your scraps into colour families

With your scraps spread out in front of you, try gathering them into loose colour families. It makes it easier to see what you have and which colours might work together.

I tend to group oranges, yellows and warm neutrals together, then greens, pinks and purples, and blues. How you group yours will depend on what’s in your collection.

You might discover that one colour family is much larger than the others, or notice a few shades that could connect different groups. Keep moving things around and see what catches your eye.

When I’m ready to cast on, each group gets its own bag. If I’m knitting and think, “Ooh, a blue would look lovely here,” I can reach for the blue bag and explore a few possibilities without searching through every scrap I own. The colours aren’t planned into a sequence—they’re simply easier to find as I go.

Choose a loose colour direction

Once I’ve looked through what I have, I like to choose a broad theme. It doesn’t need to be complicated or very specific. For my next blanket, I’m imagining lots of neutrals with pops of orange and peach, and probably some greens finding their way in too.

Another palette might begin with green as the main colour family, supported by creams and browns, with a little pink or yellow appearing occasionally.

I like thinking of it as:

main colour family + supporting colour + a small pop of something else

It gives the project enough direction to feel connected without making every colour choice predictable.

Think about light, medium and dark

Colour gets most of the attention, but value—the lightness or darkness of a colour—makes an enormous difference to how a palette feels.

If all your scraps are a similar depth, the finished project can sometimes feel a little flat, even if the colours themselves are beautiful.

I like to include a good mixture of:

light + medium + dark

For example, a pale cream, mid-tone olive and deep charcoal will create much more movement than three shades that all sit at roughly the same value.

If you’re unsure, take a quick black-and-white photograph of your yarn. It makes the differences much easier to see.

Add a few saturated colours

Once I have the quieter foundation of the palette, I like to add a few brighter or more saturated shades. This is where a scrappy project can really come alive.

Against a mostly neutral palette, that might be a vivid orange, coral or fresh green. If the project is predominantly green, perhaps the surprise colour is pink or golden yellow. You don’t need much. In fact, the brighter colours often have more impact when they appear only occasionally. They become little moments your eye discovers across the fabric.

Let colours repeat

Even in a very scrappy project, repeating a few colours helps everything feel connected. You don’t need a formal sequence. Simply letting the same cream, olive, rust or charcoal reappear every so often can create a lovely rhythm through your project.

Those repeated shades give your eye something familiar to return to.

Don’t remove every odd colour

It can be tempting to edit the palette until everything coordinates perfectly. But some of my favourite combinations in my current blanket are the ones I would never have deliberately chosen.

Before dismissing a scrap because it doesn’t obviously belong, try placing it beside a few other colours. Sometimes the unexpected colour is exactly what the palette needs.

It’s also one of the things I love most about making with scraps. It gives you permission to try combinations you might never consider for a more planned project.

Then stop planning

At some point, you have to begin.

Once I have a loose colour direction, a good range of values and a few colours I’m excited about, I stop trying to decide the entire project in advance.

I choose the next colour as I go. Sometimes I’ll place two or three possibilities beside the fabric and immediately know which one belongs there. Other times I’ll try something and change my mind. That freedom is part of the pleasure and the palette grows along with the project.

You don’t need to know exactly where every colour will go before you begin. Start with what you have, give yourself a loose direction, and then let the project surprise you.

Very often, that’s where the most interesting colour combinations appear.

Here’s a little cheat sheet to keep handy when you’re gathering your scraps or choosing the next colour.

Join us for Scraptober

This October, we’re gathering our scraps and making together—and we’d love you to join us.

I’m starting another Log Cabin Blanket and knitting a scrappy sweater, but any scrappy project is welcome: knitted or crocheted, big or small. There’s no set schedule and no need to finish in October. Start whenever you like and make at your own pace.

Visit our Scraptober at Skein Yarn page for the free blanket recipe, project updates and inspiration throughout the month.

We’d love to see what you’re making too. Tag @skeinyarn and use #SkeinScraptober on Instagram, or reply to one of our emails with a photo. With your permission, we’d love to share your photos in our newsletter and on Instagram, with credit to you.

I’m so looking forward to getting started and seeing what we all make from our little collections of scraps.