Cosy Tea Love

This colourful Fair Isle design features panels of hearts and little houses inspired by a croft house on the west coast of Scotland. 

The Home Sweet Home Tea Cosy pattern includes a knitting chart to make it with 11 pastel colours of Jamieson's of Shetland dk yarn and is knitted in the round.

It would be great project to practice colour work knitting using some of the traditional fair isle motifs.

Also included in the pattern are instructions for a 'Scandinavian' style colour way using just 4 colours of Jamieson's of Shetland dk yarn in red, white, light grey and dark grey.

Knitting skills used in the this project are:
cast on, cast off, knit stitch, purl stitch, knit two stitches together, slip stitch, pass stitch over, working with changes of colour, grafting, sewing duplicate stitch.

Tension: 
approximately 28 stitches over 32 rows = 10cm (4ins).

Suggested needle size:  
3.75 mm (US 5) circular knitting needle length no more than 50cm in length. 3.75 mm circular needle, 40cm long or a set of 3.75 mm dpn’s for the decrease section. For the cord x2 4.5 mm dpn’s (US 7).

Finished size: 
24cm x33cm (9.5ins x 13ins).

There are also instructions showing how to line the tea cosy with fabric.

Home Sweet Home Tea Cosy

is available to purchase and  

download from Ravelry

Birch Trees Scarf - Projects

With low temperatures, snow and ice around, it's definitely scarf weather again. This post features Birch Trees Scarf and some project images uploaded to Ravelry by knitters. 

There have been over 64K downloads to date of the Birch Trees Scarf knitting pattern from Ravelry. For my design I used size 4.5mm (US 7) needles with some of my shetland sheep DK wool in neutral white. 

Originally published in April 2014, the pattern is free to download.

I've picked out a few Birch Tree Scarf images from Ravelry of finished projects, made in different colours, different yarns, which caught my eye.

Image used with permission from Eight-by-Six

Image used with permission from Eight-by-Six

The above two images show a lovely version by Eight-by-Six, knit in Fyberspates Vivacious DK, in colour way Pebble Beach, on size 4mm needles. I love the stitch definition and slight variation in tone and shade.

Image used with permission from jayhen

I love the colours in this version by jayhen. The yarn is Debbie Bliss Luxury Silk DK in colour way 'Circus' made with 4mm needles.

Image used with permission from jayhen

Another recently complete version by jayhen. This one is mainly in Sirdar no1 in  Deep Navy. The bands of contrast colour are made with left over yarn from other projects.  

Image used with permission from PineLakeChic

I love the warm, rich red tone in this version from PineLakeChic. This knit project was the first one she had made in 30 years and how lovely it is. The yarn is Jaeger Matchmaker DK shade 781.

Image used with permission from BrunswickKnitter

Love the way this has been used as a shawl. This is a version knit for a shop sample by BrunswickKnitter on 3.75mm needles in Jupiter Moon Farm Zooey in shade purple.

Image used with permission from lindzfrog

In 2014 lindzfrog took on this project to improve her lace creating skills and made a fantastic job. The yarn is Moda Vera Fayette "Fuchsia Mix. I love the way the colour transitions from light to dark.

Image used with permission from sadieagility

And finally but not least, I love this version and the stitch definition by sadieagility. It's knit in a hand dyed and hand painted yarn in Merino/Bamboo using 3.5mm needles. 

Birch Trees Scarf pattern is free to download from Ravelry.