New pattern: Candy Cones

Introducing Candy Cones, a collection of little stuffed ‘trees’ which I designed to brighten up my apartment during the holidays. I've been wary of putting up a proper Christmas tree because my cats like to get into absolutely everything, so I designed these as a safe (and cute!) alternative. With five texture options, you can choose the difficulty level according to what you feel like knitting: stockinette, or mini bobbles, or fiddly travelling cables. And they’re so nice and quick it’s hard to make just one.

Inspiration & design journey

The cable textures for these little cones went through a number of iterations, and taking them from my rectangular swatch to the actual cone shape threw up a few surprises. It turned out that dotting the diamond-trellis and swirl cables with bobbles made for a much too fiddly knitting experience once shaping was brought into the mix, so after some head-scratching I edited out the additional bobbles. I want these little cones to be fun to make as well as to look at, and sometimes making things extra complicated is just not worth it. While the final cable textures are still fiddly, especially in the later rounds, they’re still doable - and those last few rounds are over in a flash!

Yarn requirements

When I was choosing my yarns for this pattern, the most important thing was colour. I wanted clear, cheerful colours in pinks and greens, ideally available in smaller balls or skeins so that I could use a few different shades. I settled on Scheepjes Stone Washed (78% cotton, 22% acrylic; 142yds/130m per 50g ball) in Tourmaline, Rhodochrosite, Turquoise, and Malachite for my cable and bobble textured cones, which has a subtle semi-solid look that shows off the textures well. For my stockinette cones I used Scheepjes Twinkle (75% cotton, 25% polyester; 142yds/130m per 50g ball) in 923, 926, 934, and 941, which has a pretty lurex sparkle that’s tricky to capture on camera.

Special techniques

Each cone begins with a Pinhole Cast On. My favourite tutorial for this method is this illustrated one by Emily Wessel of Tin Can Knits: Pinhole Cast-On.

After working the base in garter stitch, it’s time to pick one of the five texture options and knit the cone. If you haven’t tried knitting mini bobbles before, you might find my tutorial useful: How to work mini-bobbles. And if you’d like to try my favourite method for working the little 1-over-1 cables, I have a tutorial for that too: How to work mini-cables without a cable needle. A few of my clever test knitters added beads to their cones, which is a really cute modification! I’m currently working on a tutorial for a beaded cone as a bonus option, so look out for that in the next few days.

I recommend adding a circle of cardboard or plastic to the base of the cone just before you work the first decrease round, to keep the base nice and flat. You can also add tiny weights on top of the circle if you wish (e.g. poly pellets or pebbles). Begin to add stuffing to the cone when you are about two thirds of the way through the patterned rounds, and then add more just before you work each remaining decrease round. I’ve included the photos below as a visual example of when to stop and stuff.

Candy Cones features:

• Stuffed decorative cones (or trees) with five texture options to suit your preference

• Each cone requires less than half a 50g ball of sport weight yarn: 47yds/43m (for stockinette cones) or 67yds/61m (for patterned cones)

• Shown in Scheepjes Stone Washed (78% cotton, 22% acrylic; 142yds/130m per 50g ball) and Scheepjes Twinkle (75% cotton, 25% polyester; 142yds/130m per 50g ball)

• Choose a springy yarn to make the cable and bobble textures easier to knit

• Dimensions when stuffed: 3.25”/8.5cm diameter at base, and 7”/18cm tall.

I can confirm that they stand up to cat shenanigans pretty well! One cone even survived a stabbing with a plastic pterodactyl beak at the hands of my four-year-old nephew, which is pretty impressive if you ask me.

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Find out more about my Candy Cones pattern, including Ravelry and Payhip purchase options.

New pattern: Braeburn Mitts

Fellow colourwork lovers, this one’s for you! I’ve designed the Braeburn Mitts to show off three colours of Appledore DK, and I couldn’t resist naming them after my favourite variety of apple, which is always one of the first things I buy when I fly home to New Zealand. Because you only need a small amount of each colour, these mitts are a perfect project for mini skeins and odds and ends. The pattern includes three sizes, and options are included for shorter or longer cuffs.

Inspiration & design journey

This is one of those designs that all started with the yarn. I had a shade card and some little samples of this lovely woolly heathered yarn, and I decided a pair of colourwork mitts would be the perfect way to show it off. I wanted to use three colours instead of my usual two for extra richness, and I wanted to use a smaller motif to make it easy to include multiple sizes. After a lot of charting and swatching with my samples I had a motif I loved, of highly stylised little trees. The next puzzle to solve was the thumb gussets, which went in a few directions before I settled on a pattern of clean vertical lines branching out from the increases along the edge.

Yarn requirements

To knit these mitts you will need small amounts of three colours of light DK or sport weight yarn suitable for colourwork. For my two sample pairs I used mini skeins of Appledore DK, a blend of 40% Devon Closewool, 40% Romney, and 20% Exmoor Blueface wool, with 68yds/62m per 25g mini skein. For the smallest size you will need one mini skein of each colour, and for the two larger sizes you will need two mini skeins of the MC or background colour and one each for the contrast colours CC1 and CC2.

The Appledore colour names are wonderful, and are all taken from apple varieties. My samples feature the shades ‘Hangy Down’, ‘Whimple Wonder’, ‘Golden Knob’, ‘Foxwhelp’, and ‘Pig Snout’!

My little yarn-thief Miss Tiny had a great time wrestling with my mini skeins before I managed to rescue them! She loves a good woolly yarn.

Special techniques

The pattern includes a few of my favourite tips for knitting beautiful colourwork, including on colour dominance, swatching, and managing tension. One additional trick, which you may have used before when knitting stripes, is ‘carrying up’ each colour until you need it again instead of breaking the yarn and having a daunting number of ends to weave in. I found I had nice tidy colour changes if I twisted my CC colours together every couple of rounds.

Using mitten blockers is another great trick for nicely finishing your mitts - I made my own out of takeaway container lids using this tutorial by designer Åsa Tricosa: Glove & Mitten Blockers in 10 min.

Braeburn Mitts features:

• Fingerless mitts in stranded colourwork featuring stylised tree motifs and bold corrugated ribbing

• Three sizes are included, to fit 5.5-6.5 (7-8, 8.5-9.5)”/14-16.5 (18-20.5, 21.5-24)cm palm circumference with -0.5”/1.25cm to +0.5”/1.25cm ease, and options are given for shorter or longer cuffs

• Requires 66 (79, 104)yds/60 (72.5, 95)m of MC or background colour, 30 (36, 50)yds/27 (33, 46)m of CC1, and 30 (36, 44)yds/28 (33, 40)m of CC2 in light DK or sport weight yarn (shown in John Arbon Textiles Appledore DK)

• Size 2 shown in MC ‘Hangy Down’, CC1 ‘Whimple Wonder’, & CC2 ‘Golden Knob’, with short cuff, and Size 3 shown in MC ‘Foxwhelp’, CC1 ‘Golden Knob’, & CC2 ‘Pig Snout’, with long cuff

• Choose a wool or wool-blend yarn suitable for colourwork, in colours with sufficient contrast

• Dimensions, relaxed after blocking: 6 (7.5, 9)”/15.25 (19, 23)cm circumference, and 6.75 (6.75, 7.5)”/17 (17, 19)cm total length with short cuffs for Sizes 1 & 2 and long cuffs for Size 3.

Find out more about my Braeburn Mitts pattern, including Ravelry and Payhip purchase options.