Knitting Projects

Knitting Yarn Stash Busters

The Sirdar Loopa is a fast way to use up left over balls of yarn. You can produce a sumptuous boa style scarf in just a few hours.

Team a bulky yarn with a glamorous novelty yarn or just look through your stash and let your imagination run riot.

The Loopa comes in 2 sizes, is really cheap to buy and all the instructions are printed on the back.

Knitted Snail Hat

The pattern for these hats can be found in Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitting Without Tears. See our knitting book reviews for more details.

Knitting at the gauge given in the book produces an adult's hat, using a lighter weight yarn and knitting at 11 sts/ 10cm will give a child's hat and 12.5 sts/ 10cm will give a toddler's hat.

The toddler's hat shown in the picture was made with 1.5 balls (approx. 90m) of Rowan Little Big Wool on an 8mm, 40cm circular needle, changing to 2 circular needles as the hat decreases.

Be sure to choose a yarn with a good percentage of wool so you can steam the hat into shape, see our knitting tips & techniques section for more details.

Basic Ribbed Hat Knitting Pattern

A ribbed hat is a good way to practice continental style knitting with the yarn held in the left hand. It has the advantage of being faster than English style knitting, especially for patterns that require swapping between knit and purl, such as ribbing. It's also a good way to try out knitting in the round, either with 2 circular knitting needles or a set of double pointed needles or a combination of both.

Materials

2 x 4mm circular knitting needles and/or set of 4mm double pointed knitting needles.
Approx 200 meters of double knit yarn - 100% wool or a yarn with a high wool content to ensure the hat has plenty of stretch.

This hat is another great knitting yarn stash buster. You can easily use up small quantities of leftover yarn. Go mad with stripes or have the cuff in a contrasting colour.

Free simple ribbed hat knitting pattern. Click here.

Ideas for Novice Knitters

Simple felted bags are ideal projects for new knitters. They are very forgiving of uneven tension and it doesn't matter too much if it's a bit bigger or smaller than you'd intended.

When I get time I will post a suitable pattern, but there are several free patterns available online.

Knitwear for toddlers is another ideal beginners project. It will let you learn basic techniques such as increasing and decreasing and will be a small enough project for you to see progress.

If you aim for a few sizes larger than the child currently needs you should be OK even if it turns out a little bigger or smaller than it should be.