A Festive Family of Fast & Easy Patterns!
Just about a year ago, I introduced a fast & easy hat pattern called Jingle. It’s the perfect last-minute hand-knitted gift idea! Jingle is a quick and easy scrappy hat pattern with some super fun options. Choose your crown style, shaped or flat, then opt for a little decor. Partial to bobbles? Pop in a round! Enjoy a spot of color work? Drop in some whimsical triangles! You can choose from two stripe sequences too. Personalize Jingle with holiday colors as I’ve done or just use what you have on hand.
Worked upward from a toasty hemmed brim, the Jingle Hat knits up in no time and is sized for kids, ‘tweens and grown ups! Just 110 to 220 yards of the main color and 25 yards of each contrast color makes this jiffy-quick hat in worsted weight yarn. Trim Jingle with pompoms for bonus points!
And now for the JINGLE Mittens!
What could be better than this festive topper? How about matching mittens?!? This year, I’ve added spritely new mittens to the Jingle Family. Top the neatly hemmed cuff with puffy bobbles or opt for some simple stranded color work. Finish your mittens with a classic point or choose an amusing little I-cord loop. Whatever you choose, you’ll have a sweet little set in no time flat! Like the hat, they’re jiffy-quick in worsted weight yarn. I’m using Wool of the Andes from KnitPicks.
Designing with Stripes
I’ve loved stripes my whole life long. I find them energizing and engaging and they open up a whole world of color play. There are literally millions of stripe sequences and color combinations, which easily leads to option paralysis. Generally, when I’m working with stripes, I limit my color palette. I try to stay within 2 – 4 colors, plus a neutral. Isolating a neutral shade provides a “ground zero” for my color way and helps to anchor the color range. Want a clear, crisp color way? Anchor with white or off-white. Trying for a jewel toned effect? Try anchoring with chocolate brown or black. Looking for a soft, cloudy palette? Use gray or beige.
Once I’ve chosen a range of colors, I experiment with color sequences. Rather than knitting-and-frogging which is pretty time consuming, I organize my stripes like this. I cut a rectangle of stiff cardboard and begin wrapping the colored yarns around it. That way, I can quickly and easily modify the size and weight of the stripes, edit the order of the colors and the choose the degree of “neutral” I want in the scheme. With Jingle, you’ll see that I’ve chosen two sequences within my chosen palette. Version B is more intense and saturated, while Version A is lighter and airier. I hope you’ll experiment with lots of different options…it’s a real rabbit hole!
New to Knitting Stripes?
In the process of designing the Jiffy Hat, I shopped the world for ways to work jogless stripes. Believe me, there are dozens of methods, some more effective that others. I probably tried half a dozen ideas, none of which satisfied me. They all seemed to mangle the stitches at the beginning and ending of a round. In the end, the wisest advise came from Arne & Carlos. I’m paraphrasing, but the idea is to let stripes be stripes. Fix them the best way you can while weaving in the ends. There’s a lot you can do during finishing to get stripes to line up and there’s no margin in trying to pretend that knitting is anything but helical.
I hope you’ll enjoy the new Jingle Mitts! I’m getting myself set to make a Mardi Gras colorway. The “Big Party” is early this year. A Jingle-inspired hat and mitts set would look awfully pretty on the parade route, don’t you think?
