Cozy winter crafting

Happy January friends! It seems that winter temperatures have finally arrived in our neck of the woods, and I’ve been busy snuggling in with lots of crafty projects. When it’s cold out, I turn to my knitting needles, crochet hooks, & embroidery projects. Paired with a movie & warm cup of coffee or tea, I’m in introvert heaven!! 😉

I’ve been puttering around in my craft room, and winding yarns to put on my peg board. Having the pretty colors up on the wall and out of bins and bags really encouraged me to dig in on my stash and do some knitting.

For hubby’s birthday, I started a pair of thick slipper socks. I’ve finished one and the other is still on the needles. The pattern is from Ann Budd’s “Getting Started Knitting Socks”. 

My new baby nephew arrived and for him, I knitted 3 soft baby washcloths and crocheted a baby blanket using this pattern. 

I’ve knitted lots of these miniature washcloths. Some are for dishes, others for baths. I love hand-knit cloths! For dishes, I usually use Sugar & Cream or Peaches & Cream cotton yarn from Wal-Mart or Michael’s. For washcloths, I prefer a soft organic cotton, like this one from Joann.

I use the traditional diagonal washcloth pattern, but adjusted it for my liking. I like smaller cloths, about palm sized. I’ve added the pattern at the bottom of the post if you’d like to try it out. It’s perfect for beginners!

With Valentine’s Day a little over a month away, I decided to make Harper a blanket of her own, in the same stitch as the one I made for my nephew, but I adjusted the pattern to a much larger size so that we can both snuggle under it. 

For her blanket I’m using Homespun yarn from Lion Brand Yarns, in the Cherry Blossom colorway. 

I’ve got more projects in the works, but a few of them are surprises so I won’t put those up until they’re finished! 

Here is my miniature washcloth pattern. 
I use size 8 or 9 needle and the yarn is listed above.

Cast on 4 stitches.
Row 1: knit.
Row 2: K2, YO, knit to end.

*Repeat Row 2 until you have 25 stitches, then the next row begins the decreases.

Row 3: K1, K2tog, YO, K2tog, knit to end of row.

*Repeat Row 3 until you have 4 stitches remaining, bind off.

Thanks for visiting! Hope you all are having a cozy month! 🙂