Knitting

Patterns, projects and techniques

Cat Knitting Patterns

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I almost titled this “knitting patterns for cats” but the projects shared here make cats, they aren’t strictly for your cats. Unless you turn them into cat toys, which is entirely your business.

If you have a tiny bit of DK weight yarn (though of course you can use other weights to make other sizes) and a few minutes to spare you can make a mini cat with this free pattern from Ravelry. Designed by a person cleverly named A knitter, this pattern takes about 20 yards or 18 meters of yarn, and you can make them any color you like. It calls for tiny doll eyes, but you can embroider the eyes just like you do the whiskers if you want.

The tiny car in a life preserver pattern from Anna Hrachovec is another cute and quick pattern that would be great to stitch up as a gift for the cat lover in your life. It’s made with 20-30 yards (18-27 meters) of fingering weight yarn, and of course you could knit the kitty without the life preserver but I don’t know why you’d want to resist its cuteness. You can find this pattern on Ravelry.

Getting a little bigger but still very cute in a different way, we have these pocket buddies from French Lavender Home on Etsy. The pattern uses worsted weight yarn and you can change up the colors and details to make them look like cats, dogs, foxes, bears… They’re worked flat and the little sweaters are part of the body, but there’s also an optional hat that’s worked separately. This is a great little skill building project because it includes duplicate stitch, stranded knitting and cables, depending on how you style the sweaters.

Gathered has an adorable cat knitting pattern that includes a little pair of overalls. There are different coloring options so you can make one to match your pet, or just use the yarn you have on hand. It calls for DK weight yarn and was designed by Sophie Jordan for Simply Knitting magazine.

Ginger and Smudge are sweet pudgy cats designed by Fluff and Fuzz. They’re shown striped but you could make them solid if you prefer, or add some duplicate stitch to the face to match your feline friend. These are worked with DK weight yarn and stitches flat for ease of knitting.

If you’re looking for the purr-fect knit cat, though, it might be these from Dot Pebbles. They’re worked with mohair blend yarns for the pettable fuzz factor, and they’re worked flat but joined as you go to make an interesting knit. And who can resist those little faces?

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Knit a Sweet Hood Covered with Flowers

I happen to live in the Northern Hemisphere, but I know we have a lot of Southern Hemisphere friends, too, who are heading into the cooler months as we are warming up. Whichever one of the seasons you’re in, you might want to  stitch up this sweet little hood.

This pattern by saskie&co is called snug hood and it uses two colors of yarn to make a close-fitting pixie style hood (almost a balaclava but it doesn’t cover your face, though there is a neck covering portion to keep you a little warmer). You can use the fingering weight wool and mohair held together that are called for in the pattern, or use a single strand of DK weight yarn.

The neck portion and the edging around the face are worked in ribbing in a single color, while the body of the hat includes an allover colorwork flower pattern. The project is worked both flat and in the round and there is colorwork that is knit flat, which means you’ll have to purl in colorwork (which some people don’t like; also, you can’t see what you’re doing as well on the back of the work).

The pattern comes in one size and the colorwork is charted. Testers noted this is a quick and easy project and a great way to learn some new skills (chart reading, working stranded colorwork flat) if you’ve never tried those things before. They noted the hood is cute, comfortable and warm, and a few said it didn’t take as much yarn as the pattern suggests, so bear that in mind if you’re trying to use stash.

Speaking of the pattern notes, check out all the cute color variations in the projects on Ravelry. From pink and red to blue and white to gray and cream, there are lots of great options to think about.

You can buy this pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: saskie&co]