Check out Kristin Nicholas’ New Fair Isle Hat Class

I don’t know how the online crafty classroom Creativebug escaped my notice for so long, but I was led there by something earlier this week and noticed that they have a brand-new class from Kristin Nicholas all about knitting a basic Fair Isle hat.

You should know from the outset that basic for Kristin still involves three colors, and some duplicate stitch to make it look more complex, but this really is a pretty easy pattern and, better yet, a pretty pattern.

Creativebug, it turns out, offers classes in all sorts of skills, from knitting and crochet to apothecary (soap and essential oil use), jewelry making, paper crafts, printmaking and more.

Some of the classes are available for free, while premium content (such as Kristin’s classes; she also has one on more general colorwork knitting) is viewable for $24.99 a month if billed monthly (or as little as $16.99 a month if billed six months at a time). Unfortunately you can’t buy a single class if you just want to see what their content is like, but you can look at the free stuff to get a feel for it.

Is anyone a member of Creativebug? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

[Photo via Creativebug.]

Fall will be here before we know it, and that means there are holidays coming right behind where we might be entertaining at home. It’s always fun to have a hand knit touch in your home for other people to see, and if you’re going to be in the kitchen all day you might as well have some nice knit dish cloths to use.

I love this little plaid hand towel from Darling Jadore. Use a little bit of leftover cotton yarn from another project for the plaid portion. It looks like the horizontal stripes are worked as you knit and the vertical stripes are done with duplicate stitch, making this a quick and easy project even newer knitters can make.

Combine garter stitch and an easy eyelet pattern worked sideways to make the Annette Dish Towel from Cluck Cluck Boots, which is meant to be reminiscent of flour sack towels. It calls for DK weight yarn and you can work it in one color or two (or even three!).

Add a little more texture with this set of kitchen towels from Whileberry Creative. They’re mostly worked in garter stitch with borders in easy knit/purl patterns, and you can work them in sport or worsted weight yarn.

Two of Wands Shop has another cute allover knit and purl pattern they call the Seersucker Textured Tea Towel. It’s an easy repeating pattern worked in worsted weight yarn, and there’s a chart in the pattern you can use, but don’t have to, if you want to practice knitting from a chart.

The Classic Cloth dish towel from Handmade Home by Connie is another one that can use a little leftover yarn in a contrasting color, or you could color block it our use stripes throughout the pattern. This one uses worsted weight yarn and another easy repeating knit purl stitch pattern.

If you like to hang your towel on the oven handle or elsewhere but it’s always falling off, try the Stay Put kitchen towel from Fancy Step Knits. This project is worked in garter stitch and includes a hole partway through so you can pull the towel through itself over a rod or handle. Stripes are optional but a nice addition.

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