Colorwork Knits for Spooky Season

I guess technically these are all Halloween knitting patterns, but they are really designs that you can knit and use and enjoy all fall long. From keeping your hands and your coffee cozy to making your couch cute, these designs are easy and fun to have on hand throughout spooky season.

Speaking of Halloween coffee cozies, I know I’ve shared this one a few times through the years but I can’t help but shout out my own Halloween coffee cup cozy (which you can also find on Ravelry, where you can see all the cute faces different people have given theirs). I’m thinking of doing more of these for different holidays (finally) so if there’s something you’d like to see let me know!

The Autumn Doodle Cup Cozy pattern from Jamie Lomax on Ravelry is a little classier than mine, and a fun way to use up some leftovers from other projects. It uses DK weight yarn and has options for stitching pumpkins, bats or ghosts on the design.

Or keep it simple black and orange with the Spooky Love Mug Cozy from Elisha Costa (My Comforting Crafts on Etsy). This one uses worsted weight yarn and has a coordinating hat pattern, too, if you’ve ever dreamed of matching your coffee. I haven’t but you know that would be a perfect look for the corn maze.

Moving on to mitts for you, these super cute Spooky Season Mittens by Anna Henriksson on Ravelry are covered in mini motifs for pumpkins, witch hats, ghosts and cauldrons. They come in one size and use super fine yarn to help get all those details.

And if you’re a fan of Hocus Pocus, you’re going to want to knit this spooky seasonal pillow from While They Dream on Etsy. In addition to the bold lettering it’s adorned with a cat, bat and a couple of spiders. It’s worked in two pieces in worsted weight yarn so you can use intarsia for the colorwork.

There are two schools of thought when it comes to instructional books about knitting. Either focus in one particular technique or kind of knitting (stranded knitting, say, or brioche) or try to cover a little bit of everything in a reference book that knitters will use throughout their careers.

The Knitting Book by Frederica Patmore and Dr. Vikki Haffenden aims to be the second kind. The subtitle is: a step-by-step guide to creating imaginative projects for the home and to wear. I’m not sure it does that, exactly, but it does include a quick look at a lot of different techniques and stitch patterns you might use in your projects.

A “guide to creating imaginative projects” sounds to me like it’s about design, but this book is not. There’s 1/3 of a page about altering patterns that only talks about how to add length to a sleeve and adjust where the increases go.

There’s nothing about measuring your body (the section on choosing a size in a pattern only suggests measuring a garment you already own), general garment construction, ease or stitch pattern multiples. The section on gauge (which is the last third of the page with choosing a garment size and altering patterns, discussed above) just says to knit a swatch, block and measure it to compare to a pattern, with no discussion on how you might use your swatch to design your own project or alter a pattern to meet your gauge.

If you ignore the subtitle, what you will find is a lot of information about different kinds of knitting and various techniques you might want to try on your projects. There are 20 cast ons and 15 bind off options, for instance, all discussed before you learn how to knit or purl. (Another quibble I have with this book is the order in which things are presented, but that’s relatively minor.)

You’ll find quick hits on increases and decreases, twists and cables, lace, colorwork, textured effects like fisherman’s rib and brioche, loops, mosaic knitting, double knitting, decorative stitches, shadow knitting, bias knitting, mitered squares, entrelac and more. There are tips for selvedge stitches, knitting with beads, adding buttonholes, picking up stitches and more.

A few patterns at the back give knitters a taste of some of the techniques included, but they’re not rated by skill level and the first one is a bias knit gradient scarf worked in six different colors of mohair, which isn’t a thing I’d wish on any beginner.

And I guess that’s maybe what my issue with the book is. I don’t know if it’s meant for beginners and it doesn’t seem to, either. I feel like this book would be overwhelming to new knitters and doesn’t really give you a place to start or all the information you might need to do projects well.

The variety of techniques included is fun, and there are also stitch patterns in the back you can use on your own projects, but again it doesn’t really provide any guidance for how to design your own projects so I don’t know how helpful all of that is.

I want to like books like this because having one reference that helps you with a lot of different things is great, I’m just not sure this is the one. If you can find it at your library or local book store and flip through it before buying, I think that would be a great idea to see if it’s a book that would be helpful for you.

And if you have this book and love it please let me know! I’m sure it’s good for someone I’m just not sure who.

About the book: 336 pages, hardcover. Published 2026 by DK. Suggested retail price $40.

Have you read?