Decorate Your Home with Spring Flowers

In the past I have shared with you a lot of ideas for knit flowers, and I thought it might be fun this year to look at patterns that include flowers that you can use all over the home.

OK, the flowers on this one are technically crocheted. But the pillow itself — from Better Homes and Gardens — is knit, and it’s really just too lovely to pass up. The crochet involved is simple, or choose a knit flower to add to the pillow instead.

This knit floral tea cosy from Justjen Knits and Stitches is so adorable I want to knit it even though I don’t ever use tea cozies. It looks like a knit garden, complete with little insect buttons for extra cuteness. She has another version that is just done with flowers that would be a great stash-buster, too.

Whimsical Knitting Designs has a nice flower-shaped washcloth, and the semi-famous almost-lost washcloth by Simply Notable has a bit of a flower shape as well.

Lorna Miser has designer a pretty flower pillow that’s offered as a free pattern from Brown Sheep; I know a little girl who would love this one!

And for slightly more whimsical choices, check out Frankie Brown’s posy flower ball and the flowering cactus pattern from Alice Buerkle (it’s actually a TP cover!).

Generally I like knitting patterns where I feel like you can use whatever yarn you have (because my stash is big enough and I want to use it, thanks) and make a successful project. This is one of those times when a special yarn makes the process that much easier.

The Floral Bouquet Shawl from Xandy Peters uses a specific extended color pooling yarn from Feisty Fibers, which allows you to place the bobble flowers with increasing frequency as you knit the project.

It starts with a solid color yarn, then the two color yarn is added in, and you make a bobble whenever you encounter the color pops. This would be hard to replicate with other yarn that doesn’t have the extended color pooling built in.

The background of the shawl is ribbed, making the project reversible.

The shawl uses fingering/sock yarn and comes out to be an asymmetrical triangle that’s 54 inches/137 cm long and 36 inches/ 90 cm deep and 60 inches/150 cm across the top edge.

Xandy says the pattern is for intermediate to advanced knitters. Knowing how to work traditional bobbles would probably help, but there’s a great video tutorial for how to work the floral bobbles so you can practice on other yarn or even incorporate the bobbles into other projects.

The bobbles are five-petaled flowers but they also kind of look like starfish to me, which could be fun on a child’s cardigan or other pattern. They’d also be fun on the leg of a sock or around the brim of a hat for extra whimsy.

The pattern includes photo and video tutorials, and written and charted instructions. It also includes tips on what to look for if you choose to use different yarn for the project, and instructions on how to dye your own yarn to use in the project.

If you want to give it a try, you can find the pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: Xandy Peters]

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