Knitting

Patterns, projects and techniques

Knit a Hug Shrug Any Way You Want it

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What we all need right about now is a comforting pattern to knit something that we can enjoy while we are at home. The Hug Shrug by Knitting Expat could be just the thing.

Not only is it a super cozy shrug that you will love to wear while you’re hanging out at home, it’s written to be totally adaptable.

As in, you can use any gauge yarn you want, from fingering to bulky. There are 13 different length options and 15 different width options. She did the math and that’s more than 1,300 possible variations. It’s worked as a big rectangle with a fun slip stitch pattern and seamed after the knitting is done. Cuffs are optional.

You can grab the pattern on Ravelry at the suggested price of £10, or check out the pattern notes for more info on her pay what you can plan.

[Photo: Knitting Expat.]

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Make Your Knitting Machine Scarves Better

I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve shared any patterns for our circular knitting machine users. I know these devices aren’t for everyone but even though I much prefer knitting by hand, it is kind of fun to crank things out on these machines.

One of the most common early projects for a circular knitting machine is a scarf. Which makes sense, because it’s just one long tube and you can make it as long as you like.

One problem that comes from knitting scarves on the circular knitting machine, though, is that it can be hard to know how to finish the ends of the tube so that it looks like a finished scarf and not a tube of knitting.

If you’re not a knitter or crocheter, the most basic way to finish a circular knitting machine scarf is just by cinching up the ends and maybe adding a pompom to each end to cover up any hole that might still be visible at the end.

But if you have a little knitting or crochet skill or are willing to learn, there are a lot of different options for closing up the ends of a scarf. And this would also be true if you hand knit a tube scarf!

I recently wrote a post over at Our Daily Craft that includes five different ways to close up the ends of a tube scarf:

  • the simple cinching method mentioned above
  • sewing the stitches together
  • three needle bind off
  • grafting
  • crochet bind off

Grafting is my favorite because I feel like it gives the cleanest, closest to a seamless look. If you’re a knitter you may already know how to do it but even if you don’t it’s not that hard to learn.

Do you knit tube scarves by hand or machine? I’d love to know how you like to finish them!