Knit Some Projects in Red, White and Blue

I always feel a little weird sharing patriotic (American) knitting patterns on this site, run by Australians and with a worldwide audience. I know a lot of our readers are American (like me!), and I also know that red, white and blue projects can become patriotic for lots of other countries, or the colors can be changed to whatever your nation’s flag is.

So while these patterns are big on red, white, blue, stars, stripes and even an eagle, you might be able to alter them to celebrate a different country, or even a sports team if you wanted. For more America-specific patriotic knitting patterns, check out these Fourth of July knitting patterns, and these patriotic American patterns.

This stars and stripes tote bag from Knitting Knicely on Etsy is a great example of what I’m talking about. It’s super cute with stripes in red and white, and the blue section even has 50 stars, just like the American flag. But if your flag has two or three sections of color, just divide up the length and make solid bands of color instead. Either way you’ve got a great, sturdy bag made with worsted weight yarn and a little national pride.

These tiny patriotic doll sweaters from Elena Alexeeva (Ravelry) would also be cute with a solid heart or stripes of the national flag of your choice. They’re worked in fingering weight yarn and are made to suit dolls or animals about 11-12 inches/28-31 cm tall.

Stars and stripes socks would be fun to knit and wear any time of year, even if you aren’t American. This design from Nadia Perepelitsa is available on Ravelry.

The Betsy Ross Beanie from Etsy seller Not Enough for Soup in mostly a solid color with a flag motif on one side. It uses fingering weight yarn and the flag is worked in intarsia. Add the stars as you go or stitch them in later with duplicate stitch.

And OK, this patriotic eagle pot holder isn’t red, white and blue, but it totally could be. I just couldn’t resist sharing this double knit masterpiece, which I would absolutely use all year long. This one is worked in fingering weight yarn and it’s also from Knitting Knicely, but I can’t find it on her Etsy shop so you’ll have to grab this one on Ravelry.

One of the fun things about knitters is that we will use a holiday theme on any kind of project. From Easter bunny socks to Christmas sweaters, there’s no combination of holiday motif and knitwear genre we won’t combine.

Case in point: Halloween cowls.

This fun cowl from Sweet Vireo Designs features large carved pumpkins and little cats and skulls. It uses two colors of DK weight yarn and I love the multicolored yarn for the background color on this one. And the braids! So cute.

Spooky Season by Jocelyn Tunney (also on Ravelry) uses fingering weight yarn in two colors to make a design with crescent moons and eyes. There are two circumferences and two heights available so you can make it a neck hugger or a slightly bigger project if you like.

Make more moons with the Broom Riding Cowl from Vanessa Ewing Knits. This two color pattern looks extra fun with a multicolored yarn for the colorwork, but you can use a solid as well. It calls for DK weight yarn but there is also a fingering weight version if you have some yarn in your stash you want to use.

Jinx Made has another fun Halloween cowl, this time covered in skulls. South Philly Skulls uses DK weight yarn and comes in two lengths, and there’s also a matching hat pattern, both of which can be found on Ravelry.

The Ghost Stories cowl from Melissa Knit Wear is a two-color cowl with ghosts of different sizes on the body. It uses DK weight yarn, and average sized skeins will allow you to get two cowls out of two skeins. It also calls for stitch markers to help you keep your place in the chart.

Or stitch up a cowl with a giant bat on it. The Nightling Cowl from Jen Immer uses DK weight yarn in two colors and has moons and a large bat on it. This pattern can be found on Ravelry.

How about spooky trees? The Weirwood Cowl from Andrea Krüß-Anders is inspired by the weirwood trees in the Game of Thrones books, and is worked in two colors of fingering weight yarn. You can find this free pattern on Ravelry.

If a bandana cowl is more your thing, try Cowloween from Tellybean Knits (on Ravelry). This colorful design is worked from the top down and features pumpkins, ghosts and candy colored stripes, and is worked in a light fingering weight yarn. There are kid and adult sizes available.

Have you read?