Project Notebook: Irish Coasters

St. Patrick’s Day is such a fun holiday, and it’s a great time for crafters because working some bright green into your wardrobe or decor this time of year is a welcome change from the drab colors of the end of winter.

I like really quick and easy projects for the “smaller” holidays like St. Patrick’s Day, because it’s not a holiday you get to keep your decorations out for over a long period of time. They can come up after Valentine’s Day (or Mardi Gras, in my house) and go right back down in favor of Easter decor.

One great way to infuse your home with a little St. Patrick’s Day cheer is to knit simple coasters in Irish colors or with shamrock shapes. They add a bit of color even when people aren’t using them, and they make keeping your table clean a lot more festive.

I whipped up a couple of versions that you can find over on CraftBits. There’s a solid color version with the shamrock worked in Reverse Stockinette Stitch, and versions showing the same pattern worked all is Stockinette in green and white. It only takes an hour or so to knit each one, so you can have a stack in no time.

While I was working on those, I was thinking about some red, white and blue coasters I made a long time ago and thinking about knitting some in the colors of the Irish flag. I decided to go with the same striping that’s found in the flag, and did both Garter Stitch and Stockinette Stitch versions, which you can find over at About.

Have you done any knitting for St. Patrick’s Day? I’d love to hear about it!

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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