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Quick Gift for Kids: Spool Gnomes with Knit Hats

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spool gnomesI love cute little handmade gifts and have been wanting to make my daughter some peg people for a while now. I was just going to paint them, but Jenni’s project from the Vintage Umbrella is a lot cuter.

Her little gnomes are made with little round wooden heads and wooden thread spools glued together. She wrapped a little bit of yarn around the spool to make “clothes” and knit a tiny hat for each little round head!

These little hats wouldn’t take much time at all; just add a little glue to some basic supplies from the craft store and you’ve got a great gift for a little one in your life.

[Photo via the Vintage Umbrella.]

Looking for more Christmas Gnomes? Check these free DIY tutorials out :

DIY Pinecone Gnomes — CraftBits.com

Christmas Sock Gnomes

DIY Christmas Gnome Wreath — CraftBits.com 

Looking for more Christmas themed Knitting patterns? Check out some of our favorite Knitting patterns on Etsy and

These Christmas Knitting Pattern Books on Amazon

Specific to knitters, you can join our Knitting Patterns Only group to get, well, knitting patterns, ask questions and gain inspiration for what to knit next.

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Knit a Blanket with the Texture of a Ceiling

Knitwear designers can get inspiration from almost anything when it comes to re-creating a color scheme, an image or a texture in stitches. Sometimes the inspiration isn’t always obvious in the finished project, but sometimes it’s more literal. 

That’s the way it is with the Tin Ceiling Blanket from Purl Soho. Not just because the inspiration is in the name, but if you’ve ever seen one of these old ceilings you can see that the design of the blanket is quite similar to the pattern of the tin tiles. 

This is also a good example of the idea that you don’t have to use fancy stitch patterns or lots of color to make a big impact with your knits. This single-color blanket (designed by Gianna Mueller and inspired by a washcloth and towel set designed by Sandi Rosner) is made completely with knits and purls, other than slipped stitches at the beginning of rows to make neater edges. 

The pattern is written out row by row, but there’s also a chart, which means this project is a great opportunity to practice reading a chart where you can check your work against the written pattern if you need to. 

It comes in two sizes, a crib blanket and a throw. The yarn used in the sample is an organic cotton sold by the cone, which is a great way to get a large quantity of yarn and have fewer ends to weave in. In fact, you can knit either size of the blanket with just one cone of yarn, which isn’t inexpensive but makes you a great, sturdy, heirloom quality but still washable blanket you’ll use for years to come. (Of course you can use any sport weight yarn you like to make this blanket.)

Check out all the details and grab the free pattern from Purl Soho. 

[Photo: Purl Soho]