Christmas Robin Pattern for Next Year!

I mentioned before Christmas that I was selling at a few local craft fairs. Getting ready for these fairs I decided to make a few little hanging Christmas Robins, and am publishing the pattern I made up for these robins in all the usual places as a free pattern. Here it is on ravelry.

They are very little, so take just a few scraps of wool, but are great fun to make. When I first started writing knitting patterns, it was because I was really uncertain if it was alright to sell products made from other's pattern. For all my patterns I am quite happy for buyers to sell what they make in small quantities at local craft fairs, but not online or in a large volume.

It was hard to decide whether to wait until next Christmas, but as this is a very little pattern, I decided to bring it out now. I started off making red and brown, but then looking at the robins in my back garden, I also tried for some slightly more realistic orange and light brown colours.

So lots of time to make a few little birds for next Christmas, and I will republish this post next autumn as a reminder, so you can make plenty more. And I have time to try and get the perfect robin photo - but for that perhaps I need a sprinkling of snow.

Rockin' Robins

Finally the rain has stopped and the robins could go out to roost in the apple tree

I like mooching around charity shops, and recently found a small pile of knitting and sewing books. They had clearly been donated by one person. I bought this one for £1.50, which I thought was a bargain. It is jammed full of knitting patterns for all sorts of toys, but I think my favourite pattern is the one on the cover.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was trying to design a realistic robin for Christmas. Well, I think for the moment I am going to admit defeat. None of my robins looked very robin like. So I was left with a lot of brown and red wool, and thought I would have a go at Jean Greenhowe's little robin, which is part of the scarecrow pattern. They are really easy to make. It is Frankie's birthday tomorrow, and she said she would like to give each of her friends a little robin in their going home bags.

So I waited all yesterday for it to stop raining, so I could take a photo of the robins outside. But it seemed like the rain will never stop, so here is my first photo of the rockin' robins on my table indoors.  The rest of the brown wool has been used on another more autumny knit, which I'm in the process of writing up.