Frankie's Knitted Stuff
Giant chocolate buttons grow on this tree which stands against the side wall of the Gingerbread House. They are knitted in two shades of brown and in cream to represent milk, plain and white chocolate. The tree is knitted in Green DK weight yarn and the buttons in brown and cream. 3.25 mm / US size 3 needles are used for everything. I used Sirdar Country Style DK (155 m / 50g) shade 610, Village Green for the tree and shades 411, Cream and 530, Chocolate (what else?) for the white and plain chocolate. The milk chocolate buttons were knitted with Stylecraft Special DK (295 m / 100g) in Walnut.
The Tree
Using the long tail method cast on 25 stitches. Row 1: Cast off 10 sts, K to end (15 sts). Row 2: K3, turn. Row 3: Sl 1 kwise, K2. Row 4: Knit 15. Row 5: Cast on 15 sts, cast off 15 sts, K to end (15 sts). Row 6: Kf&b, Kl, turn. Row 7: Sl 1 kwise, K2. Row 8: Kf&b, K3, turn. Row 9: Sl 1 kwise, K3 (17 sts). Row 10: Cast off 12 sts, K to end (5 sts). Row 11: Cast on 15 sts, Cast off all 20 sts. What you should have now is a tree trunk with three branches at the top. This goes on the side wall with the door on. Pin the tree to the end of the wall, lining the base up with the bottom of the wall. Straighten out and pin the branches in place, one at a time. The bottom branch should be roughly horizontal, about 5.5 cm / 214" from the bottom of the wall. It should reach to about 6.5 cm / 21/2" from the corner of the house. Pin the top branch so that it reaches about 1.5 cm / 12" from the top of the wall and pin the middle branch in between the other two. Using ginger thread, sew the tree to the wall, working all round it and sewing through the top layer of knitting on the wall only.
The Chocolates
Using the long tail method cast on three stitches. Row 1: Purl. Row 2: K1, (m1, K1) twice (5 sts). Row 3: Purl. Row 4: SSK, K1, K2tog (3 sts). Cast off purlwise, slipping the first stitch purlwise. Darn in the ends. Make nine chocolates, three in each colour.
Pin six of the chocolates on to the tree and sew them on round the edges with ginger thread in the same way as you did for the tree. Then add the remaining three chocolates, overlapping them where necessary.
Abbreviations
st / sts stitch / stitches K knit sl1 slip one stitch kwise knitwise kf&b knit into the front and back of the stitch m1 make 1 by lifting the thread before the next stitch and knitting into the back of it SSK slip, slip, knit (see below) K2tog knit two stitches together slip, slip, knit Slip two stitches knitwise (or knitwise followed by purlwise) one at a time, insert tip of left needle into stitches from above, put yarn round right needle and knit both stitches together. Frankie Brown, 2014. My patterns are for personal use only and should not be used to knit items for sale. Please do not use them for teaching purposes without my permission.
