I love flowers, in the garden and as decorations on some my knitted projects. I always get lots of looks, comments, and questions when I wear my flower cowl. I admit, it’s rather unusual with randomly felted flowers sprouting between the stitches.
So here’s how they are done. You’ll need:
1. large size crochet hook
2. 100% wool yarn (not superwash) in colors you like
3. a bowl, hot water and a little soap
4. another bowl with ice cubes
Crochet loose circles. Use one color yarn for the flower center, another for the petals. Mix and match stitches as you like when you go around in circles to create a flat flower, about 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter. Take some loose threads and weave them through the flowers. You will end up with something looking similar like this:
Now comes the fun part! Put a squirt of dish detergent into the first bowl and add hot water from the tap. Immerse the flowers and stir them around. OMG – they are expanding. Don’t worry. Get your second bowl ready with ice cubes and a little cold water. Pick up a flower and roll it in your palm, hard, into a little ball, toss it back into the hot water. Repeat with all your flowers until they have shrunk and felted to the size you like. Toss into the ice water and swirl around. They are a bit big still? Repeat the hot water, rolling in your hands, followed by a dip in the ice water treatment. Don’t worry, you won’t hurt them. Roll them hard! Once you’re happy with the flowers, set them out to dry.
You may like to sew them on as a finish, however, I like to knit
them in as I go. I use a crochet hook to pull a loop of the working yarn through the back and then knit that loop loosely together with the next stitch on my needle.