Vikki Bird Designs

FOs of 2023 (2/2)
I haven’t done as much knitting as in previous years (hello return to formal employment), nor have I been especially good at record-keeping (or taking photos of FOs), but this is what I think I have knitted this year - 14 projects, which is too many for one post, so let’s round off with the non-socks (see previous post for FOs 1-8).
9. Rainbow cowl - for my daughter
10. Granny’s Favourite by .nicolson in Everyday DK - for a friend’s new baby
11. Cozy Flannel by - for my nephew
12. Baby blanket - my design, might write up one day - for a family baby
13. Flax jumper by in Forest Aran - for me
14. Shaun the Sheep jumper by - for my daughter

FOs of 2023 (1/2)
I haven’t done as much knitting as in previous years (hello return to formal employment), nor have I been especially good at record-keeping (or taking photos of FOs), but this is what I think I have knitted this year - 14 projects, which is too many for one post, so let’s start with the socks.
1. Vanilla socks in Regia Pairfect - for a friend
2. Vanilla socks in King Cole ZigZag - for my brother
3. Vanilla socks in Coop Socks Yeah! DK - for my husband
4. Vanilla socks in West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4ply in Brightside - for my husband
5. Vanilla socks in West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4ply in Nutcracker - for me
6. Christmas Cracker Socks in sparkle sock from Quack Yarn - my pattern .yarn
7. Vanilla socks in King Cole ZigZag - for a friend
8. Christmas Cracker Socks in West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4 ply and leftover sparkle sock from Quack Yarn - my pattern

My advent socks are done! And blocked! It’s a Christmas miracle ✨
These are for my husband, knitted using my Christmas Cracker socks pattern with a single colour for the body of the socks and leftovers from the original sample from .yarn for the coloured stripes. I need to get these wrapped and under the tree now.
Pattern is Christmas Cracker Socks by me. You can get 15% off with the code CRACKERS until the end of the year.
Happy Christmas Eve everyone!

Thank you for all the love for the Christmas Cracker Socks - I’ll be casting on a second pair as my advent socks later today.
Get 15% off with the code CRACKERS
Head to vikkibirddesigns.com or my profile for all the links you need.

Let’s take a look at all those colours!
The pattern is very nearly ready to go, thanks for all the enthusiasm so far this week 🥰
If you want a discount code when the pattern goes live, sign up to my newsletter.

🎄
The pattern is written and edited, just a few finishing touches to go…

Ooh… the tiniest sneak peek of my new pattern…
Coming soon…

It’s been a while…
New pattern coming soon…

Hot off the needles! A pair of festive socks for me.
I picked up this year’s Christmas colourway from a few weeks ago on a day trip to Newcastle. I love that it has gold sparkles ✨ I paired it with another WYS colourway - cobalt.
Probably ought to knit up the other festive colourways I have stashed…

Do I have a favourite pair of socks? No… but these are pretty special!
The yarn is by Trailing Clouds on Etsy. I stalked the shop for ages to get hold of some! The stripes represent the colours of the tube map, and I think each dyelot has them in a different order.

New socks day!
gifted these to me a couple of years ago, but for one reason or another, I didn’t wear hand knitted socks much last year and these ones got hidden away… it’s great to finally be able to wear them!

I appear to have switched straight from summer to autumn with my latest yarn purchase - I really want a big hug of a cardigan in autumnal yellow! Can’t wait to get this on the needles…
I don’t usually gravitate to autumnal colours, but a quick scroll through my camera reel tells me I use them quite a lot when I knit! Socks are: Contorto (red), Little Pine Cone (orange), Lynda (yellow - hello 👋🏻), Susurration (pale yellow) and some standard self-striping socks in some very autumnal stripes from Paintbox Yarns (gifted by a long time ago!). Named patterns can be found in my Ravelry, LoveCrafts and PayHip stores.
Are you team autumn, or longer for summer already?

Apparently I’ve started my Christmas knitting 🎄🎅🏻🎁
I love knitting socks, my husband loves wearing hand knitted socks, so it’s win win. I try to take a pressure off gift knitting by knitting things all year and just assigning them to the next gifting event. Sometimes there are lots of knits, sometimes there aren’t any. And that’s ok! It’s my knitting time, and I’m only going to knit what I want to.
Yarn is CoopKnits Socks Yeah! DK
If you want to knit your own DK socks, why not try my Milk Chocolate Socks? Available on Ravelry and PayHip.

Knitting things that make me happy… I’m a big fan of intarsia - I love seeing the picture emerge.
I designed these banners to be hung in windows in 2020, when trick or treating was cancelled because of lockdowns. This year I’ll be hanging them on the walls instead!
Each of these only takes a few evenings to knit. If you want to start easy and work your way up, the ghost is the easiest.
Available in my Ravelry, PayHip and LoveCrafts Stores.

Sweater weather 🍂
I’m going to trial something new over the next few months and share all the knits that bring me joy: not just socks, but intarsia, blankets, my patterns, other people’s patterns. Because right now, my knitting is just about what makes me happy, and hopefully some of it will make you smile too.
Sweater is Bright Above Me by I didn’t think yellow was my colour, but right now I’m considering making a cardigan in that shade. What do you reckon? 💛

These popped up on my FB feed a couple of days ago. Apparently I knitted them 8 years ago - they were an early pair of socks and I remember working on them at a friend’s house on holiday in Cornwall. I think I gifted them to my sister (if that’s not true Liz, then I’m sorry!).
I’ve knitted a lot of socks since then, I suspect over a hundred pairs (I don’t often record vanilla socks anywhere). And, true to form, there are more on the needles at the minute. Circumstances change, but socks always seem to stay…
How long have you been knitting socks?

I was hoping by now I might have most of a Vesuvius Tee to show off, but life has got in the way. Last night I finished the front and discovered that my gauge has totally changed between the front and the back 😭
What would you do?
1. Rip it out and start again?
2. Shove it in a bag for time out?
3. Just rip it out and use the yarn for something else?
4. Keep going and hope it all works out in the end?
I love the colour, but gauge issues and it being so slow makes me wonder whether this might be one to rip and repurpose…

Woohoo! I’ve finished the top of the back of my Vesuvius Tee (we’ll ignore that I am a week behind the CAL…). I’ve sort of enjoyed crocheting this, the colour is fab 💙, but it’s been slow going, and my gauge is quite different to that in my swatch as I relaxed into it. I ended up ripping back my first attempt and going down a size… On to the next section, and once the whole of the yoke is finished I’ll give it a block to check the length - I have a feeling the armholes are going to be a bit big. Good job I like problem solving 🤓
Pattern is Vesuvius Tee by
Yarn is Cotton 8 by

Ah, summer crafting… Let’s work with cotton, cotton is lovely and cool and breathable… Also, it’s nothing like working with wool! On the left, the swatch I had to do in three hook sizes before I got gauge, and on the right the Rift Tee that I swatched for, then cast on and knitted 8 inches of, only to find it grew massively when I washed it, so that’s essentially a very large new swatch. Fingers crossed one of these projects works out!

Default project right now: socks for my husband. Apparently he always needs more socks!
I bought this Coop Knits Socks Yeah DK for a completely different project years ago, but the project didn’t work, and the yarn got abandoned. Grey isn’t my favourite, but this one has a very subtle blue tone to it that makes it quite satisfying to knit up.
How’s your weekend shaping up? Mine features child chauffeuring today, but tomorrow looks like it might be a nice quiet one!

Have you ever enjoyed knitting something so much you knitted it twice? When I was pregnant with my smallest, I cast on the Wonder Woman shawl, and it was probably my favourite ever knitting project. I loved the geometry, short rows and logic, combined with simple garter stitch: it somehow absorbed all my attention, but in a relaxing way. Fast forward five years, and I finally found an excuse to make a second!

A recent revelation for me is that I love knitting gifts. I haven’t particularly previously, but I have embraced it in the past year or so now I’ve cut right back on sample knitting. My friend Lucy had admired by Wonder Woman shawl more than once, so I decided to knit one for her birthday. And here it is.

I loved knitting this, as much as the first time, even though I messed up the first yellow stripe on the first attempt and had to unravel the whole thing and start again, despite my attempts fix it (maybe short rows, decreases and tired don’t mix). In fact, I enjoyed it so much, I’m now contemplating, making another for me, possibly in royal blue and yellow, maybe in two shades of blue…

Have you ever had a pattern that you keep going back to? What’s your favourite project you’ve ever knitted?

Pattern by the fabulous

Yarn by from when she was Phileas Yarns (no longer dyeing)

It’s been a while… You might have noticed that I haven’t published any patterns for over a year now… Somewhere between my children growing up, an impending 40th birthday and a global pandemic, I lost my love for designing knitting patterns.

I’m still knitting, but most of my current projects are vanilla socks, with the odd knit for my kids that I’m knitting following someone else’s pattern. And right now that’s all I need.

I started a new non-knitting job towards the end of last year, which I love. I thought I might return to designing patterns during my free time, but right now I realise that I’d rather spend my free time with my family and friends than chasing deadlines.

This is not goodbye - my patterns are all still available in the usual places and I’m still responding to pattern support requests, but I’m much quieter on social media, just sharing my personal projects when I’m in the mood. There are a couple of patterns that I started designing before I started my new job - some have samples ready to go, and I’ve even taken photographs of a couple of them. And maybe one day I’ll release them as patterns, but I’ll let you know that as and when they’re ready!

Thanks for reading. I hope all is well with you and hopefully I’ll be in touch again sometime before the end of 2023.

One gorgeous little cardigan done and ready to post… I now just need to wait patiently for my friend’s baby to arrive!
Pattern is Granny’s Favourite by .nicolson, and I would thoroughly recommend it - I think this is the 9th I’ve knitted.
Yarn is Everyday DK by Knitcraft at
Also, aren’t daffodils the best?!

Want to make a gift you know will be received well? Ask the recipient what they want! One of my friends is about to have a second daughter, so she already has almost all the clothes she needs. But when I asked she said she would like a newborn/0-3 months cardigan in pink/purple. It’s so nice to be able to knit something and know that it will be used.
What’s on your needles this weekend?
Pattern is Granny’s Favourite by .nicolson It’s a classic and I’ve made *loads* of them over the past 10 years.

Hello! I mentioned half term socks, and here they are! All done and the ends are woven in. I usually block my socks before the first wear, but apparently it’s almost mid-March and these needed to go in the post today for there to be any chance of them getting to their recipient on time 🤷🏻‍♀️
Yarn is Zig Zag in the colourway Kaleidoscope. It’s one of my go to yarns for gift knits as it wears really well.
Do you always block your socks?

Half term knitting
Once in a while one of the kids requests a knit that sounds achievable, and like they might wear it… the latest in the list is a sparkly, rainbow cardigan with a hood and pockets and swirly buttons. Somehow I’ve managed to tick all the boxes with my pattern and yarn choices and am making good progress.
Yarn is Twinkle DK, and Baby Sparkle DK for the cuff. Pattern is Rainbow Child by Rebecca Newman. I have made several mods: pockets will be true afterthought, the sleeve decreases are more spread out and go all the way to the cuff, then I decreased again to pull the cuff in a bit. I’ve omitted the icord edges throughout.
I hope your week is as sparkly as this cardigan!
And of course, I do also have some socks on the needles - I’ll share them later in the week.

Good evening! Let’s end the week with a FO 🎉
I don’t have much time for knitting at the minute, and when I do knit it’s to wind down, or to keep my hands busy while I’m listening to or reading something. I find socks the perfect knitting for those occasions: portable and I can work on them without looking.
These socks are for a friend’s 40th (yep, I turn 40 this year too. Not sure how that happened!). The yarn is a Pairfect Colourway, from pretty deep in my stash. I love that the yarn takes all the guesswork out of making matching socks.
Have you finished any socks this year? Tell me all about them!

We had a really cold snap in December and I decided my fingerless mitts were really not cutting it, so cast on some mittens. I’ve been very grateful for them this last week as we’ve had another cold spell. Much as I’m enjoying having warm hands, I have learnt though that mittens aren’t all that practical with school runs - I keep dropping things 😂
Pattern is Counterbalance by Yarn is Bloomsbury DK by in Surf

First FO of 2023! 🎉
These flip-top, half-finger-gloves were a special request from a friend for her son. These were a labour of love - really fiddly and a dark yarn isn’t a great combination! But they will be well-used and the recipient loves them, so totally worth it.
I used the recipe from Knit Mitts by . Small word of caution: I would not recommend the book to anyone who doesn’t like maths - you have to look up the numbers for the pattern in tables, and I found a lot of typos, so I had to check all the numbers before actually knitting anything.
Yarn is Special DK in Emperor.

Hello! And happy new year!
I’ve been quiet on here recently because… drum roll please… I have a new job! All my kids are now at school, and knitting wasn’t bringing me the same joy it used to, so it was time for a change.
I am still knitting, and all my patterns are still available, but I might not bring anything new out for a while.
Easy projects are where I’m at right now, like these vanilla socks for a friend who turns 40 next month. What’s on your needles right now?