My November bullet journal setup started out life as my October bullet journal setup (which never actually came into existence, as a result of the aforementioned lack of enery). I had an idea for a setup inspired by one of my favourite knitting projects: my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, with colouring pencil ‘colourwork’ designs and kraft paper accents. By the start of October, I’d just about managed to finish the layout & coloured patterns, but hadn’t gone beyond that and made the setup, you know… functional.

Around mid-October, I figured I’d be better off putting my energy into my November setup, rather than finishing off the October one. It seemed a waste to leave all of that colouring/effort behind, so I decided that I would just convert my October setup into a November setup: the pumpkins aren’t quite so relevant, but November’s still autumn here in the UK, so I think it still works??

Anyway, enough chit-chat! Let’s get into the setup…

Table of Contents

• Equipment
• Cover Page + Things to Look Forward to
• Monthly Calendar
• Autumn Bucket List + Daily Sunshine
• Weekly Spreads
• November Review
• Final Thoughts

Equipment

To create this setup, I used the following equipment:

• Uni Pin Fine Line pen: 0.5, sepia.
• Colouring pencils (brown, orange and green).
• Kraft paper.
• Scissors.
• Corner rounder.
• Glue stick.
• Sakura Quickie Glue pen.
• Alphabet stamps + ink pad.

Cover Page + Things to Look Forward to

For my Cover Page, I decided to fill the whole page with the colourwork design. Admittedly, this took a rather long time, but I think it really sets the scene for the rest of the setup. I used the alphabet stamps to write the ‘November’ heading on a piece of kraft paper and my brown fineliner to add a ‘stitched’ border around the edge (I was on a bit of a fibre-craft theme this month), then stuck that in over the top of the colourwork design. I really love how this turned out (even if it was pretty labour-intensive to make)!

Alongside my Cover Page, I included a spread that I’ve been really enjoying in recent months: my Things to Look Forward to Page. On this page, I can jot down all the fun things I have coming up throughout the month, so that I can check in on them from time to time and get re-excited all over again. Fun!

Monthly Calendar

To protect my sanity, I opted to draw just the chevron pattern from my colourwork design as the decoration on most of the other pages in this setup, and for my Monthly Calendar I opted to place it near the bottom. For the calendar itself, I stuck in little squares of kraft paper, then wrote in the dates with my brown fineliner (the alphabet stamps I was using sadly do not contain numbers). Finally, I stamped in the ‘November’ heading vertically, down the left-hand side of the page.

I had actually already set this spread up back when the setup was still in its October phase, so I had to add a few more kraft paper boxes to the end of the month to fit November’s layout (which is why there are 5 blank boxes in the top row… needs must!).

Autumn Bucket List + Daily Sunshine

Next up, we have my Autumn Bucket List and Daily Sunshine pages. I used a similar chevron pattern to decorate these spreads as the last spread (only with two stripes this time, rather than three), placing this decoration at the top of the left-hand page and the bottom of the right-hand page.

I plan to use my Autumn Bucket List page to jot down some of my favourite autumnal activities that I don’t want to miss out on before this season ends and the snowy, festive season begins! Autumn is my favourite season and I feel like I’ve missed a lot of it these past two months, so I really want to capitalise on the last of the cosy reds and golds!

My Daily Sunshine page serves exactly the same purpose as usual: each day, I write down one thing that happened that brought me joy or was just, in general, very sunshine-y. I’ve opted for a grid format this month, though I usually prefer a vertical format (it gives me more space to waffle!), so we’ll see how that goes.

Weekly Spreads

Into my Weekly Spreads now and I’ve used my classic layout again: trimmed down central pages, leaving a section on both the far left and far right exposed. In those exposed sections, I put my ‘master task lists’ (i.e. tasks I need to do, but don’t necessarily have a specific date for), so that I can refer to them easily throughout the month. The internal, trimmed-down pages then house my daily task lists, separated out into individual weeks.

I used a long piece of kraft paper for each of my master task lists. This means that no matter which page of the weekly spread section I am on, there is always a kraft paper accent to the spreads, so I was able to tie this section into my theme with minimal glue-ing in & effort.

For the weekly spreads themselves, I decorated the right and left side of each spread with that same two-stripe chevron design, though this time I drew it going vertically down the length of the pages and added some additional dots of colour to the pattern.

For the daily task lists, I split each spread up into 8 sections (4 down, 2 across). I used my brown fineliner to draw a ‘stitched’ border around 7 of the sections, leaving the final section plain, so that I could use it for the weekly subheadings, which help me to navigate through this section of the setup.

Finally, I used my alphabet stamps to add the weekly subheadings. As I mentioned, this particular alphabet stamp set doesn’t include numbers, so I had to write those in with my brown fineliner. It doesn’t look amazing, but I was kind of losing the will to live by this point, so I let it slide.

November Review

Finally, we come to my November Review spread! The layout of this one is exactly the same as in its previous iterations: on the right-hand page, I have the ‘November Review’ heading (here, stamped onto pieces of kraft paper) and a big space for sticking in a polaroid at the end of the month. On the left-hand page, I have sections for noting down the ATP & WTA (tennis) Top 10 players, a favourite memory and my 6 favourite songs of the month.

I also recreated the full colourwork design from the Cover Page on the right-hand page of this spread, just to really tie it back to the theme (and because I think it will make a great backdrop for the polaroid!).

Final Thoughts

I really love this spread and I’m so glad I opted to carry on with it instead of letting it go to the bullet journal graveyard when October got too overwhelming to finish it off. It was quite labour-intensive, but I think it’s really functional, autumnal and nice to look at, which is exactly what I need in a bullet journal setup this time of year! Admittedly, it probably does suit October slightly better than November (mainly because of the pumpkins), but what’s a girl gonna do? Sometimes life just gets in the way.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about my November bullet journal setup!

Gemma

xxx

Also, a slight disclosure: I actually haven’t blocked this jumper before taking these photos (I just gave it a heavy steaming), because I wanted to get this post out before we get into the festive posts! Please rest assured that I will be blocking it (and, if you see any bumpiness… no you don’t).

Table of Contents

• The Pattern
  • Adapted Charts for Size L
    • Chart 3
    • Chart 5 & 6 (combined)
    • Chart 7
• The Yarn
• The Knitting Process
  • Neckline
  • Short Rows
  • Colourwork
  • Hem/Cuffs
  • Sleeves
• New Techniques
• Final Thoughts

The Pattern

I was inspired to make this sweater after seeing the pumpkin sweater made by Tiny Human Knits, which was itself inspired by a commercial sweater. Just like Tiny Human Knits (or THK, as I’ll be referring to her for the rest of the post), I used the Strange Brew pattern by Tin Can Knits for the actual jumper construction. This pattern is kind of a build-your-own sweater recipe: it contains lots of different puzzle-piece instructions that you can join together to make the perfect jumper for you. I also relied heavily on the notes on THK’s Ravelry project page for her sweater, which include LOADS of information & tips for making the sweater.

Using the Strange Brew pattern, I followed the instructions for the top-down sweater in size L (which is significant, because THK’s sweater was made in size M/L, so the charts were made to suit the stitch counts for that size and I did have to adapt a couple of them for the larger size). I adapted the ribbed neckline to created a folded-over neckline (because I thought it would look cool). I also added German short rows (following THK’s instructions) underneath the neckline, on the back.

This was actually my first time making a yoked sweater (or any fitted sweater really, my jumper experience before this was limited to two, boxy Weasley jumpers…). Of course, being me, I decided to go all out with a pretty complicated colourwork situation for my first foray into sweater-making. As recommended by THK, I used the Ladderback Jacquard Technique for most of the colourwork sections (which I had practised a lot while making the two hat swatches!).

Adapted Charts for Size L

As I mentioned I had to adapt some of THK’s colourwork charts to suit the stitch count of the size I was making (L). Charts 1, 2 & 4 were all absolutely fine, so I just followed them directly from THK’s Ravelry page. For the other charts though, I did have to make a few alterations to get them to work. You can find them here (I’ve given the basic chart for each one first, then the one with red lines to indicate where I placed my ladderback stitches, for reference):

Chart 3

Chart 5 & 6 (combined)

Chart 7

The Yarn

After copious testing of various different colours and combinations (you can read more about that here), I finally settled on the following yarns/shades:

• Yarnsmiths Merino Sock, in the shade Rich Brown (2K079)
• Scheepjes Metropolis, in the shade Liverpool (065)
• King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, in the shades Aran (046) and Willow (3942)

I wasn’t quite sure how much yarn I’d need of each colour, so I played it safe and ordered more than I thought I would need… I guess there’s some more pumpkin hats in my future, because I now have quite a lot of leftover yarn! I kept track of how much yarn I used throughout the process, so, to give you a rough idea, if you want to make your own Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, I used the following amounts of each yarn:

Yarnsmiths Merino Sock, Rich Brown (2K079):

• 235g (3 skeins, with about 2/3 of a ball remaining).

Scheepjes Metropolis, Liverpool (065):

• 55g (2 skeins, with most of the second ball remaining).

King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, Aran (046):

• 81g (2 skeins, with just under half of the second ball remaining)

King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, Willow (3942):

• 8g (1 skein, with most of the ball remaining).

The Knitting Process

This project was a big challenge for me, being my first time knitting both a yoked and a colourwork sweater. It involved a lot of planning and intense thinking beforehand, but the actual knitting process went pretty smoothly, which was a relief! I did make some adaptations along the way (and, inevitably, ran into a couple of problems here and there), which I’ll talk about now:

Neckline

The original Strange Brew neckline is just a simple ribbed situation. I was 100% thinking that I would work my neckline according to the pattern when I started out, so I wanted to make sure my cast-on edge was nice and neat (and suitably stretchy). To achieve this, I opted to use the Alternating Cable Cast-On and, though it is a bit moot now, I really liked the slight picot effect it gave!

About halfway through the ribbed section, I decided to make a folded neckline instead (hence the moot-ness of my pretty picot cast-on…). I just thought that a folded neckline would make the jumper look that little bit more neat and professional, so I decided to go for it!

To make the folded neckline, I just knit double the length of rib the pattern called for (i.e. 2.5 inches instead of 1.25 inches). When I’d finished knitting the jumper, I went back with some brown yarn and used a whip stitch to secure the cast on edge to the base of the rib on the inside of the jumper (I used the first row of purl bumps as a guide). I made sure to keep my stitching loose, but neat, to preserve the stretch.

Short Rows

Like THK, I included German Short Rows in my sweater, to help it sit better. The Strange Brew pattern does contain instructions for adding opitional short rows, but they are worked after the yoke, which I didn’t really want. Instead, I opted to follow THK’s instructions and worked my short rows right after I finished the neckline (before starting the colourwork yoke), on the back of the garment.

I did, however, skip the ‘knit 1 row, purl 1 row, knit 1 row’ section from THK’s notes, just because I didn’t really want a visible purl ridge on the yoke.

Colourwork

As recommended by THK, I used the Ladderback Jacquard technique for the majority of the colourwork sections (basically anywhere where there were gaps of more than 5 stitches between a single colour). To set up my ladderback stitches, I followed this tutorial from knitdarling.com. I found that I preferred setting up the stitches by working a M1L increase purl-wise, as opposed to a backwards loop cast-on, which I also (accidentally) tried out when making my hat swatches. I purled all of my ladderback stitches throughout, to make the inside of the sweater extra neat (because, that way, all of the ladderbacks appear as knit stitches from the back).

I did run into a little bit of trouble with the increase rounds of the yoke distorting my colourwork, so I did have to do a little bit of trial and error to work out the best places to work those rows. In the end, I worked the increase rounds on the following rounds:

• Increase round 1: Row 1 of Chart 1
• Increase round 2: Row 2 of Chart 2
• Increase round 3: Row 18 of Chart 2
• Increase round 4: Row 3 of Chart 5

I also added 2 more rows of plain brown before starting the colourwork (on row 6) in Chart 1, just to suit the size L a little better.

The one real problem I ran into with this pattern was The Jog, where the colourwork is slightly offset at the beginning of the round (on mine, this was at the centre back in the yoke, then under one arm after splitting for the sleeves). The Strange Brew pattern talks about this in depth, so I was fully prepared for it, but I did get myself into a bit of a pickle with it, where I thought I’d made a mistake, so dropped down, ‘fixed’ it and then couldn’t for the life of me figure out why my colourwork wasn’t working. I stared at it for ages, trying to find the problem, then gave it to my mum, who also stared at it for ages, before she was eventually able to work out what I’d done (spoiler alert: I hadn’t made a mistake— The Jog tricked me…)! Phew.

Hem/Cuffs

The Strange Brew pattern recommends going down to the smaller needle size (2.75mm, instead of 3.50mm) for the ribbed hem/cuffs. I opted to use 3.00mm needles for my rib, instead, just so they didn’t pull in too much. 2 inches of rib ended up being about 21 rows at my gauge.

To cast off both the hem and the cuffs after the ribbed sections, I used HiyaHiya Grandma’s Stretchy Bind Off, making sure not to do it too tightly (which is a longstanding, unfortunate habit of mine). I like this cast off for rib, because it looks nice and keeps everything nice and stretchy.

Sleeves

To make sure that my charts fit the sleeves, I opted to pick up a handful more stitches than the pattern called for at the underarms: 11 and 12, respectively (before and after the centre marker), for a total of 96 stitches for each sleeve (instead of 92). I made sure to pick up the 4 extra stitches at the beginning and end of my underarm cast-on stitches, because that’s usually where you get a bit of a gap anyway. Actually, this method ended up reducing the gaps, which I meant I had less darning to do at the end of the project, so it all worked out for the best!

I worked the setup round in the white yarn, then, once that was done, continued on in colourwork, following Chart 5/6.

Things got a little trickier when it came to the sleeve decreases— there was a lot of trying on and measuring and calculating. To get sleeves that fit me, without the decreases warping the colourwork, and ending up with the right amount of stitches for the colourwork at the cuffs, I did the following, all in brown yarn:

• [Decrease round, 4 plain rounds] 7 times.
• [Decrease round, 3 plain rounds] 10 times.
• [Decrease round, 1 plain round] 1 time.

So, this gave me a total of 18 decrease rounds, which took me from 96 to 60 stitches, just as I needed. They’re more condensed than the decrease rounds in the Strange Brew pattern, but the sleeves fit me, so all is well. After the sleeve decreases were done, I worked Chart 7, before knitting the ribbed cuffs in brown, again.

New Techniques

• Alternating Cable Cast-On
• HiyaHiya Grandma’s Stretchy Bind-Off*
• Ladderback Jacquard colourwork technique*
• Following a colourwork chart*
• Colourwork in the round*
• Folded neckline (stitched down)
• German short rows*
• Knitting a yoke
• Sleeve decreases*

Final Thoughts

Oh. My. Goodness. I kind of can’t believe I made this?! It was so far out of my comfort zone and felt like such a mountain to climb, but it was actually a really fun project to make. I was very much overwhelmed initially by using the Strange Brew ‘recipe’ instead of a regular pattern that you can just follow to the letter, but it did make it super easy to customise the jumper and make sure it fit me perfectly (which is good, because it was a lot of work and I would hate to not be able to wear it after all that!). I’m proud of myself for persevering, though, and, actually, I just took things one step at a time, making adjustments when needed, following the pattern/THK’s instructions when needed (and, of course, taking a break every now and then!) and it all worked out.

While I don’t think I’ll be jumping into another colourwork sweater straight away, I really did enjoy working on this project— I think I may just have got super used to working the Ladderback Jacquard technique after the double-hat-swatch-situation, but I honestly found that the colourwork sections went faster than the plain brown sections!

This was definitely my most ambitious Project Knitwear so far, but I also think it might be the most successful: it turned out exactly how I imagined it, which makes me so unbelievably proud!

Also…. a special thank you to Tiny Human Knits for providing such extensive notes on her Ravelry project page for her jumper: it has truly been my Pumpkin Sweater Bible over the last couple of months!

If you're interested...

You can find the Strange Brew Sweater pattern by Tin Can Knits here.

You can find the project page for the Strange Brew Pumpkin by Tiny Human Knits on Ravelry here.

You can find the project page for my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater on Ravelry here.

Gemma

xxx

I thought this project would be a great way of trialling some of the amazing, free patterns out there for knitted/crocheted pumpkins. I wanted my pumpkins to have a variety of textures, colours and patterns, so it gave me the perfect opportunity to try out lots of different methods and styles. In total, I made 5 different pumpkins. In this post, I’ll go through all of the details for each pumpkin, link the patterns I used & share any amendments/changes I made.

I think it’s time for some pumpkins, don’t you?

Table of Contents

• Pumpkin #1: Wee Pumpkin by Susan Rainey
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #1
• Pumpkin #2: (Fluffy) Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #2
• Pumpkin #3: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #3
• Pumpkin #4: Vertical Stripe Pumpkin by Sara Myers
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #4
• Pumpkin #5: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #5
• Final Thoughts

Pumpkin #1: Wee Pumpkin by Susan Rainey

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Wee Pumpkins by Susan Rainey.

Yarn: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, in the shade Cinnamon (leftover from my Anthology Pumpkin Hat).

Needles: 2.75mm DPNs.

Stem Details: 5-stitch i-cord, made using King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply in Chocolate (023) on 2.75mm DPNs. I knitted 5 rows of i-cord, then pulled the yarn through the stitches to ‘cast off’.

Adaptations:

• Used fingering weight yarn instead of sport.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #1 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #1

• This makes a super small pumpkin. It’s SO cute, but a little flat.
• It’s quite easy to make the pumpkin ‘segments’ uneven by accident (I did).
• Pattern used BLCO for increases (not my fave method) and K2tog for decreases (a classic). This pattern, unlike some of the others, does include shaping, which gives the pumpkin a nice appearance.

Pumpkin #2: (Fluffy) Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães (large size, in-the-round version).

Yarn: Scheepjes Sweetheart Soft, in the shade 06 (leftover from a spontaneous mammoth amigurumi, made a while back for my soon-to-be sister-in-law).

Needles: 4.5mm circular needles (40cm).

Stem details: I followed a similar method to the stem of Pumpkin #5, using the same Scheepjes Metropolis in Valencia (062), but made the stem a bit wider (24 stitches, as opposed to 12) to suit the larger pumpkin. Because of the larger stitch count, I worked an extra round of k2togs before finishing off.

Adaptations:

• Used fluffy, chunky weight yarn instead of worsted.
• I added stitch markers to mark where the purl stitches went on every round. This was super helpful, particularly at first, because the fluffy yarn is quite difficult to see/work with! It also made the knitting process much quicker/easier, because I didn’t have to keep double checking where I was in the round.
• I knitted the main piece until it measured 25cm.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #2 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #2

• I had planned to crochet a pumpkin using this yarn, but my GOODNESS it was hard to work with— it was a real struggle to feel where the stitches were! I decided to use it for a knitted pumpkin instead and it was MUCH easier.
• This particular pattern gave some very helpful information on the ratio between the length of the knitted piece and the height of the finished pumpkin (0.4 ish), which I was able to apply to all of my subsequent pumpkin-making endeavours.
• I LOVED the use of purl stitches as a guide in this pattern— it made dividing the pumpkin up evenly SO simple and easy.

Pumpkin #3: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry

Craft: Crochet

Pattern: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry (regular size).

Yarn: Stylecraft Special DK, in the shades Cream (1005) and Gingerbread (1806) (from my excessive stash of Stylecraft Special DK).

Hook: 5.0mm

Stem details: I made a basic, crochet stem for this one using a single strand of the Gingerbread yarn and a 3.0mm hook. The pattern is as follows (as always, UK terminology is used):

Round 1: Work 6 dc into a magic loop (6)

Round 2: 2 dc in each stitch around (12)

Rounds 3-7: dc in each stitch around

Fasten off yarn, leaving long end for attaching to pumpkin.

Adaptations:

• Used DK weight yarn held double, instead of worsted (obviously, this is not equivalent, so my pumpkin is a bit chunkier than it should be!).
• For the surface crochet, I worked all of the horizontal stripes on the right side, leaving 4 stitches between each one. For the vertical stripes, I alternated between working them on the right and wrong side (to add a bit of interest) and left 5 1/2 rows between each right-side, vertical row.
• I didn’t darn in the Gingerbread ends from the surface crochet, just used a needle to carry them right to the edge of the work, in the same chain pattern, then tied them off and caught them behind the work with the ‘cinching’ yarn (though I don’t actually think the pattern calls for darning in the ends either!).
• I used a few extra stitches as well as the ‘cinching’ method to close the pumpkin shut (because my fabric was so chunky!).
• I used the MC yarn (Cream), not the CC yarn (Gingerbread) to define the pumpkin ‘segments’. I think this looks a little more seamless.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #3 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #3

• Using DK held double was probably a bit thick— it worked perfectly everywhere except the top and the bottom, where there was a bit too much stiff material to gather it in properly.
• I really liked the effect and colour combo of this pattern!

Pumpkin #4: Vertical Stripe Pumpkin by Sara Myers

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Trio of Pumpkins by Sara Myers (Pumpkin #1 (Maroon & Beige Vertical Stripe)).

Yarn: Cascade Cantata, in the shades Cocoa (15) and Sand (16) (leftover from my Atlantis Sweater).

Needles: 5.0mm circular needles (40cm).

Stem details: Using the darker shade (Cocoa), I made a 4-stitch i-cord that was about 10cm long, then twisted it back on itself and secured it in that shape with a few stitches before attaching it to the pumpkin.

Adaptations:

• I used smaller needles than suggested (even though I actually used the right yarn weight with this one!) because I was worried about the stuffing poking through. I’m actually glad I did this— I think I could have gone even smaller because this pumpkin definitely has the loosest gauge of all of them!

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #4 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #4

• I was a bit disappointed that my pumpkin wasn’t as ‘swirly’ looking as the pumpkin in the pattern photo? I’m not entirely sure how you could achieve that, and I do like the stripes, but it’s just not quite what I was hoping for.
• As I mentioned, I think I would use slightly smaller needles if I were to make this again— perhaps 4.0 or 4.5mm?

Pumpkin #5: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel.

Yarn: Fyberspates CoopKnits Socks Yeah!, in the shade Citrine (118) (leftover from a project that I will be sharing soon!).

Needles: 2.75mm (DPNs and circular (40cm)).

Stem details: I followed the instructions for the stem from the pattern, but made it separately (as opposed to directly on from the pumpkin itself) and stitched it on after stuffing because I knew my pumpkin was a little more sparse at that end (because of my reduced row count) and wanted to stitch it together first! Like Pumpkin #2, I used Scheepjes Metropolis in Valencia (062).

Adaptations:

• Used fingering weight yarn instead of worsted.
• After round 62, I jumped straight to round 103 to decrease the height of the finished pumpkin.
• I intended to follow the pattern from there as written, but I was playing yarn chicken, so, I ended up working rounds 103-108, then only worked rounds 110, 112, 115, 117, 119, 121, 124 and 126-134 (i.e. the ones with shaping/cables, plus a few extra rows, just until I was confident I had enough yarn!). I don’t recommend doing this, because (obviously) the top of my pumpkin was a little sparse, but it was nothing a little darning couldn’t disguise.
• I made the stem separately (so that I could fix the problems caused by my above fudging more easily).

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #5 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #5

• I ran into SO MUCH trouble with this one at first, because I just couldn’t work out the increases vs the stitch count! Turns out you absolutely NEED to use an increase that doesn’t use an existing stitch (i.e. not KFB), otherwise the stitch count won’t add up right. I ended up using a combo of lifted increases and M1Ls.
• This pattern is a little bit fiddly to work up at the beginning and the end (when you’re on the DPNs), but becomes much more fluid on the circular needles.
• This definitely took the longest of all of my pumpkins— it involves a lot more knitting than the rest!
• If knitted as instructed (using worsted weight yarn/ and working the whole pattern), this pumpkin would be absolutely huge. Like, HUGE. If you want a massive pumpkin, this pattern is your friend.
• I absolutely LOVE the cable pattern and yarn colour.
• I’m also a big fan of the slip knot/crochet starting technique used in this pattern! It’s not a technique I’ve come across before, but I thought it was very neat and super snazzy.

Final Thoughts

I have to say, I really LOVE my yarn-y pumpkin patch. I think each pumpkin has so much character— they’re all so different and individual, but still all very pumpkin-y. I think that they make the perfect, autumnal decorations!

Overall, I think my favourite pumpkin is probably Pumpkin #5 (the Handsome Cable Pumpkin), which is funny because it was definitely the one that caused me the most grief as I was making it! I don’t think the written pattern is perfect, but the cable pattern is just so gorgeous, and the Fyberspates yarn is such a pretty shade of orange, I think it all came together really nicely (even with all of my fudging).

Sadly, I do think Pumpkin #4 (the Vertical Stripe Pumpkin) is my least favourite of the quintet. It just doesn’t have the same neatness (dare I say, elegance?) as the other pumpkins, and I was disappointed not to achieve the same swirly effect that the pumpkin from the pattern seems to have. I also think I could have knitted this pumpkin on even smaller needles, because it has a slightly more open fabric than I would have liked for a stuffed object.

Having said all that, I love all the pumpkins together and think they make a lovely, autumnal cluster! What do you think? Which pumpkin is your favourite?

Gemma

xxx

The first stage of any knitting project is swatching (sigh), because it’s important to test out gauge, yarns and colours (so I’m told). In the Strange Brew book, there is a pattern for a colourwork hat called the Anthology Hat. The pattern even suggests that you treat the hat as your ‘swatch’, thereby testing out both the yarn and your gauge AND being left with a wearable item by the end of it. As someone who quite literally despises swatching, this seemed like a great plan for me! So, in swatching for my soon-to-be Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, I made two colourwork hats (hence why this is Project Knitwear #6.5— technically, these are wearable knits, but they’re not the knitwear item I have lined up for the next instalment). In this post, I’ll be giving you all the details for both hats, chatting about my experience making them AND talking you through my final colour/yarn choices for my sweater.

Table of Contents

• The Pattern
• Hat #1: King Cole Merino Blend
  • Mini Review: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply
  • Hat #1 as a Swatch: Thoughts
• Hat #2: Scheepjes Metropolis
  • Mini Review: Scheepjes Metropolis
  • Hat #2 as a Swatch: Thoughts
• Ladderback Jacquard Technique
• To Pom, or Not To Pom
• New Techniques
• Final Thoughts (and Final Colour Decisions)

The Pattern

As I mentioned, I used the Anthology Hat pattern by Tin Can Knits. This is a simple, customisable hat pattern, that features a ribbed brim and a large, plain section for colourwork. For both hats, I made the size ‘Adult SM‘ and followed the instructions for sock weight yarn (the pattern also provides instructions for Aran and DK weight yarns). I opted for a regular (not fold-over brim) and used an amalgamation of the charts provided by Tiny Human Knits on Ravelry for the colourwork section.

I followed the chart above (my amalgamation of the originals), then followed rows 1-4 of Chart 4 (from Tiny Human Knits).

Because I wanted a little more of the cream shade at the top of the hat than I had space for in my colourwork section, I kept knitting with the cream shade for the first 3 rows of the crown decreases on both hats, before switching back to the brown shade and finishing off the hats.

On her Ravelry project page, Tiny Human Knits suggests using the Ladderback Jacquard Technique for the colourwork. This is a technique I’ve never come across before, so I thought I could give it a go when making these hats, to practise ahead of the larger (more intimidating) sweater project.

Hat #1: King Cole Merino Blend

For my first hat, I used King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply (which is curiously also known as King Cole Anti-Tickle Merino Blend 4 Ply), a 75% merino/25% nylon fingering weight yarn, in the following shades:

• Chocolate (023)
• Cinnamon (3298)
• Aran (046)
• Willow (3942)

I knit the hat on 3.5mm needles (2.75mm for the ribbing) and used a basic, long tail cast-on. This cast-on wasn’t the best choice- truthfully, I really thought it was a stretchy cast-on, but apparently that is not the case! This hat’s definitely a little tight along the cast-on edge, but I guess we live and learn. I also added a pom pom to the top of this hat (more on that later— see ‘To Pom or Not To Pom‘).

For the colourwork section of this hat, I followed my amalgamated colour chart, but only did 1 plain brown row (instead of 2) between the chevron pattern and the pumpkins, and the pumpkins and the top white pattern, respectively. I increased the size of these stripes in Hat #2, because I thought the pattern looked a little cramped in this one.

Mini Review: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply

Overall, I liked this yarn. I thought it worked up really neatly in the colourwork sections and doesn’t have much of a ‘halo’ (which I like). It is a soft yarn, but it’s not the softest I’ve used. I also found that the thickness (squidgy-ness?) of the knitted material drastically reduced after blocking, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but I did find it a little disappointing at the time.

There’s a pretty good range of colours available for this yarn, but, unfortunately, it didn’t quite have all of the shades I wanted for this project. I purchased this yarn from Wool Warehouse, at £3.89 per 50g ball, so it is a pretty affordable option, which is good to know!

Hat #1 as a Swatch: Thoughts

My main takeaway from this swatch was that the colours weren’t quite what I was looking for: the orange was a little too bright, the brown a little too dark and the cream a little too white. The combination just felt ever so slightly too in-your-face (dare I say, garish…?) for the sweater.

I did go back and look at the colour options for the King Cole yarn, but, as I mentioned, it just didn’t have the slightly more muted, warmer colours that I was looking for, so I had to broaden my search a little. That led me to Scheepjes, which, in turn, led to…

Hat #2: Scheepjes Metropolis

I found some great-looking shades in Scheepjes Metropolis (another fingering weight, 75% merino/25% nylon blend yarn), so I decided to make a second swatch-hat using that instead. For the new hat, I used the following shades of Metropolis:

• Valencia (062)
• Mumbai (068)
• Liverpool (065)
• Vancouver (028)

Just like with Hat #1, I knit this project on 3.5mm needles (2.75mm for the ribbing). However, I used a German Twisted Cast-On for this project, which made the cast-on edge a lot stretchier— much better for a hat!

For the colourwork, I followed my amalgamated chart exactly (i.e. with 2 plain rows above and below the pumpkin motifs). This did mean that my colourwork section was slightly longer, but I have a relatively big head (sigh), so that’s no problem.

Mini Review: Scheepjes Metropolis

Okay, not to be dramatic, but I’m kind of obsessed with this yarn. It’s SO soft. Truly, I was trying to describe to my mum what this yarn felt like to knit with and the only fitting adjective I could come up with was ‘buttery’. It’s a buttery yarn. It’s ever so slightly heathered, but not in a dramatic way at all- more of a solid-colours-with-a-little-more-dimension kind of way. It was really good for colourwork and blocked nicely I feel like it didn’t thin out quite as much as the King Cole.

Again, though, the colour range caused me problems— there are so many shades that I thought I had hit the jackpot, but some colours have very few options (e.g. brown, which is a big problem for this project) and others have lots of variations, but no ‘neutral’ option, if that makes sense (I’m thinking about a nice, basic cream shade here!).

Hat #2 as a Swatch: Thoughts

I was SO confident as I was knitting this— I truly thought I’d stumbled on the perfect yarn for this project, but now I’m just… not so sure. First and foremost, I’m just not a fan of Vancouver (the green shade). It feels very lurid to me, particularly alongside the other, more muted colours. I’m also not crazy about the cream shade I chose (Mumbai)— it actually has little specks of a kind of… hot pink shade in it? So in some lights it looks cream (which I want!) and in others it looks pink (which I don’t want!). I LOVE the pumpkin shade (Liverpool), and I think the brown is more what I was after than the King Cole version, but when I look at them together, the hat just looks a little… muted to me? I feel like there’s not enough contrast between the brown and orange shades, which I think is important for this design. I’m disappointed, because I really thought this yarn/colour combo was THE one, but I guess it’s back to the drawing board a little bit in terms of colours.

Ladderback Jacquard Technique

So, as I mentioned, Tiny Human Knits recommends using the Ladderback Jacquard Technique for carrying the floats in the colourwork sections of the sweater, because often there are large stretches between the different colours in the chart. This is a technique I’d never heard of before (I’m not particularly experienced at colourwork), so I figured it would be a good idea to give the technique I try while I made my swatch-hats.

Weirdly, I really enjoyed this technique— I didn’t find it too tricky (once you’ve set up the ladderback stitches, you’re away!) and I always worry about carrying the floats loosely enough, so it definitely helped to ease some of my colourwork anxiety. In fact, for the first hat, I think it went really well for me— I didn’t make any mistakes (that went unnoticed and uncorrected, at least) and I think it looks really neat from both the right and wrong sides of the work. I actually enjoyed the whole process— I flew through it!

With the second hat… I got a little cocky. I became weirdly obsessed with finishing the second hat as quickly as possible, so I was definitely rushing, which probably didn’t help the situation. If you look closely, you can see a rogue ladderback stitch that I forgot was a ladderback stitch and promptly knit as a regular stitch, increasing my overall stitch count and interrupting my colourwork pattern. The worst part is that it was in the lurid green shade! Sigh. Moral of the story: don’t rush colourwork. I will definitely be remembering that when I make my jumper!

To Pom, or Not To Pom

When I made Hat #1, I was fresh-faced and optimistic, so I envisaged the final hat with a big, multicolour pom pom on top, containing all four of the colours used in the hat itself. With the help of one of my handy bobble makers (the blue one (which I believe is 8.5cm), from this pack), I made the pom pom of my dreams, then promptly remembered all the woes that pom poms bring with them. Why are they never actually secure? Why are threads always falling out even though I tied them TIGHT with ALL my strength AND ran a needle through them? Why are they never as big and puffy as I dream they will be? Why do I have to trim off half the pom pom to get it looking like a pom pom? Why do I have to have the skills of an award-winning hair stylist to trim it and keep it round? Sigh. Pom poms. I love them in theory, and I love how they look, but they drive me insane.

Anyway, I made the pom pom for Hat #1 using all 4 colours that I used in the hat: brown, orange, cream and green. To make sure the colours were evenly distributed throughout the pom pom, I held all 4 strands (one of each colour) together as I wrapped it, so there were no patches of colour (this also had the added benefit of making the process a lot quicker, which was a win).

To attach the pom pom to the hat, I used a trick my mum taught me: using a button on the inside. This is great because it means you can easily remove and reattach the pom pom at any point, so the hat can still be washed (without a pom pom massacre), or, if you’re not feeling particularly frivolous one day, you can go pom-less. To do this, you just thread the ends of the pom pom through the top of the hat, from the outside to the inside. Next, you thread those ends through a large button (on the inside of the hat, still), pull them tight, then tie them to each other. This keeps the pom pom secure on top of the hat, but makes it super easy to remove it when needed. And, before you ask— no, you cannot feel the button (unless you have no hair, in which case, you kind of can and I apologise for that).

As I was making Hat #2, I was already starting to dread making another pom pom. It was only once I finished the hat that I remembered not every hat has a pom pom, and, seeing as this was my hat, the decision was entirely up to me! Wow, isn’t free will just great? Anyway, I left this hat pom-less, which I think suits it more sophisticated, muted colour palette anyway (or so I tell myself).

New Techniques

As this is (technically) a Project Knitwear post, I wanted to document the techniques that I used while making these hats: both the new techniques, that I tried for the first time, and the ones I’ve met before, but had an opportunity in this project to practise (as always, previously encountered techniques are marked with an *):

• Long tail cast-on*
• German twisted cast-on*
• Ladderback Jacquard colourwork technique
• Following a colourwork chart*
• Colourwork in the round*

Final Thoughts (and Final Colour Decisions)

Overall, I enjoyed making these hats. It was great practising the Ladderback Jacquard technique (even if I did get a little ahead of myself with it) and I did really enjoy knitting the colourwork sections. It’s not something I’d want to do all the time (it’s much harder to watch TV and knit when you’re working with colours!), but it is pretty addictive and SO rewarding.

Weirdly enough, these are actually my first ever knitted hats! They were so quick and easy to make, so I don’t think they’ll be my last. I really liked following the Anthology ‘recipe’ by Tin Can Knits- even though it felt a little overwhelming at first to have so much creative control, it definitely opens up a whole world of hat-related possibilities!

In terms of my final yarn/colour decisions for my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater (aka the reason we’re all actually here), I had to do a little bit more testing and trialling before I found a combination that I was happy with. In the end, I’ve settled on a combination of 3 different yarn brands (because I’m a very minimal person, evidently):

• Yarnsmiths Merino Sock, in the shade Rich Brown (2K079)
• Scheepjes Metropolis, in the shade Liverpool (065)
• King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, in the shades Aran (046) and Willow (3942)

The brown was the shade I was struggling the most with, until I remembered that I had a ball of the Yarnsmiths leftover from another project (which you will eventually be seeing!). Sure enough, the Rich Brown colourway was EXACTLY the warm, mid-brown shade I was looking for, plus the yarn has the exact same composition (75% merino/25% nylon) as the other two yarns, so everything worked out perfectly! The contrast between the new brown shade and the Scheepjes orange shade is much better, so I’ll be using that yarn for the pumpkins/orange sections of the pattern. With the warmer brown shade, the cream King Cole shade looks a little less white, so it’ll be perfect for my sweater. Alongside the other yarns, the original King Cole shade of green works perfectly— it’s not too lurid, but brings a nice touch of leafy green to the pattern.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading all about my hat-swatch adventures! I’ve ordered all the yarn for my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, so (fingers crossed) that post should be coming to the blog later on this season! If you want to be notified as soon as it goes live, you can subscribe to my newsletter!

If you're interested...

You can find the Anthology Hat pattern here.

You can find the Ravelry project page for the Strange Brew Pumpkin sweater by Tiny Human Knits here.

You can find my Ravelry project page for Hat #1 (King Cole) here.

You can find my Ravelry project page for Hat #2 (Scheepjes) here.

Gemma

xxx

Table of Contents

• Bakery-Style vs Regular Muffins
• Muffins: 101
• Making the Streusel Topping
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Making the Pumpkin & Coffee Muffins
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Making the Maple Glaze
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Recipe

Bakery-Style vs Regular Muffins

If you missed my last muffin post, I did a deep dive into how to make the perfect, bakery-style muffins. Bakery-style muffins are big– they have super domed muffin-tops and that perfect, fresh-from-an-artisanal-bakery look. When I bake bakery-style muffins, I like to use tulip muffin cases, because a) they’re bigger, so there’s more room for all of the extra batter and b) they look fancy. You can make bakery-style muffins from any muffin recipe, including this one!

However, I realise that, sometimes, home-bakers would rather just make standard-sized muffins. Not only does baking regular-sized muffins help with portion control (who is she? I definitely don’t know her), but it also means that you can bake more muffins at once- when baking bakery-style muffins, you can only bake 6 muffins at a time (instead of 12), because bigger muffins need extra space to grow and puff up! So, with that in mind, I’ve written this post with instructions for both muffin styles!

For this recipe then, here’s a rundown of the two muffin types:

I found that the bake time was pretty much the same for both muffin styles. While you might expect the bakery-style muffins to take longer, you’ll always be baking fewer at a time, so the heat can circulate more easily, which evens out the times.

All of this to say that, with a few little changes here and there, you can make these muffins in whichever way you want!

Muffins: 101

Whether you are making bakery-style or standard muffins, there are some rules in the muffin-verse that you should always follow:

• Don’t over-mix the muffin batter.

Over-mixed muffin batters produce tough, dense muffins. Don’t worry if you’ve got a few lumps/streaks of flour left in your batter- just go with it!

• Use the fan setting on your oven to bake the muffins.

Muffins are best baked quickly and at a high heat (at least, to begin with- more on that in a sec!), so the fan setting is your friend.

• Bake the muffins at a higher temperature for the first 5 minutes.

Bake the muffins at a high temperature (200°C fan, in this recipe) for 5 minutes. Then, turn the oven down (to 150°C fan, in this recipe) for the remaining time, to finish off the baking process. The initial high temperature helps to activate the raising agent in the muffins, which helps them to rise up and become big and fluffy, then the lower temperature helps to ensure that the muffins are fully and evenly cooked through.

Making the Streusel Topping

This cinnamon & pecan streusel topping is super quick and easy to make, but adds great texture and flavour to the finished muffins. If you just want plain muffins, you can absolutely leave it off, but I think it’s a really great addition (plus, it makes these muffins feel even more autumnal, which is a definite plus in my book!). The topping isn’t overly sweet, but, when paired with the super-sweet maple glaze, the flavours balance out perfectly.

Ingredients

To make the streusel topping, you’ll need the following ingredients:

• Plain flour

Don’t use self-raising flour, or your streusel won’t be crisp and crunchy.

• Granulated sugar

I usually use caster sugar in my baked goods, but granulated sugar is preferable here for its crunchier texture.

• Light brown soft sugar

Brown sugar adds a caramel-y depth of flavour to the streusel.

• Ground cinnamon

A small amount of ground cinnamon gives the streusel a warm, autumnal flavour, which compliments the spices in the muffins perfectly.

• Salt

Just a little pinch of salt is added to the streusel to balance the flavours and make it extra tasty.

• Unsalted butter

I prefer to use unsalted butter, so that I can be in control of how much salt goes into my baked goods, but if you only have salted butter, you can just omit the salt.

• Toasted pecans

Chopped pecans are tossed through the streusel topping to add even more crunch and nutty flavour. To get the most flavour out of the nuts, toast (or roast) them first and allow them to cool before mixing into the streusel. I do this in the airfryer (about 5 minutes at 180°C should be perfect), but you could also do it in a dry pan on the stove, or in the oven.

Method

To make the streusel, start by whisking together the flour, both sugars, the cinnamon and the salt, just until everything is nicely combined.

Next, melt the butter and add it to the dry ingredients.

Use a fork to mix everything together. The mixture should form little clumps and crumbles.

Finally, tip in the chopped, toasted pecans and mix until the nuts are evenly distributed throughout the streusel.

That’s it! Now your streusel is ready, you can set it aside while you make the muffin batter.

Making the Pumpkin & Coffee Muffins

This muffin batter is super easy to whip up- you don’t even need a mixer!

Ingredients

To make the pumpkin & coffee muffin batter, you will need the following ingredients:

• Plain flour

Make sure to use plain flour, not self-raising, otherwise the raising agent ratios will be off!

• Baking powder

One of the two raising agents in the muffin batter, this helps the muffins to puff up and be extra fluffy.

• Baking soda

The second raising agent in the muffin batter, baking soda is used alongside baking powder because of the acidic ingredients in the batter.

• Salt

A small pinch of salt helps to balance all of the flavours in the muffins.

• Spices

I’ve used a traditional combination of ‘pumpkin pie’ spices in these muffins: ground cinnamon, ginger, cloves and freshly grated nutmeg. These spices give the muffins a lovely, warming flavour.

• Caster sugar

Back to caster sugar for the batter- I prefer baking with caster sugar because it is finer and so dissolves more easily into batters than granulated sugar.

• Light brown soft sugar

Brown sugar adds depth of flavour and extra moisture to the muffins.

• Sunflower oil

Oil is used instead of butter in this batter to make the muffins extra moist.

• Pumpkin purée

You can buy pumpkin purée in cans in most supermarkets, or you can use homemade purée, if you prefer. If you use the canned stuff (like I did), just make sure it is 100% pumpkin (and no other flavourings/ingredients)!

• Eggs

I always use large eggs.

• Greek yoghurt

Greek yoghurt adds extra moisture to the muffins. If you don’t have greek yoghurt, you can use sour cream instead.

• Vanilla extract

Just a small amount of vanilla extract helps to bring all of the other flavours together.

• Instant coffee granules

Instant coffee granules are used to make these muffins into Pumpkin Spice Latte Muffins! Dissolve the granules in hot water before mixing into the rest of the wet ingredients, to ensure the coffee flavour is evenly distributed throughout the muffin batter.

Method

Start by preheating the oven to 200°C fan. Line your muffin tin(s) with cases and set aside. Remember- if you’re baking regular-sized muffins, you can go ahead and line every cavity in the tin with a muffin case, giving you a total of 12 muffins. If you’re planning to make bigger, bakery-style muffins, you’ll need to space 8 muffin cases out over 2 x 12-hole muffin tins, to give them plenty of room to puff up! You’ll have to bake the trays one at a time, but the muffins will be extra big and fluffy for it.

To make the muffin batter, start by placing all of the dry ingredients (the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices) into a bowl.

Whisk the dry ingredients together to combine them, then set aside.

Place the remaining ingredients (the ‘wet’ ingredients) into another, large bowl.

Whisk well until a smooth mixture has formed.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, then fold together, being careful not to over-mix the batter (it’s okay if there are a few streaks/lumps of flour left!).

And that’s it! The batter is now ready to be baked.

Divide the batter between the muffin cases. The muffin cases will be pretty full- for regular-sized muffins, I fill each case with 1 heaped, regular-sized ice cream scoop’s worth of batter. For bakery-style muffins, I fill each case with 2 level regular-sized ice cream scoop’s worth of batter!

Crumble a generous layer of the streusel topping over each muffin, making sure to get some pecan pieces on each muffin. It will seem like a lot of streusel topping, but the muffins will expand a lot, so it will look a little more sparse on the finished bakes!

Place the muffins into the preheated oven and bake for 5 minutes at that initial, high temperature, then turn the temperature down to 150°C fan and bake for a further 20 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the muffins comes out clean, or with only a few moist crumbs.

If you’re making bakery-style muffins, remember to turn the temperature back up to 200°C fan and wait until the oven has heated back up after baking the first tray of muffins! Then you just need to bake the second tray in exactly the same way.

I like to remove the muffins from the baking tin as soon as they come out of the oven, to prevent the bottoms of the cases from becoming greasy. The tulip cases make this super easy to do, because you can hold onto the papers and not have to worry about burning yourself on the hot muffins! Transfer the muffins to a wire rack to cool completely before icing.

Making the Maple Glaze

This maple glaze is only 3 ingredients and is so quick to make! It adds an extra hit of autumnal sweetness to these cupcakes and helps to balance the flavour of the streusel topping.

Ingredients

All you need to make this sweet, maple glaze is:

• Icing sugar

You need to use icing sugar, or powdered sugar, for this- caster sugar isn’t fine enough!

• Maple syrup

Maple syrup adds a lovely flavour and texture to the icing.

• Water

Water is used to thin out the icing slightly, so it can be drizzled onto the muffins. You could use milk instead, if you prefer.

Method

To make the glaze, start by sifting the icing sugar into a small bowl.

Add the maple syrup, along with a splash of water, and stir to combine.

Check the consistency of the icing- you’re looking for a thin(ish) glaze that you can drizzle over the muffins, but that won’t all run off immediately! To make the glaze thinner, add a little more water. To make it thicker, add more sifted icing sugar.

Once the glaze is ready, you can drizzle it over the cooled muffins. The muffins can be enjoyed at room temperature, but they’re extra lovely if you warm them slightly in the microwave, before serving!

As with all muffins, these are best enjoyed the day you make them, but leftovers can be stored in an airtight container for a day or so at room temperature.

Recipe

Print

Pumpkin Spice Latte Muffins

Spiced pumpkin and coffee muffins, topped with a cinnamon & pecan streusel and drizzled with a maple glaze. The perfect autumnal treat!

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword Cinnamon, Cloves, Ginger, Maple Syrup, Muffin, Nutmeg, Pecans, Pumpkin, Streusel

Prep Time 45 minutes minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes minutes

Total Time 1 hour hour 10 minutes minutes

Servings 12 muffins (or 8 bigger bakery-style muffins)

Ingredients

For the cinnamon & pecan streusel topping:

• 90 tbsp plain flour
• 2 tbsp granulated sugar
• 2 tbsp light brown soft sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 pinch salt
• 60 g unsalted butter, melted.
• 40 g pecans, toasted and roughly chopped.

For the pumpkin & coffee muffin batter:

• 190 g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg, freshly grated.
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 1/8 tsp ground cloves
• 135 g caster sugar
• 135 g light brown soft sugar
• 120 ml sunflower oil
• 340 g pumpkin purée (see Note 1).
• 2 eggs
• 60 g Greek yoghurt
• 1 splash vanilla extract
• 4 tsp instant coffee granules, dissolved in 2 tbsp hot water and cooled.

For the maple glaze:

• 60 g icing sugar, sifted.
• 2 tsp maple syrup

Instructions

Make the streusel topping:

• In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, both sugars, cinnamon and salt. Add the melted butter and stir together until the mixture forms crumbles. Stir in the chopped, toasted pecans and set aside for later.

Make the muffins:

• Preheat the oven to 200°C fan. Line muffin tin(s) with muffin cases (12 cases in 1 x 12-hole tin for regular-sized muffins, or 8 spaced out over 2 tins for bigger, bakery-style muffins) and set aside.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves until well combined.
• In a separate, larger bowl, whisk both sugars together with the oil, pumpkin purée, eggs, yoghurt, vanilla extract and the dissolved instant coffee granules, until you have a smooth mixture.
• Fold the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture, being careful not to over-mix the batter.
• Divide the batter between the prepared muffin cases (about 1 heaped regular-sized ice cream scoop's worth for regular-sized muffins, or 2 level scoops for bakery-style). Sprinkle each muffin with a generous layer of the streusel topping, then bake one tray of muffins at a time in the preheated oven for 5 minutes, before turning the temperature down to 150°C fan and baking for a further 23-27 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the muffins comes out clean, or with a few moist crumbs.
• Once the muffins are baked, remove them from the tins and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before icing.

Make the maple glaze:

• In a small bowl, mix the sifted icing sugar and the maple syrup, along with 1 tbsp of water until a smooth icing has formed. The icing should be thin enough to drizzle over the muffins, but not so thin that it runs off immediately. If the icing is too thin, add a little more sifted icing sugar. If the icing is too thick, add a little more water.
• Drizzle the icing over the cooled muffins, then serve. The muffins are best eaten the same day that they are baked, but leftovers will keep for a day or two, if stored in an airtight container at room temperature.

Notes

1. You can buy ready-made pumpkin purée in cans from the supermarket- just make sure you get one that is 100% pumpkin (i.e. not pumpkin pie filling).

 

Muffin recipe adapted from https://www.brownedbutterblondie.com/pumpkin-muffins-recipe/

Streusel topping recipe adapted from https://celebratingsweets.com/pumpkin-crumb-muffins-with-cinnamon-icing/#recipe

To mark the end of Spooky Season, I thought I would share a recipe for the most autumnal, innately Halloween-y (even though in the US I feel it’s probably more Thanksgiving-y, but I digress) treat: Pumpkin Pie. This sweet treat was always a staple in my house growing up, so it’s a really nostalgic dessert for me. Also, it’s super tasty, so there’s that too!

We’ve always used the same recipe for pumpkin pie, namely, the recipe from Delia Smith’s How To Cook: Book One. However, as seems to be the case with all family recipes, we (read: my dad, who usually makes this- and who helped me make the one pictured!) have adapted, altered, changed (and sometimes changed back) the ingredients & method quite a bit, over time. This recipe is the result of all that tweaking (ironically, it’s not even that different- what can I say, Delia knows best).

This pumpkin pie has a slightly sweet and super nutty pastry, which you can make super quickly in the food processor! The pastry shell is then filled with a silky-smooth, spiced pumpkin custard. It can be served warm or chilled, so it’s easy to make ahead. As a bonus, it is pretty easy to make (especially for a pie!), so it makes for a great, stress-free dessert option for this time of year.

Table of Contents

• Ingredients
• Equipment
• Making the Pastry
• Baking the Pastry Case
• Making the Pumpkin Filling
• Baking the Pie
• Recipe

Ingredients

This pie is made up of two elements: the nutty pastry and the rich pumpkin filling. You start by making the pastry, then you make the filling as the pastry bakes (we LOVE a time-saving recipe here!).

For the pastry, you will need:

• Pecans

A slightly unusual addition, but mixing finely chopped, toasted pecans into the pastry really elevates this pie. Not only does it give the pie a lovely, warm and nutty flavour, but it also adds another texture to the pie. I like to toast the pecans on the hob, in a dry pan over a medium heat, but you can toast them in the oven if you prefer.

• Plain flour

Don’t use self-raising flour here, or your pastry will puff up and not be crisp and flaky.

• Icing sugar

It’s only a small amount of icing sugar, but you just need the slightest hint of sweetness in the pastry, to complement the filling.

• Salt

Just a pinch, to bring out the other flavours.

• Unsalted butter

You want the butter to be very cold when you make this pastry, so that the finished pastry case is super flaky and delicious! Keep it in the fridge right until you are ready to use it, to ensure it stays as cold as possible. You’ll also want to cut it into cubes, to help incorporate it into the dry ingredients more easily.

• Egg yolk

The egg yolk adds richness to the pastry. You will need a small amount of egg white later, to seal the pastry case, so you can save the white from this egg (you’ll need another yolk later on though, so you’ll have one leftover white whatever you do- you can use it straightaway in another recipe or freeze it for another day).

• Cold water

Like the butter, it’s important that the water is very cold to ensure you get the best pastry possible.

For the pumpkin filling, you will need:

• Eggs

For the filling, you’ll need 2 whole eggs, plus an extra yolk. Use the extra white in another recipe, or freeze it for another day.

• Double cream

The cream works together with the eggs to create a silky-smooth, thick custard. If you’re in the US, use heavy cream.

• Soft dark brown sugar

Using dark brown sugar lends a deep, treacle-y flavour and colour to the filling, which really complements the pumpkin flavour.

• Maple syrup

The original recipe called for molasses, but we prefer this pie made with maple syrup. The molasses can make everything a little bitter, while maple syrup adds a gentle, smoky sweetness that goes perfectly with the other flavours.

• Spices

A variety of spices go into the filling to really give this pie that classic ‘pumpkin pie’ flavour. We use ground cinnamon, nutmeg (which is always better when freshly grated, if possible!), allspice, cloves and ginger, which are all very traditional pumpkin pie spices.

• Canned pumpkin

In the original recipe, Delia (very impressively) roasts and purées her own pumpkin. I have very vivid memories of my dad spending a looooong time pushing roasted pumpkin chunks through a sieve and, honestly, I think we unanimously decided that it just wasn’t worth it. If you have a pumpkin you want to use, and you don’t mind the excessive elbow grease required, then, by all means, go for it! But, if, like us, you prefer your pumpkin pie to be a bit less labour-intensive, canned pumpkin makes for a super smooth filling with much less effort on your part. I’d call that a win.

Equipment

Aside from the standard baking equipment you probably already have in your kitchen, you will need a couple of (slightly more) specialist equipment for this recipe.

• 9 inch (23cm) fluted tart tin, with a removable base

We’ve always made this in a fluted tart tin, but that’s kind of optional- you could have a pie with straight sides if you wanted! Having a removable base makes it SO much easier to get the pie out of the tin, so I would definitely recommend that. I believe that in the US, pumpkin pies are usually made and served in pie dishes, which would mean you don’t need to worry about removing the baked pie from the dish. I’ve never tried baking this recipe in a pie dish, but I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work!

• Food processor

I like to use a food processor to a) finely chop the pecans and b) make the pastry. Strictly speaking, using the processor isn’t wholly necessary- you could chop the pecans finely by hand, using a large, sharp knife, and you could make the pastry by hand, rubbing the butter into the dry ingredients with your fingertips and mixing the pastry together with a blunt knife. However, using a food processor really speeds up the process (and is a lot less messy!).

I recommend fitting the processor with a metal blade to chop the nuts, then a plastic blade to make the pastry (the plastic blade helps to prevent you from overworking the pastry, which is the reason many people worry about making pastry in a food processor. Overworking pastry can make for a tough pastry case after baking, but this particular pastry recipe is pretty hard-wearing, so I wouldn’t worry too much!).

Making the Pastry

Before you start making the pastry, you need to chop the pecans. They need to be very finely chopped (hence why it is so much easier to use the food processor!), otherwise they will prevent you from rolling out the pastry thinly enough. However, make sure you don’t go too far when processing them, or they will release their oils and end up as pecan butter- not what you’re looking for! Aim for a fine rubble, like this:

Once you have your pecan rubble, remove it from the processor and set aside. Switch the metal processor blade out for a plastic one (to prevent overworking the pastry). Then, sift together the flour, icing sugar and salt and add the dry ingredients to the processor, along with the cold, cubed butter.

Pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. If you prefer/do not have a food processor, you can do this by hand in a large bowl- just rub the butter into the dry ingredients using your fingertips.

Now, you can add the finely chopped pecans, egg yolk (reserve the white for later) and cold water. Pulse until the pastry comes together into a slightly crumbly dough (you may need to add a little more cold water- just to bring it together, until it resembles the photo below).

Remove the pastry from the processor and shape it into a flat disk. Wrap the pastry disk tightly in clingfilm, then place it into the fridge to rest for 30 minutes. This will make it easier to work with later, while also helping to prevent it from shrinking too much during baking.

Baking the Pastry Case

Once the pastry has rested, preheat the oven to 180°C (conventional oven). Unwrap the pastry and place it onto a lightly floured surface. Roll it out into a circle about 30cm in diameter- it might be a little crumbly, but that’s okay- it’s a very forgiving pastry that you can patch up later if needed!

Carefully transfer your pastry circle to your fluted tart tin (lightly grease the tin beforehand to help get the pie out later) and press it into the base and sides- patching any gaps as needed. You’re looking for an even layer of pastry all over the base and sides, with a little extra sitting just above the top of the tart tin, to account for any shrinkage.

Prick the pastry all over with a fork (try not to go all the way through to the bottom of the tin- just prick the surface), then brush lightly with the reserved egg white. Bake in the centre of the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, until the pastry is golden.

If you notice that the pastry is puffing up during the baking process, just remove it from the oven, give it a few extra pricks to release the air, then return it to the oven for the remaining time.

Making the Pumpkin Filling

While the pastry case is baking, you can make the pumpkin custard filling. Place the eggs and extra egg yolk into a large bowl and whisk to combine, before setting aside.

Put the cream, sugar, maple syrup and all of the spices into a medium-sized saucepan over medium heat. Allow it to warm, whisking gently, until the sugar has melted and the mixture has come to just below a simmer.

Remove the pan from the heat and add to the beaten eggs in a slow, steady stream, whisking constantly to prevent the eggs from scrambling. Add the canned pumpkin and mix well, until you have a thick, smooth custard.

Baking the Pie

Once you have your filling made and pastry case baked, you can add the filling to the case. I find it is easiest to add the filling while the case is still in the oven- just pull the shelf the case is on halfway out using one (oven-gloved!) hand, then pour in the filling with the other hand. This way, you won’t spill any filling trying to get the pie from your countertop to the oven, which could lead to, at best, a mess and, at worst, a soggy bottom! Paul Hollywood would be QUaKinG!

Bake the filled pie at the same temperature as the pastry case (180°C) for 35-40 minutes, until the filling has puffed slightly around the edges, but is still slightly wobbly in the centre.

Allow the pie to cool slightly in the tin, before carefully removing it, then transfer to a serving plate. The pie can be eaten warm, but is equally delicious when served chilled- just store it in the fridge until you are ready to eat it.

Admittedly, as pies go, this one is a little rustic, but that’s mainly because of the pecans in the pastry. The added nuts are a real game-changer in terms of taste and texture, but they do make the pie a little less neat and perfect-looking. I kind of like that homemade, rough-and-ready kind of look, though- particularly this time of year! Besides, it tastes so good, it could look like a complete mess and I would still make it over and over again!

Recipe

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Pumpkin Pie

A traditional Pumpkin Pie with a twist: rich and nutty shortcrust pastry, filled with a velvety and spiced pumpkin filling.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword Pie, Pumpkin, Pumpkin Pie, Shortcrust pastry

Prep Time 40 minutes minutes

Cook Time 1 hour hour

Chill Time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 2 hours hours 10 minutes minutes

Servings 10

Equipment

• 1 23cm diameter fluted tart tin, with a removable base, lightly greased with butter.

Ingredients

For the pastry:

• 40 g pecans, toasted (see Note 1).
• 175 g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
• 10 g icing sugar
• pinch of salt
• 75 g unsalted butter, cold from the fridge and cubed.
• 1 tbsp cold water
• 1 egg yolk (reserve the white).

For the filling:

• 2 eggs + 1 yolk
• 275 ml double cream
• 75 g soft dark brown sugar
• 1 tbsp maple syrup
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg, freshly grated
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 x 425g can canned pumpkin

Instructions

Make the pastry case:

• Place the toasted pecans into a food processor, fitted with a metal blade, and pulse until they are very fine- be careful not to go too far, or they will release their oils.
• Sift together the flour, icing sugar and salt. Remove the pecans from the processor, switch the metal blade with a plastic one (see Note 2) and tip in the sifted dry ingredients. Add the cubed butter, then pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
• Add the pecans back to the processor, along with the water and the egg yolk. Pulse until the pastry comes together into a slightly crumbly dough (you may need to add a little more water to achieve this).
• Take the pastry out of the processor and form it into a flat disk. Wrap the disk tightly in clingfilm and place in the fridge to rest for at least 30 minutes.
• Preheat the oven to 180°C. When the pastry has finished resting, unwrap it and place it onto a lightly floured surface. Roll the pastry into a circle about 30cm in diameter. The pastry will be a little crumbly- don't worry, you can patch it later. Transfer the pastry circle to your greased tin and press it firmly into the base and sides, patching any gaps, so that you have an even layer of pastry all over the base and sides. Make sure that the pastry sits a little above the rim of the tin all the way around, to account for any shrinkage. Prick the base of the pastry all over with a fork, then brush it lightly with the reserved egg white. Place the tin on the middle shelf of the preheated oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden.

Make the pumpkin filling:

• While the pastry case is baking, make the filling. Place the eggs and extra yolk into a large bowl and whisk to combine. Set aside.
• Put the cream, sugar, maple syrup and all of the spices into a medium-sized saucepan. Place the pan over medium heat and allow to warm, whisking gently to combine, until the sugar has melted and the mixture is just below a simmer.
• Remove the hot cream mixture from the heat and pour into the eggs, in a slow and steady stream, whisking constantly. Add the pumpkin and whisk well until you have a smooth custard.
• When the pastry case is ready, you can fill it with the pumpkin mixture. Pull the oven shelf, with the pastry case still on it, half out, so that you can pour the filling directly into the case, before pushing the shelf all the way back in and baking the pie for 35-40 minutes, until the filling has puffed a little around the edges, but is slightly wobbly in the centre. Remove from the oven and allow to cool on a wire rack. Once cool, place in the fridge to chill, before serving, though you can also eat it warm, if you can't wait!

Notes

1. I like to toast the pecans in a dry skillet over a medium-high heat on the hob- this takes just a few minutes. Alternatively, you can toast them for about 8 minutes at the same temperature that the pie bakes at (180°C). 
2. I find that using a plastic blade in the food processor helps to make the pastry less tough. You will want to use a metal blade to chop the nuts, though, because the plastic blade will not be strong enough to break them up. 

 

This recipe is adapted from Delia Smith’s ‘How to Cook: Book One’. 

As I mentioned in that post, the whole setup was inspired by this Halloween Ghost Cat Amigurumi crochet pattern, by Imelda Liputri (@medaami). I think it is truly one of the most adorable things I have EVER seen and it definitely made for a super cute, super spooky setup. I did say that I might give the crochet pattern a try at some point during October and… I did! I made my very own Halloween Ghost Cat Amigurumi, and I thought I would share my experience working with this pattern and making my cat with you today.

A little disclaimer to begin: obviously, this post does NOT include the pattern for the cat. If you want to make your own cat, you will need to buy the original pattern yourself. You can purchase the pattern from Ravelry (which is what I did!) or from Etsy. I purchased this pattern independently for my own, personal use and this post is just me sharing my experience of it and attempting to shine a light on this super-talented creator! 

With that out of the way, let’s get into my cat-making adventure!

Table of Contents

• Materials
  • Yarn
  • Additional Equipment
• The Process
  • Head
  • Body
  • Tail
  • Sheet
  • Ears
  • Arms
  • Pumpkin Bag
• Final Thoughts

Materials

Yarn

I just used odds and ends from my stash for this project- you don’t need very much. For the majority of the yarn, I used Stylecraft Special DK. To the best of my knowledge, I used the following shades:

• Black (1002), for the body and the embroidery on the pumpkin.
• Powder Pink (1843), for the nose and ear details.
• Warm Grey (1805), for the whiskers
• Camel (1420), for the eye details.
• Spice (1711), for the pumpkin bag.
• Walnut (1054), for the handle of the pumpkin bag.

I didn’t have any white acrylic yarn on hand, so I used some cotton yarn instead. I have absolutely no idea what brand it is, but it is a DK weight yarn, just like the Stylecraft.

Additional Equipment

• 3.5mm crochet hook
• Locking stitch marker (I use these ones).
• Tapestry needle
• 2x12mm safety eyes (a little bigger than the ones listed in the pattern, but it’s what I had- I figure bigger eyes can only make amigurumi cuter anyway, right?)
• Scissors
• Stuffing

The Process

For this pattern, like most amigurumi patterns, you make most of the elements separately and sew them all together at the end. It doesn’t really matter what order you make them in, but I did find it helpful to make the head (top left) before I made the sheet (top centre) that goes over the top, so I could ensure it fit (which it did, pretty perfectly, which I was very impressed by- the pattern was so precise!). Along with those two pieces, you have 2x ears, 2x arms, 1x tail, 1x pumpkin basket and 1x body (which includes the two legs- more on this later). For the most part, I just followed the pattern for each body part, but I did make a couple of adaptations, here and there. I’ll talk through those adaptations in a second.

The original pattern suggests using a dark grey yarn for the body of the cat. This works really well, because you can then embroider the facial details on with a black yarn- the whole thing still ends up looking like a black cat, but you get a bit more dimension. I think it looks great! I, unfortunately, did not have a dark grey yarn on hand, so I opted to use black for the whole thing. I do feel I lost a little dimension by doing this, even though I managed to keep the nose/whisker details by replacing the black embroidery with pink/grey embroidery, respectively.

Head

For the construction of the head, I followed the pattern exactly. The pattern makes for a really cute head (that sounds weird, I know, but it’s true!)- the cat has little chubby cheeks that are super easy to make but have a real impact on the finished cat- you might not be able to see it so clearly on my cat, because of the colour, but it’s definitely there!

The only thing I did differently for the head was that I embroidered the face (i.e. the pink nose and the grey whiskers) when I added the safety eyes- just before you finish off the head. I did this just to make the process a little easier for myself- embroidering onto a toy that has already been stuffed is a little trickier than embroidering onto an unstuffed piece of crochet because it’s a little harder to secure the ends. Having said that, the placement of the embroidery is easier to visualise when the head is stuffed, so do whatever you find easiest! I didn’t add a mouth, like the cat in the pattern has, because I thought a pink/grey mouth would look a little… strange? I also didn’t add the optional ‘eyeliner’ because, unless my cat wanted to go full 80s blue with its eye makeup, the little wings wouldn’t have shown up against the black body…

A couple of notes here:

• My whiskers looked super cute at this stage, but, when I put the sheet over the head, it completely covered them! Having looked at the original pattern’s photos, I think this was the case for that cat too- which seems a little pointless to me- I wanted to see the whiskers! I went back later and extended them out a little- they’re still a little obscured, but they are at least visible now. If you want your whiskers to be seen, I recommend taking them much closer to the eye- about a stitch away.
• I am OBSESSED with the technique this pattern used to enhance the safety eyes! It was so simple, but SO effective- genuinely, if you’re looking to up your toy eye game, I would recommend buying this pattern just for that! I’m not sure if it’s an original technique, but I’ve definitely never seen it before.

Body

For the body, I followed the pattern exactly as it was.

When I first started following amigurumi patterns, I would make one body piece and two leg pieces, all separately. Either I was using the wrong patterns, or the collective hatred of the amigurumi world for darning in ends and sewing things up has inspired a more seamless approach to bodies: an all-in-one method, where the legs are made separately, then worked together into a single body piece. This pattern uses that all-in-one technique! I’ve made a few patterns that utilise this kind of approach and I am completely, utterly IN LOVE. Not only does it mean that there’s less sewing up, but I think it gives a really professional, seamless look. The technique can feel a little awkward when you start out, but the pattern is so clear- just follow the instructions and you’ll get there!

Tail

When I first made the tail, my first thought was: “Tail, why are you so LONG?” Everything else about the pattern seemed so proportional and right, that this tail just felt a little weird. Admittedly, in the photo of all the body parts, it doesn’t even look that long, but it just seemed very long when I was making it, you know? Anyway, having assembled the whole cat, I have since discovered that the long tail is vital to this design. The legs are quite small, so the tail really helps balance the cat so that it can stand up by itself. I often find that my amigurumi makes don’t stand up so well on their own, so the fact that this cat does (and so well!) is a real win for me. Tail, I’m sorry- I misjudged you!

Sheet

Ah, the sheet. Honestly, the sheet was one of the main selling points of this pattern to me- I use a lot of amigurumi patterns, but I was really intrigued by the construction of this sheet- specifically, the hole around the face. It was really interesting to see how this unusual shape was constructed and I was super impressed by how perfectly it fitted over the cat. The problem, however, is that, for someone like me who despises sewing in ends, the technique suggested in this pattern is absolutely hellish. Essentially, to get that hole in the front, you have to leave a gap in your rounds of crochet- the pattern achieves this by cutting the yarn at the end of every row and re-joining it at the beginning. All fun and games, but this goes on for a good number of rows- when every row has 2 ends to sew in, I’m sure you can see why I was so aghast.

I honestly could not bring myself to do that. Instead, I opted to form the rows by crocheting back-and-forth over the area. It takes a little bit of working out, but it is much easier (and much less soul-destroying) than sewing in all those ends- just remember that the shaping is always at the start/end of the row and work out the number of regular stitches from the pattern accordingly. However, you can see a difference in the texture of the stitches. If you look in the photo above, you can see that my crochet is a little more open where I have gone back and forth (around the centre portion) and is slightly more ridged than the crochet worked in rounds. Obviously, the pattern was designed to avoid this- but I just couldn’t face all the ends (I’ve seen a lot of other people who made this pattern who felt the same way!), so I decided that the slightly less neat sheet was the lesser of two evils.

While the sheet did fit very well over the cat’s head, it does have a tendency to slip about a little, making it look a little less like the perfect fit it is! In the end, I decided to use some more of the white yarn to add a few little stitches to keep it in place. I didn’t want to stitch all around the face hole because I thought that might look a bit funny, so I opted to make 8 little stitches, evenly space around the perimeter of the face hole, making sure to make each stitch as invisible as possible. Honestly, I think this made a huge difference- my little cat always looks his best now and the whole thing is much more secure!

Ears

In the original pattern, you crochet the black ears, then you crochet two teeny-tiny triangles of pink, which you then stitch onto the black ears. I won’t lie, it seemed like a lot of effort- sewing in ends on tiny things is the WORST, especially when they really have to look nice and neat. Again, I let my laziness win. Instead of the extra crochet details, I opted to do a little bit of freehand embroidery to add the ear details. I cut a length of pink yarn, threaded it onto my needle and looped it through one side of the black ear piece, over and over, going through the same point near the top of the ear each time, to get a triangle. When I was done, because I was really embracing the whole lazy vibe at this point, I tied the two ends in a double knot and tucked it inside the ear, never to be seen again. Truth be told, I actually… love how this turned out? The embroidery gives the ears a slightly puffy look, which I think makes the cat even cuter!

The embroidery did make it slightly trickier to attach the ears to the cat- it is quite loopy, so it’s not the best for stitching into. However, I found that if I stitched very solidly along the back and sides of the ears, they were secure enough anyway. I also wrapped the black thread once around the base of the ear, at the front, before darning in the end, to add a line of black in-between the pink of the ear and the white of the sheet, which made a HUGE difference in how put-together my little cat looked. Such a simple trick, but so effective.

Arms

I am undecided about the arms on this cat. I think they are very proportional to the cat body, which is great, but I would almost like them to be just a little bit longer (maybe a single row?). I think that would make it easier to position the pumpkin bag on the right-hand one, because I just feel that the bag doesn’t quite have enough room to sit right?

The pattern suggests stuffing the arms lightly, before sewing them to the body. I was a little worried about attaching the arms to the body (you have to attach them through the sheet and onto the body), so I opted to stuff only the paws, then stitch across the opening of the arms so that I had a flat edge to attach to the body. After that, the process really wasn’t as bad as I thought! I sewed the arm fully onto the sheet, then attached it to the body underneath with a stitch on each end- that way, it was secure and gave the cat some dimension, but the sheet wasn’t so cinched in that it looked weird. I do wonder if stuffing the whole arm and leaving the opening as it was would have given the ams a bit more structure and length though, so maybe that was on me!

Pumpkin Bag

I feel like the pumpkin bag is the thing that really makes this cat. It’s just so cute! I opted to embroider the face on, using black yarn, as opposed to the felt used in the original pattern (again, it just seemed like sooooo much work to find the felt, cut the felt, stick it on etc.). I embroidered two little upside down V’s for the eyes, then made a loose straight stitch for the mouth, which I curved into a smile by securing it at the bottom with a tiny stitch.

For the handle, the pattern suggests making a chain, sewing in the ends and glueing it to the pumpkin part. I just crocheted the chain directly onto the pumpkin and sewed in the ends afterwards- it was very quick, neat and effective.

I didn’t fill mine with scrap yarn to look like sweets, as the pattern suggests, because I figured they’d just fall out. Sorry, cat.

One final note on the pumpkin basket: the pattern suggests that you just hook the pumpkin bucket over the arm, which I felt was just an accident waiting to happen, so I decided to secure it with a single stitch, in the centre. That way, it can still be manoeuvred a little bit, but it’s not about to go missing (or be eaten by a misguided dog) anytime soon!

Final Thoughts

I’m pretty used to the techniques used in most amigurumi patterns, so I was pretty confident going into this one, which is listed as an intermediate-level pattern. Honestly, I think this rating is spot on- I didn’t struggle with it by any means, but I feel if I had less experience with amigurumi, it definitely would have been challenging in places- specifically the body piece and the sheet. Having said that, I feel like it looks a lot more challenging than it actually is (which can only be a good thing because I apparently live to impress).

I made a few little changes throughout, here and there, just to suit the pattern/finished cat to my individual needs, but the pattern itself is incredibly clear and thorough, so none of my changes were really necessary.

I still would have loved to have made this cat in a dark grey yarn, so I could really get the detail/dimension of the original pattern, but I’m still really happy with my black cat. It’s so cute and it really didn’t take me too long to make at all!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this post! Let me know if you’re crocheting anything spooky this October!

Gemma

xxx