Snowman's Secret Towel Topper

This little project was worked up at the request of my friend, Tina, who lives in St. Augustine, FL. She made the Ms. Santa Towel Topper and challenged me to make a snowman topper. If you know me, you know that I love a challenge! So, on our weekly trek to our Alabama cabin near Centre, I designed the Snowman Towel Topper pictured above. While the actual design and knitting took a little less than two hours while riding in the car, adding details and finishing up took another hour or so at home. Now that I've worked out the pattern, I'm thinking you could make the whole thing in about an hour or so.

Now, what secret is this little Snowman hiding? Most towel toppers are physically attached to the towel , or they feature a decorative motif at the top of an exposed hook. This little fellow's towel is interchangeable, but the towel holder is completely hid beneath the topper body so you can switch the towel when it needs to be washed - or when you want to change the look of the snowman.

Towel holder ring on the underside of the snowman's body

If time permits, I'll try to write the PDF pattern up in the next few days. However, here are the general steps I used to make Snowman's Secret Towel Topper:

• This topper-holder was knitted from the bottom up using two strands of white and black worsted weight yarn and the Knifty Knitter Flower Loom.
  
• With the white yarn, work a three stitch picot cast on, then e-wrap knit stitches for twelve rows for the body. The e-wrap creates a looser knit in order to accommodate the towel.
  
• Flat knit fourteen more rows to form the head.
  
• Change to black yarn and knit seven e-wrap rows.
  
• Using the hang hem technique, reach down to the first black row and place those stitches on the corresponding pegs and knit off this row to form the hat brim.
  
• Flat knit six rows for the body of the hat, plus one e-wrap row for a total of seven rows.
• Purl one row, then using the hang hem technique again, reach down two rows below and pick up the stitches from the e-wrap row. Knit off to form the crown edge of the hat.
• Flat knit three rows to finish the crown.
• Decrease the twelve stitches to form pairs from pegs (1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-10, 11-12); lay the working yarn across the pegs & knit off two over one; and shift the finished six stitches so there are no empty pegs between stitches. Tighten working yarn to remove slack, then flat knit a row without decreasing.
• Decrease again by placing three of remaining six stitches onto the corresponding adjacent stitch to form three pairs of two loops. Lay the working yarn across the top of the two combined stitches and knit two over one. Shift these three stitches to consecutive pegs so no empty pegs are in between.
• Using the three pegs from the previous step, work a four inch I-cord and finish with a decreased bind off.
  
• Loop the end of the I-cord back about half way on itself to form a buttonhole.
  
• Finish the face & hat by sewing a button to the edge of the hat crown to form the hanging loop, and adding beads, buttons or embroidery for face decorations. Add a very small amount of stuffing to the hat to shape - if necessary. Also, after shaping the hat, use a yarn needle and close the inside opening at the base of the hat with a few tack stitches.
  
• Push a white shower curtain ring (or a large cabone ring - I couldn't find these, but the shower curtains are readily available and sturdier to boot) inside the head to shape. Run a gathering stitch around the neckline, cinch and tie off to form the neck.
  
• Make the body towel hanger by pushing a second white shower curtain ring inside the body and whip-stitch to the base of the neck.
• For the arms, using two strands of white yarn as one work a drawstring cast on using the five peg end of the Knifty Knitter Spool Loom. Knit using all five pegs until the I-cord is approximately eight inches long and work a decreased bind off leaving six inch yarn tail. Use a crochet hook and pull the arms through the "shoulder area" stitches on the body. (I pulled my in front of the ring). Even up the arms and tie them together in front. If necessary, tack them in place on the lower body.
• For the scarf, work an alternating red & white (or the colors of your choice) I-cord using one strand of yarn on four pegs of the Knifty Knitter Spool Loom. Tie and tack in place around the neckline.

All you need to do now, is hang your favorite holiday towel in the body ring and attach the hanging loop on a cabinet drawer pull. Your finished towel should look something like this:
Hopefully, I'll add the PDF file in a few days and send a message to Loom Lore readers through Notify (see upper right of sidebar) to let you know when it is available for download.

Ms. Santa Towel Topper

Need a helper for the holidays? Ms. Santa Towel Topper is handy in the kitchen or she can just hang around and brighten your day. All you need is a 12-peg Knifty Knitter Flower Loom, 5-peg end of the Knifty Knitter Spool Loom, a small red towel, small amounts of yarn in red, white and flesh tone and about an hour (more or less).

This towel topper was designed about three years ago, but I never posted the pattern. Before she was forever lost, I decided to add the pattern to my Pattern Box on the right, or you can click here to download. Ms. Santa has always been a favorite with my grandchildren, so I hope she brings a little happiness to you, too.

Update: Here is a Ms. Santa Towel Topper knitted by Tina in St. Augustine, FL. I love the contrasting green towel.

Towel toppers and the “u-turn” flat stitch

As usual, I spend most of this past Saturday in transit to and from our cabin in Centre, Alabama. However, I’ve learned to use the car trip time wisely by loom knitting and since Saturday was the day before Christmas Eve, I had all the more reason to do some last minute gift knitting. I had previously bought some small burgundy with ivory striped cotton towels along with the cutest little primitive heart-shaped buttons and I had dug through my bargain yarn stash for some sand-pebble color yarn, so I had everything I needed for the road trip. By the time I returned home, I had four little towel topper gifts completed, a new way to work an old stitch, and a towel topper pattern that had been refined several times.
Starting the towel topper
First, divide the top of the towel into 12 units, then with two strands of yarn threaded on a darning needle do a running stitch along the marked edge creating 12 double-strand loops. Leave 4 inch yarn tails on either side of the towel to later work and secure into the completed first row of the topper. Using the Knifty Knitter 12-peg flower loom with the right side of the towel facing out, bring the towel up through the middle of the loom and cast the twelve loops along the towel’s edge onto the 12 pegs of the flower loom. With two strands of worsted weight yarn held as one, cast on by e-wrapping above the towel loops, then knit by lifting the towel loops over the e-wrapped loops. This will complete your cast on edge.
Which stitch?
The e-wrapped or twisted knit stitch just seemed too loose for this particular project. The flat knit stitch produces a truer version of the stockinette stitch, but it can sometimes get a little tight after several rows. Also, if you manually loosen stitches, they don’t always have a uniform look. While playing around with the position of the working yarn, I discovered what I call a “u-turn” flat knit stitch. This is accomplished by bringing the working yarn in front of the peg above the existing loop, making a “u-turn” around the peg, then knitting off by lifting the bottom loop over the u-turn loop. This produces an even tension stockinette stitch without the tightness you get from the regular flat knit stitch. This is the stitch I used on most of the towel toppers I made.
Towel topper body
To create the base of the towel topper body, work 1-4 in rounds (working in a circle) and 5-22 in rows (working back & forth). Rounds 1-4: work a “u-turn” flat knit (UFK) stitch on each peg. Begin decreasing on row 5 by lifting the peg1 loop off and placing it on peg2 and lift peg12 loop off and place it on peg11 (this leaves pegs 1 & 12 empty). UFK pegs 2-11 on both rows 5 and 6. Row 7: work end peg decreases then UFK pegs 3-10 on both rows 7 and 8. Row 9: work end peg decreases then UFK pegs 4-9 on both rows 9 and 10. Row 11: work end peg decreases and UFK pegs 5-8 once.
Towel hanger strap
Row 12 begins the towel topper strap used for hanging the towel on the cabinet handle. Since the strap will be flipped to the front of the towel with the wrong side facing out, the strap is completed using purl stitches. Rows 12-22: purl 4 stitches back and forth on each row, which has the appearance of three columns of stockinette stitch from the reverse side. After completing the last row of purl stitches, bind off by going to the opposite end of the working yarn, lifting the next to the last loop off and placing it on the last loop. Knit off, and then move the loop back to the vacated peg. Repeat this procedure two more times ending with one loop. Put a crochet hook through the last loop, chain 4 or 5 stitches, then attach the chain stitch to the opposite side of the bind off edge to form a buttonhole loop. Sew a large shank button at the top of the towel topper body, a couple of rows below where the hanger strap starts. Finish off any loose yarn tails.

On the right, is the group of completed towels. The one in the lower right was the first one I did and is slightly different from the others. I worked the decreases unevenly and had not quite mastered the hanger strap. Also, I used only one strand of yarn in the running stitch on the towel. I try to think of all these little things as "lessons" instead of "mistakes."