(Every week until December 1st we will be making a small Christmas ornament that can be used in our Pocket Advent Calendar. Join us in making all 24 or just pick and choose your favorites.)

To fill pocket 8 in our Advent calendar we are going to revisit a popular ornament Susi created last year, the knit candy cane.

These candy canes will last for years and won’t tempt you from adding to the holiday pounds.

Knit Candy Cane

The cane itself is a knit i-cord. Most of the stitches are done in white, then one red stitch staggered through the cane. (Never knit an i-cord before? Knitting Tips has a video showing how, just scroll down the page.)

Supplies:

• red yarn
• white yarn (scrap yarn is fine. you will not need a lot of yardage, unless you are going to make hundreds)
• two double pointed needles that are the appropriate size for yarn. (or, one circular needle that you can slide the yarn from end to end.)
• wire

Gauge:

Since this doesn’t need to fit anyone gauge doesn’t matter. It will differ depending on the yarn you use, thinner yarn=smaller candy canes, thicker yarn=bigger candy canes.
Cast on 5 white (slide)
*knit 4 white, and 1 red, (slide)
knit 3 white, 1 red, 1 white (slide)
knit 2 white, 1 red, 2 white (slide)
knit 1 white, 1 red, 3 white (slide)
knit 1 red, 4 white (slide) *
Repeat until you have a cane as long as you would like.

When the cane is the length that you are happy with, then cast off. The cast off stitches will look like a straight line. So you will need to weave in the tail. Take the tail, and begin by weaving in the stitch opposite of where the tail is, to form the last row into a tube. Sew through all the stitches, gathering them up. Then bury the yarn in the middle of the chord itself.

To give the cane a little structure, I took a piece of wire, and carefully (slowly, carefully) stuck it into the middle of the i-chord.) I used a wire that is about as ‘firm’ as a pipe cleaner. If you are feeling really dextrous, you could knit the piece of wire INTO the i-chord as you are knitting.