Pōhutukawa flower

Welcome to my 9th yarn scrap challenge post. This little flower is something I have been thinking about creating for a long time but haven't quite ever gotten around to making and writing up. I made an earlier version about 2 years ago. My original version is in the photo to the right and, from memory, the red “petals” were made using loop sc stitches. However, this time around I wanted to use up some of my leftover yarn tails.

Lately, I have been making so many little Pōhutukawa Christmas angels (in DK yarn and in crochet thread) that I have accumulated a huge amount of yarn scraps from weaving in my ends that I thought this might be the time to finally make something with all my ends.

My pōhutukawa flower design came to mind so I thought it might make a nice pattern to write up for my blog. We don’t have a pōhutukawa tree at our house. The closest looking flower we have at home is the feijoa flowers that come out about the same time in Aotearoa (pictured to the right). Feijoa (Acca sellowiana) are not native to here but have been introduced from South America. They grow particularly well in my city so when the fruit is ready there is always plenty for everyone to share around (a national news article once labelled it as our “most socialist fruit”)

This little pattern uses a mixture of leftover yarn tails and crocheted parts using small amounts of yarn. These little flowers are a bigger than the original flower (comparison shown to the right), even when made using crochet thread and a 1.5 mm hook (as are my kōwhai flowers from a previous yarn scrap challenge). The leaves are also slightly narrower than I would have liked. If you wish to have a little more fullness in your leaves you can rejoin your yarn on the opposite side of the starting chain and hdc in the 4 sts from the stem towards the point of the leaf.

I also noticed that these kind of look like they need to have some little googly eyes added to them to turn them into a little pōhutukawa person… at least that is how they looked to me (see photo to the right – I used 4 mm eyes for both size of flower). For both of my little pōhutukawa flowers I had more lime and green yarn tails left over. However, I managed to use up all of my red yarn tails. I will need to wait until I have a few more red tails if I’m going to make more of these (and I think there need to be several of them as they are usually found with more than one flower in a group). Perhaps, if I end up gluing on the googly eyes, I might make some with lime or green-coloured “hair” and that would solve the problem of the extra leftover tails (and I also have yellow and brown leftovers from my kōwhai angels to use up). I’m also considering stringing them together and turning them into something to decorate the Christmas tree with since before they have “hair”, they almost look like crocheted lights. Maybe that can be a project for next year to use up all my scraps and see how long I can get my chain of “pōhutukawa people” or perhaps “feijoa friends”.

Insert your hook into the post of the first st and pull up a loop

Insert your hook into the post of the next st and pull up a loop

Yarn over and pull through 3 loops on your hook

Rnd 1:             Ch 1, loosely sc 6 into magic ring. (6 sc)

Rnd 2:             *2 WST in the next st, WST in the next st* 3 times. (9 WST)

Rnd 3:             *2 WST in the next st, WST in the next 2 sts* 3 times. (12 WST)

Rnd 4:             WST in each st around. (12 WST)

Rnd 5:             *WST2tog, WST in the next 2 sts* 3 times. (9 WST)

Stuff with lime coloured yarn tails (or use regular fibrefill). From this point on you may wish to add matching stuffing every few rounds as it can be tricky to stuff this at the end due to the size of the hole created when making the stem of the flower.

Rnd 6:             *WST2tog, WST in the next st* 3 times, change to green. (6 WST)

Rnds 7-9:        WST in each st around (6 WST)

Rnd 10:           *WST in the first st, ch 6, sl st in the 2nd ch from hook, hdc in the next 4 ch, WST in the next 3 sts* 2 times, omitting the last WST on the second repeat. (8 hdc, 2 sl st, 6 WST)

In this round you will only be working into the WST stitches from Rnd 10, make your stitches so that the ch 6 and associated stitches are on the outside.

Rnd 11:           *WST in the next st, working behind the ch 6 and its sts, sc into the WST, WST in the next 3 sts* 2 times, omitting the last WST on the second repeat. (2 sc, 4 WST)

Rnds 12-14:    WST in each st around. If you would like you can add more rounds to make this longer. (6 WST)

Fasten off leaving a long tail to sew the bottom closed. Stuff and then sew closed.

Use your yarn tails of red yarn to create the petals of the flower. These are made by folding each scrap of yarn in half, inserting your hook into the place you wish to put it on the flower, pulling through the middle of the folded yarn, yarning over and pulling through both tails. Add as many “petals” as you wish.