How to Make French Dolly Knitted Flowers

Threading the knitting dolly: Use a needle or crochet hook to thread the yarn through the knitting dolly, pulling the yarn from the top through to the bottom.

Repeat until you have wound the yarn around each loop, moving around the knitting dolly.

Knitting a stitch: Use the needle and pull the bottom loop (labelled ‘2’ in the photo) up and over loop ‘1’.

Knitting a stitch: slip loop ‘2’ off the needle, leaving loop ‘1’ on the hook.

Knitting a stitch: pull gently on the tail to tighten the stitch. Repeat steps 4-7 to knit your cord, working around the doll, until you’ve reached your desired length.

Casting off:  There are lots of different methods to cast off so feel free to use your favourite one. For this version: stop winding the yarn once you have reached your length of cord, and work with the single loop. Lift the single loop onto the next hook.

Lift loop ‘2’ over loop ‘1’ and off the hook. Pull gently on the cord from the bottom of the dolly to tighten. Repeat step 8&9 until there is only one stitch left on the hook. Cut your yarn to leave a tail and pull this through to secure the end.

Making the wire flowers: Print off the template or hand draw your own flowers. You can use pliers for this stage or work by hand.

Bend the wire to follow the shape of the template. This is easier to do against the flat surface of a table.

Cut the end. You can tape the end or apply a little blob of glue from a hot glue gun to cover the sharp end. Don’t worry if your wire looks untidy, we’ll be finishing off the shape properly afterwards.

Slip the cord onto the wire, so the wire is going through the middle and slowly ease on the cord around the shapes of the flower. Do this section by section, taking care not to twist the knitted cord. Continue until the leaves/stem are covered and then repeat from the other end for the flower. You may need to unwind the wire slightly for more tight corners.

Use the tail to stitch the two colours together and weave in the ends.

For the flower centres, create a spiral with the knitted yarn and stitch together to hold in place. Then stitch into place holding the flower petals in position.