One of the things I do not need to do right now is knit a tea cozy. It's unlikely that I will ever need to knit a tea cozy. In spite of my otherwise rabid Anglomania, I seldom drink tea. I own a teapot, but it hasn't seen action in three years. A teapot that is never full of tea does not require a cozy.
Nor has anyone else asked me to knit a tea cozy. There are several people who are waiting for me to write things and draw things and photograph things. There are even people who are waiting for me to knit things–but not a tea cozy.
And yet, this afternoon while I try to keep my shoulder to the wheel and my nose to the grindstone and my feet to the fire and all sorts of other undeniably nasty expressions for getting work done, I cannot stop thinking about knitting a tea cozy.
Not just any tea cozy, either. A so-called "bachelor's" tea cozy, with openings to fit over the spout and handle. This is of course a subtly misandrist label suggesting that unmarried gentlemen are too lazy and/or stupid to lift the cozy off the tea, but never mind. I still want to knit a "bachelor's" tea cozy because without the openings what you really have is a hat pretending to be something else, and I am bored of knitting hats at the moment, even devious undercover hats.
Of course, there is somebody who expects me to be knitting a hat. But I don't want to work on the hat, I can only thinking of knitting a tea cozy. And I have the most dreadful sinking feeling that before long, I will be knitting a tea cozy.
End of communication.
107 comments:
But what about cumcumber sandwiches!!
-Tom
I have at least one friend who has worn a tea cosy as a hat. He did not care to discuss it.
Well, if it's supposed to be a "man's teacozy", why not just go "butch" all the way? Think about it: Berroco Suede in black, knit in very tight stockinette, add the zipper from the second drawing (exposed metal, of course), and some studs, or better yet, spikes. Well, don't say I didn't try to help.
Do it! You know you must...
Hmm...I'm not a bachelor, but I'm definitely too lazy to lift the cozy off the teapot. Of course, doing so would leave my tea feeling un-cozy. Yeah, that's it! I'm not lazy, just thoughtful to the needs of my tea.
... that "Drink Me" one... that needs to happen.
*runs off to find Alice Blue yarn*
http://www.ravelry.com/groups/quirky-cosies
Sorry, couldn't resist.
Why is that teacosy wearing a bikini?
Or is it sporting shades and a goatee.
I cannot decide.
Em would have LOVED this entry. ~x~
But... I like tea, and it's my birthday. I vote yes.
Sadly, I'm not cool enough for a teapot. I use a samovar; it makes Mom proud.
Then this would be up your alley for a tea cosy: http://lollipopknits.blogspot.com/2008/09/tea-cosy-pattern-freebie.html
You can knit a bachelor tea cozy if you wish, but for practicality it's quite useless because the openings allow the heat to dissipate and let your teapot get cold.
But then you don't use a teapot often enough for it to be practical so knit a chicken. And if you just want one in a hurry, I have a fat yarn tea cozy pattern on my blog made out of the penultimate English yarn, Rowan.
Hmm, I have the exact item you describe. It says "drink me" and has an opening for handle and spout. It's in brown sheep, black and white. I don't use it often. Maybe cause I'm not a bachelor.
I fear there is little choice in the matter for you.
Hopefully not the bikini tea cozy. Ironic? or just wrong?
I'm so glad to hear of another anglophile who's not that into tea. People are always surprised to find out that I'm more of a coffee girl. But tea cozies are still quite appealing to me, too. Is it OK to knit my husband a bachelor tea cozy? He does like tea, but he's a professor of Victorian Literature, so it's really a job requirement.
I recommend the bachelor tea cosy. Forget laziness - I knit one of the other type. It was darling, a samll production hand dyed worsted weight, lightly felted...then my teen decided she lie it better as a brimmed hat and wore it for the rest of the winter.
Bachelor cosies do not create this problem. Plus, I love your sketches!
Huh. I'm from England and all of our tea cozies had holes for the handle and spout. They were knitted, too. I'm going to England July 31st ... I could just bring you one back.
I do that exact same thing! The more stuff I have to do, the more I start that have nothing to do with it. Little grasshopper brain, what oh what shall I do with you?!?
I vote for "Drink Me". Maybe stitch a hooka on the other side in ode to the butterfly.
I think you should knit the leaf-topped cozy with a zipper on the other side.
You know, I have rhinestone zippers if you need them for your tea cozy...
I guess it would be too something or other to knit one with a zipper opening over the spout. In denim blue. With a pocket on the side to hold the packets of sweetener. Too Dolores, I guess.
I just love getting glimpses into your brain. And I'm totally into what Tiggywinkle Knits suggested!
Haven't YOU just caused a tempest in a....nevermind. I don't know about the *bachelor* bit, but my cherished tea cozy is wondrous padded chintz, and ties around the lid with a comely blue ribbon. It DOES have an opening for handle and spout, and elastic around the base to hold it snug. In truth, it keeps my tea VERY hot; the wee gaping maw of the spout does not release enough heat that it affects the tea. If you DO knit one, O Great KnitterlyGuy, could you make available the patt-run for those of us slavishly chained to The Pattern?
Me, I skipped the tea cozy and went straight to the egg cozy 'cause I KNOW how to live.
I checked with my English friends. A true bachelor does not own a tea cozy -- or will not be able to find it. Instead, he will use one of three things:
1.) When serving Gran and/or Mum, he'll use a clean tea towel, wrapped around the teapot;
2.) When the gas fire is slow to warm his draughty home, he'll use his winter scarf or muffler in lieu of the tea towel; OR
3.) If he's a real slob, he'll use a stretched-out tube sock in lieu of the tea towel. It may or may not be clean.
And not all tea cozies are knitted. One of the Brits has a quilted one she loves -- because it was inspired by Bjork's infamous "dead swan" Oscar dress.
Okay, begin with a circle, then pick up stitches around half the circle and work up to the depth of the pot plus a bit. Repeat on the other side. A bit of flairing that will allow the two parts to overlap a bit when you place the pot on the circle and bring the sides up is good. Icord to tie the tops of the flaps together in such a way that the handle pokes out one side, the spout pokes out the other side and you reach down into the top to open the lid as needed. Made dense enough it will hold the heat just fine.
oh no. now i want to knit tea cozies! it's most certainly your fault. also, some of our local coffee/tea shops have reusable knitted cup sleeves instead of those cardboard things. they are great. and ludicrously easy to make.
Now I want to make a tea cozy too. And I dont even own a teapot.
Have you been reading Malcolm Pryce's noir masterpiece "Aberystwyth Mon Amour"? It has more tea cozies per chapter than any novel I've ever read, not that I've read many noir thrillers set in Wales.
I am English, I drink plenty of tea, I knit, & I think knitting a cozy is a marvelous idea. It can be your first step towards tea-drinking nirvana.
I have a good tea story:
I was living in Canterbury at the time, right in the centre of the picturesque city, with a view of the cathedral. Walking tours would sometimes go by the kitchen window. One morning a stereotypical (in a good way) middle-aged middle America couple stopped outside. The wife pointed at me, tugging on her husband's sleeve and said, "Look Bob, a real English person making tea!" I turned and waved, and they scurried off.
Of course a proper man's tea cosy would be knitted in string and resemble a pair of Y fronts, with the spout poking out of the opening.
Way back in olden times (the 60's) Gypsy Rose Lee had an afternoon talk show. (Younger readers should go google her, now.)
A viewer sent her a tea cozy crocheted to look like her little dog.
Gypsy was so charmed by the cozy that she put it to use on the show, but she inadvertantly put it on the pot incorrectly.
The spout ended up looking a bit inappropriate... let's just say that that little dog was *very* excited to be on the show.
Still can't believe it aired - this was back in the days that the censors had married couples sleeping in twin beds...
In December, I crocheted a "manly" tea cozy as a Christmas present for my dad. It leaves the handle and spout accessible, but it still does a very good job of keeping the tea warm. If you want to take a look, http://craftinginmuddyyork.blogspot.com/2009/04/playing-catch-up-part-deux.html . It's nowhere as sophisticated as any of your designs! but I flatter myself that it may possibly provide some inspiration.
(But if it doesn't, I vote for the zipper design, or some variation thereof.)
The bikini cozy looks *so* Dolores ;)
I think you might want to check out Grand Purl Baa (Loani Prior). She is the Queen of Tea cosies and wrote the book Wild Tea Cosies.
http://www.grandpurlbaa.com
She is very inspiring and may send your ideas soaring to another plane.
Sewbeads
You've got to let that creative spirit play! It's what's keeping you alive.
I have found procrastination to be a great motivating force. I bet that cozy gets knit in a New York Minute.
This entry sent me post haste to the Oxford English Dictionary. Sure enough, cozy is the American spelling of cosy as in tea cosy. That z really jarred. Shows how long I've been away.
Janet, a displaced American in Dublin
"What the hell is this?!" Ahh, yes.
If you are thinking about the bachelor's tea cosy in Weldon's, try it! It's fast and easy.
Carol in WI
Couldn't you knit a hat that looked like a tea cosy? Or a teapot with a cosy? You know you want to.
I know nothing about tea cozies; I don't even own a teapot, but I like the "what the hell is this" one in the lower right corner.
I think the zipper needs to go over the um, "spout", and promise a manly American bulge.
One day -- it has happened before -- the knitting category for entries to the Home Industries Tent at the Strathardle Highland Games will be "tea cosy". If there were a Panopticon pattern out there, I would win the Glenisla Shield again (as I did with Sam the Ram -- "knitted toy" -- in 2007).
I'm just saying.
Love, Jean
They are great for using up odds and ends, and hmmmm, I need one!
I've had knitting a tea cozy in the back of my mind for a while now (actually 3 one for me & for each of my DD's - we do all drink tea - but mostly in the winter.) But I have 2 more Wonderful Wallabies to knit for the grands (1 done.) And a scarf out of some slippery Colinette yarn that I promised my great niece as part of her 8th grade grad present (she has shown exceptional delight with all previous hand knits - how could I not?. And a baby due Labor Day weekend (with a big sister - so really I should make 2 presents - I'm thinking big & little Bobby Bears.) So tea cozies will have to wait - perhaps I'll even order the delightfully wacky book of tea cozy patterns from Amazon UK - or maybe I'll wait to see what the one coming out in Nov is like. Now all I can think about is te cozies - why order a book when it would be os easy to wing it -stop. See what you've started.
So instead of a full grown tea cozy, make a miniature one.
http://solomon-roggey.blogspot.com/2009/06/what-honey.html
Works well for me, you're such a quick knitter you could churn out your own kind of mini in mere hours...just saying.
I want the pattern (and I don't care what type of teacosy it is)!!!
I have approximately 1000 projects going, and yet, right now, I want to start another pair of socks (not needed by anyone I know) and try to knit from the toe up (I have not learned this method yet) and both at the same same. I know if I start this, I will only want to start yet another something no one wants, needs, or ever thought of. Oh well, where is that sock yarn?
I love the tea cozy with the zipper. Perhaps in manly denim yarn?
How about a hat in the shape of a tea cozy?
Resistance is futile. Pray you can avoid felting it.
I never drink tea. I store heads of garlic in my teapot.
I like the sideways one at the bottom right. It looks... lotus-y.
I love the tea bikini... teakini!
Not following one's muse is dangerous. Knit the tea cozy.
I love tea and the cozy's that go with them, you can definitely design a tea cozy with a "Drink Me" on it in a Alice in Wonderland style....fun fun, you rock! And a manly one would be awesome too.
Oh, Franklin. Your summer schedule sounds much like mine. (Albeit mine is mainly sewing with some beadwork thrown in for kicks, and only because I'm altering a pageant gown that is TOTALLY bugle beads and it needs to come in.... *SIGH*)
I can state with much conviction that the side trips and detours that we take from our deadline oriented work keep us saner than we'd be without them. Everyone needs a break from the screaming heap of projects that *must be*. Must be done, on time, to someone else's specifications, for money/to make a living. Every creative person out there needs to take a little mental vacation when under that kind of stress to keep the creativity alive.
I like a joining of the flower-type cozy with the "Drink Me" Alice reference. After all, in "Through the Looking Glass" she started out in a lovely garden of talking flowers. :)
I'm pretty sure Billy Connolly (Scottish Comedian) said 'never trust a man who left alone in a room with a teacosy doesn't try it on!' I do entirely understand the teacosy thing too. I rarely have need for one, but they are soooo entirely charming.
I've often wondered if Tea cozy's actually keep the tea any warmer any longer than a naked tea pot. but that is just me. I can only say if the knitting gods want you to knit a tea cozy, then knit the damn thing, They will hound you night and day until you do. On ravelry I saw a Tea cozy knit from HOT Pink Eyelash yarn. I would HIGHLY recommend you do not use hot pink eyelash yarn for your tea cozy. I'll be checking back often for a tea cozy update.
Thank you, from someone else who listens to the Archers faithfully... have you checked out Silver Street? :)
I do drink tea every day, but only make pots on the weekend. I agree that it's much easier to have a cozy that doesn't have to be lifted off the pot, so I designed my own! It won't set you back on your deadlines; I've never designed anything before and it only took me a day to design and knit.
Curiouser and Curiouser!
I too do not really want to knit a tea cozy, but I do want to make the "Woolly Mammoth" tea cozy (complete with tusks) in Shannon Okey's "Spin to Knit" book. Because it's awesome.
It will be interesting to see what you come up with for the tea cozy.
I'm liking the zip over the spout area suggestion that's Knitting Painter Woman made. A rude tea cosy is a great idea ;)
I'm thinking I like your urges better. I once had an urge to knit one of these ... http://knitty.com/ISSUEwinter04/PATTwomb.html
I love the one with the flower on top!
Might as well knit it and get it over with (for now). For some reason (and I really don't like working with fun fur yarn) I feel the need to knit the fish from the Tea Cosies book. It appears that tea cosies are capable of influencing us poor knitters when we are distracted.
A teacozy is quite easy if you would have the teapot in hand to take measurements.
Good luck!
If the cozy also fits the pitcher of iced tea...."noublem" as the word verification states.
M
I would be even lazier. Knit it, Felt it, then cut slits for the spout and handle.
Why didn't I think of that when I made my tea cozy?
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/155/431366336_5d19a3aeb2.jpg
But go ahead ... use my idea for the extremity holes.
check out this tea cozy: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/arachnesdaughter/im-a-little-teapot
Please, please, please make the Alice one, and then post pictures of Delores and Harry reenacting the Mad Tea Party with it. I think that it would make my life complete if that happened.
Loved this post. It's so hard when you're supposed to do many things and all you can think about is doing some other singular thing. And it becomes an obsession.
Shared this post with Fiber Arts Friday on my blog. Good luck getting it done.
I can see it with sewn on leather straps to fasten through the handle, perhaps the zipper at the front to custom adjust to the individual spouts...
A bachelor's tea cozy. I like it! Hats can wait, follow your heart.
Cozies are wonderful but if you leave an opening for the spout, the liquid will get cooler much more quickly.
I laughed and laughed! I had the experience and (mostly) pleasure of unexpectedly teaching kindergarten this past year. There was much "tip me over"ing and "pour me out"ing going on in various degrees of grace and coordination...always very funny and always I wound up laughing and sitting on the floor. Thanks for bringing the images up for me again!
I think the bikini/sunglasses tea cozy is the love child of Dolores and Boris Badenov. (And their first names rhyme, just to be uber-precious.)
Knit the hat but leave 2 openings for the ears - voila a 'tea hat cosy'
Dum di dum di dum di dummm :)
If you know and love radio 4 you'll understand this reference
Funny, I have had the EXACT same urge lately. I'll give in if you will! We can compare notes at the Sock Summit!
Hello! I've been reading you for some time now but I think this is the first time I've commented - tea will always move me to type! I'm Irish - we drink a LOT of tea. I think possibly more than the Brits. (Though I wouldn't want to challenge a group of knitters pumped up on caffeine, so lets not argue the point.) If you're going to make a cosy, it has to be this one: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/terrific-tea-cosy
(I'm proud/slightly embarrassed to say that the lime green/purply pink one you see on the Rav pattern page is mine.) Why this one? Because if you're going to knit something as silly as a cosy, you may as well go for all out kitsch, right? And this one has pearls and everything! (Though they are a beeeeatch to sew on, I warn ya.) I made mine at the insistence of my boyfriend's mother but I have to admit I found it very hard to give away. You think you're not a cosy person ... and then you surprise yourself. As you seem to be discovering.
Anyway, great blog. I love your writing style, it does cheer me up of a cold, wintry, Irish July morning. (Well, that and a cup of tea ...)
Not sure how to make the link work, so forgive me for the huge line of text, but your teapot musings reminded me of this:
http://www.iwantoneofthose.com/lifestyle-home/cool-kitchen/terrorist-teapot/index.html
I think it's cute. :p
Marianne
You could make a very butch tea cosy using the suggestions from the comments, and add in a purled depiction of androgens around the rim. Science, knitting, anglophilia, and ironic comments on gender --- squared --- all in a few hundred yards of yarn. Multi-tasking at its finest.
I can tell that this is what you need: http://www.suck.uk.com/product.php?rangeID=103
Just a thought.
Did you know Paul Schaffer (of David Letterman fame), cowrote "It's Raining Men"? I tell you this because all water, even that in a tea pot, was rain at some point, and a verification word like "rainin" on this blog should not be allowed to go unnoticed.
Also, if you ever saw Harry Nilsson's movie _The Point_ (narrated by Ringo Starr), you may want to see the life cycle of the water in a tea pot here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2O3cUN8yWk&feature=related.
"end of communication" -- seriously?? Where are you, Franklin? Hope you're OK.
Now I want you to draw my next tattoo.
Just like that tune that gets stuck in your head...I can't stop thinking about tea cozys! Now I have this urge to knit a 'dress' for each of my tea pots!
You should definitely just knit the tea cosy. I went through a similar mania two winters back, was convinced the only thing I ever wanted to knit for the rest of my life was tea cosies, and then I made one and felt much better. To date I have not felt compelled to knit another one, although the compulsion to buy an unnecessary number of teapots is at times overwhelming.
When your giftee gets their hat, will it have a hole for the spout? I haven't made a tea cozy either, but definitely want to knit one for my mom. I already have the teapot for it. Just need to decide on a pattern.
Um, Franklin? It's late August and, um, well, do we need to send a rescue party down the rabbit hole to find you? Hello??
wow ! what a blog
wow ! what a blog
I present to you...the Tea Mitten (rav link)! It's svelte, it's manly, it's free! It also looks very compatible with your sketches. :)
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Just a note I'm surprised I resisted at the time -- I'm Laura, who gave Shannon the Mammoth tea cozy pattern. I do think tea cozies could be an art form like teapots often end up being, not intended for practical use. I have a plush octopus who needs, for instance, a knitted rock with seaweed. You could do a line of them and auction them for charity.
Anyway, I' glad you liked it.
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