1. A pair of mittens
Two matching mittens on a string, banded with hearts, crosses, trees and zigzags, with snowflakes around them.
Free printable · Color online
Winter coloring pages for adults
Eight pages for the cold months, with nothing that has to come down on December 26: a pair of mittens, a hat with scarf and mittens, a patterned sweater, a mug of cocoa, two snow globes, three candles in greenery, and pines in the snow.
The knitwear is drawn in bands of small repeating shapes, the way stranded knitting is charted. Print the pages on letter paper or color them on screen.
Each page prints on one sheet of US letter paper. Under every page are buttons to print just that one, to color it on screen, or to save it as a picture.
2. Hat, scarf and mittens
A bobble hat, a fringed scarf and a pair of mittens laid out together.
3. Patterned sweater
A sweater laid flat, the same bands running across the body and down both sleeves.
4. A mug of hot cocoa
A patterned mug on a saucer with marshmallows, a candy cane behind it and holly at the corners.
5. Snow globe with pines
Three pines under glass, snow falling, on a base banded with pattern.
6. Snow globe with a cottage
A small cottage in a globe. Color the glass around it pale blue and leave the flakes white.
7. Three candles
Three patterned candles with pine, holly and a cone at their feet.
8. Pines in the snow
Three evergreens in drifts under a sky of flakes, drawn large and simple.
About the knitting patterns
The bands on the mittens, hat and sweater borrow from two knitting traditions. Fair Isle knitting, named for one of the Shetland Islands north of Scotland, builds a garment from narrow bands of small motifs, usually with only two colors of yarn in any one row.
The eight-pointed star is the best-known motif of Norwegian knitting. It is often called the Selbu rose, after the district of Selbu, where a girl named Marit Emstad is credited with knitting it into mittens in 1857; black-and-white star mittens are still made there. Rows of small trees, crosses and diamonds are as common in Nordic sweaters as they are here.
Color ideas for these pages
Real stranded knitting uses few colors, and the pages look most like wool if you do the same. Pick a background color for the whole garment and one or two pattern colors, then keep to them: cream with red and navy, or gray with white and mustard.
The ribbed cuffs and brims are plain on purpose. Color them in the darkest of your colors and they will frame everything else. For the cocoa, a brown ring just inside the rim and bare paper for the marshmallows is all it takes.
Which page to start with
This set has 8 pages: 1 bold and easy, 6 medium and 1 detailed. The quickest to finish is “A mug of hot cocoa,” with 108 areas to color, and the longest is “Patterned sweater,” with 660. Bold and easy pages have heavy lines and large shapes that suit markers and tired eyes; detailed pages have fine lines for sharp pencils or gel pens.
How printing, saving and coloring on screen work is explained on the coloring pages home. If you like filling shapes by number, Linseed Loft Color by Number is a free paint by number game with 74 pictures.