This lovely rabbit, who I've somewhat unoriginally christened Rusty, is a project from First Knits by Luise Roberts and Kate Haxell. It was my stocking stitch practise piece, although the ears are in fact all garter stitch.
The recommended yarn is Rowan Yorkshire Tweed Aran, but the book was published in 2005 and Rowan no longer make that yarn. So, I bought some Rowan Scottish Tweed Aran, which sounded like it should amount to about the same thing. I also bought twice as much as I needed, being unable to detect the difference between 50g and 100g per ball. I'm sure it will come in for something.
The original project was on 6.5mm needles, but I decided to use the 5.5mm recommended with the Scottish Tweed yarn. I knit three wedge-shaped body pieces and then two long ears. By the time I had knitted the body pieces I had started to panic slightly. The book said the rabbit should be 9 inches nose to tail. Mine was heading for a good 50-70% bigger. My needles were smaller than in the book and my knitted fabric didn't look excessively loose or holey. What I had done wrong?
In a bid to reduce the bunny's size, I sewed the body right sides together rather than using mattress stitch to lose some of the excess in the seams. I left a gap for stuffing and attached the ears. I then decided to send bunny for a swim in the washing machine at 60 degrees for a bit of a felting diet. I decided not to risk more than one round of felting (there's no mention of felting in the book) and bunny did look at bit smaller and was also a lovely texture.
I stuffed the bunny with toy filling and inserted some safety eyes (they tend to look neater than my embroidered eyes). I did the nose with embroidery thread and then made the pom pom tail. I have a set of Clover pom pom makers, which are absolutely fab for doing pom poms quickly. I always fasten pom poms off with embroidery thread rather than knitting yarn as I find you get a much more secure result.
And there you have him. Bunny is still at least 13 inches nose to tail. The only comfort I have is that having consulted Flossy Blossy, who has also made this rabbit, I discovered her version was also bigger than in the book.
He's very cute and cuddly though...
Melx
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