made — peanut the elephant It’s pretty crazy how many people I know right now that are pregnant, over 13… so that means you’ll be seeing quite a few baby related things on my blog in the months ahead.  This little guy was a challenge, but so worth it in the end. I’m sad to see that the author took this pattern down off of Ravelry, I’m glad I had grabbed it before she did. I understand her reasoning, but really it wasn’t a bad pattern I think it just needed a little more detail to guide the knitter through it better. First off, I really didn’t grasp from the pictures that it was so small! My final elephant is only 3 inches tall and 3 inches wide (by the ear span). It’s amazing how much time small projects take! The following are the modifications I made to the pattern if you were one of the lucky ones to have saved it before it was taken down. The only thing I really had an issue with was figuring out how to do the increase rows. The M1’s fell in between the dpn’s and doing them the right way kept messing them up, being way too lose or they would fall off the needles. So I added a row of just knitting before the first row in the pattern (on the head and body) so I had some normal stitches to work with. Then, I would use all four dpn’s for the project except when I did the M1’s in between the dpn’s… I would just use three needles. This made them much tighter and they looked better. The only other change I made was adding one row of knitting to the top two legs and two rows to the bottom two legs. I liked the bottom two a little longer to balance out the larger ears on top. I also used a size D hook for the ear border instead of the B hook suggested, it was the smallest size I had and I don’t think it made a huge difference. It really is a cute pattern, I’d love to see a larger version! {photography: Jill Cannon}

made — peanut the elephant

It’s pretty crazy how many people I know right now that are pregnant, over 13… so that means you’ll be seeing quite a few baby related things on my blog in the months ahead. 

This little guy was a challenge, but so worth it in the end.

I’m sad to see that the author took this pattern down off of Ravelry, I’m glad I had grabbed it before she did. I understand her reasoning, but really it wasn’t a bad pattern I think it just needed a little more detail to guide the knitter through it better.

First off, I really didn’t grasp from the pictures that it was so small! My final elephant is only 3 inches tall and 3 inches wide (by the ear span). It’s amazing how much time small projects take!

The following are the modifications I made to the pattern if you were one of the lucky ones to have saved it before it was taken down.

The only thing I really had an issue with was figuring out how to do the increase rows. The M1’s fell in between the dpn’s and doing them the right way kept messing them up, being way too lose or they would fall off the needles. So I added a row of just knitting before the first row in the pattern (on the head and body) so I had some normal stitches to work with. Then, I would use all four dpn’s for the project except when I did the M1’s in between the dpn’s… I would just use three needles. This made them much tighter and they looked better.

The only other change I made was adding one row of knitting to the top two legs and two rows to the bottom two legs. I liked the bottom two a little longer to balance out the larger ears on top.

I also used a size D hook for the ear border instead of the B hook suggested, it was the smallest size I had and I don’t think it made a huge difference.

It really is a cute pattern, I’d love to see a larger version!

{photography: Jill Cannon}

05/11/2010 knitting baby elephant gift