Thursday, March 7, 2013

Any Gauge Easter Bunny?

My friend Laura hunted through her craft supplies for possible bunny makings and brought me a care package to help me get ready for knit club Saturday.  Here is a pink bunny, next to my prior effort, in fuzzy pink yarn in a worsted weight.  What you can't see in the photo is how very soft the pink yarn is.  It's kind of like a chenille.

All you need for these cute little chubby bunnies is a knitted square piece of fabric (using just about any yarn), a needle, and a little fiber fill.  For a different gauge like this worsted, you just knit a square about the same size, but with less stitches, and make it in the same way.  The shape is all in the sewing (see the pattern at heartstringsfiberarts.com).

I did a few things differently on the pink bunny:  I sewed the legs on the sewing machine, which was fast and looks nice.  I just pinned right sides together and helped advance the thick knitting through the sewing machine, sewing across the point at the corners so I wouldn't get such pointy front paws this time.  I hand sewed the head shaping and the tummy (after stuffing), and that's the extent of the hand sewing! 

If you are curious, I used 60 stitches and 90 rows for the white variegated bunny, and 30 stitches and 45 rows for the pink one.  Since the pattern over at heartstringsfiberarts.com is a hand knitting pattern and calls for garter stitch ears, I wasn't sure how I'd do the ears.  After making a few samples, I settled on this:  The white ears are 15 stitches, *knit 3 rows, decrease both sides, repeat from * down to 1 stitch and end off.  The pink ears are 9 stitches and the same procedure.

I think, after having made a fine gauge bunny and a worsted weight gauge bunny, that I might like an in-between thickness for the yarn about the best.  These make up fast enough (especially with the sewing machine) that I can imagine making several for a charity or for a group of children.

Before the pink bunny had a pom pom tail, I realized how easily this shape could be made into a little green frog.  You'd just change the shape of the face a bit and add some froggy-looking features.  I don't know why you couldn't make him into a bean bag with character, if you wanted.  No reason you couldn't do a dog, a cat, or other critters with various modifications. 

Laura gave me some goo-goo eyes to glue on, as well, which will add personality! 

Hmmm, fun fur...camoflage...tiger stripes...neon...heck, I bet a tiny fair isle pattern would be cute, checks maybe, or polka dots.

Hey, knitters, if you do something fun with this pattern, send me a photo, please? 

1 comment:

  1. I made the bunny using a square knitted on my LK-140 and it turned out great.
    Just a thought - wouldn't this bunny be a good use for those old felted hand-knit sweaters found at Goodwill stores. Or a knitted garment of great yarn that doesn't (sigh) fit anymore. I have a lot of these...

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