The Big Knit

My innocent Big Knit woolly hats

Over the last few years I've noticed incredibly cute woolly hats appearing on bottles of Innocent Smoothies in the Autumn.  At first I was clueless...I thought it was just an advertising campaign, but then I discovered that the Innocent Big Knit was a yearly event which raised money for Age UK to help the elderly stay warm and healthy over the cold winter months.  For every behatted bottle of smoothie sold, Innocent donate 25p to Age UK.  What a great cause!

This is the first year that I've managed to get my act together and knit some tiny little hats for them and while I haven't quite managed to knit the hundreds that I'd envisioned, I'm happy with the twenty or so that I've made.

Strawberry hat

A lot of the patterns that I've used have come from Jo's Big Knit, a fabulous resource for anyone who wants to knit for The Big Knit.  Unsurprisingly the Minions are Lucas's favourite and he helped me knit the very first one.  Give it a few more years and he'll be knitting all by himself!  The cupcakes are one of my favourites, and have a knitted cherry on top that has saved me from the trauma of making miniature pom-poms!

As we've had such a lovely summer rambling around Bristol in search of Gromits, I decided to knit a woolly Gromit hat for The Big Knit.  A small tribute to Bristol's favourite pooch, much loved by the old and young alike.  Plus, Gromit is a knitter, too, so it seemed fitting.

The last date for posting to Innocent is the 1st of October 31st October (innocent have extended the date to get as many hats in as possible).  So get those needles clicking!

I'm linking up to Hookin' on Hump Day.

Woolly Gromit
This is based on the Sweep pattern, on Jo's Big Knit.  This is the first knitting pattern I've written in years, so it's a bit rough and ready.  Hope it works out if you try it!

Cream, black and brown DK yarn
4mm knitting needles
Wool needle
Ideally, sew-on googly eyes, but if you can't get hold of them, just glue on some regular craft ones

Using 4mm needles cast on 28 stitches with cream.
Purl 2 rows
Continue in SS and work 4 rows.
K13 in cream, change to black to create the nose (don't cut the cream yarn):

K into front and back of next stitch to create 3 stitches, repeat this with the next stitch.  You should have 6 black stitches on your needle.  Turn and purl these stitches
SS 4 more rows
K2tog, K next 2st, K2tog;
Turn P2tog twice

Turn return to cream and K to end of row
Continue in SS and work 9 rows.
K1, K2tog to last 3 stitches, k2tog, k1
P1, P2tog to last 3 stitches, p2tog, p1
(K2 tog) repeat to end
(P2 tog) repeat to end
(I elongaged the shaping for the head in an attempt to make it more Gromit-esque.)
B & T tightly

Ears--make 2
Start by casting on 2sts in brown yarn.
Row 1 inc knitwise in both stitches (4 in total)
Row 2 purl
Row 3 knit
Row 4 inc purlwise in first st, p to end of row
Row 5 knit
Row 6 purl
Row 7 inc in first st, k to end of row
Row 8 purl
Row 9 knit
Row 10 purl
Row 11 knit
Row 12 purl
Row 13 knit
Row 14 purl
Row 15 K2tog to end of row
Row 16 purl
Row 17 knit to last two stitches, K2tog
Row 18 P2tog to end, past first stitch over the second
B & T; this forms the top of the ear.

To make up
Use the black tail ends to create the right shape for Gromit's nose.  I used little stitches to 'catch' the base of the nose against the cream of the head, and then did a gathering stitch around the base of the nose, pulled fairly tight, then tied off the yarn with a knot on the reverse side of the work.

Once that's done, you can join the back seam with the cream tail ends.

Sew the ears to the top of the head.  I tried to get them to arch up like Gromit's but it hasn't worked out quite right.  Hopefully you'll have better luck with them!  Don't forget to work in the ends.

Lastly, either sew or glue on googly eyes.

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