Custom Dog Sweaters
I'm sitting here at our monthly Knitwits party at HYS and Bex, evil woman that she is, handed me a new book that just came in. It's called "Fleece Dog" by Sinco. This incredible book is full of needle felted dogs of more than a dozen breeds and they are so realistic you just want to reach out and pet them. Bex knows I have a softness for dogs and that I've been wanting to try out needle felting. She claims she didn't want me to be upset if I "hid" the book from her, but I know the truth: she just likes taunting and torturing me with new books and yarns I just can't live without.
Bad Bex!
As we were passing the felted dog book around the topic of dog sweaters came up. Several years ago I stumbled upon a custom dog sweater pattern on the internet. It's darned hard to find a knit sweater pattern for a German Shepherd, so I was quite pleased and promptly knit Cole a sweater. Unfortunately there were two problems: his acute embarrassment at other dogs seeing a big manly dog wearing a cute sweater, and the fact that acrylic yarn absorbs water and snow making the dog colder than if he had no sweater at all.
My next sweater will be knit of wool. I haven't decided which route to go. I could go with a superwash wool for easy care. If he was a small dog, I'd go for a nice sock yarn with a pretty pattern. The other option is to felt the wool. Felted wool, assuming it is tightly felted, is water resistant. I could go with the Brown Sheep wool, that reliable old standby that comes in many pretty colors, or I could go with a silky soft Frog Tree alpaca (also in many pretty colors). I haven't decided yet.
Here's the original pattern I used: http://www.cs.oswego.edu/~ebozak/knit/esb-patterns/dog-sweater.html
And here's one that let's you type in your dog's measurements and it will do all of the calculations for you: http://www.thedietdiary.com/cgi-bin/chart_dog.pl
Do you have a furry friend who needs a sweater knit with your own loving hands?
Some Missouri dog trivia. Did you know that the term "man's best friend" was coined by Missouri Senator Vest during a summation in a case in Marshall Missouri. You can read part of this "Eulogy for a dog." http://www.warrensburg.org/drum.htm
Bad Bex!
As we were passing the felted dog book around the topic of dog sweaters came up. Several years ago I stumbled upon a custom dog sweater pattern on the internet. It's darned hard to find a knit sweater pattern for a German Shepherd, so I was quite pleased and promptly knit Cole a sweater. Unfortunately there were two problems: his acute embarrassment at other dogs seeing a big manly dog wearing a cute sweater, and the fact that acrylic yarn absorbs water and snow making the dog colder than if he had no sweater at all.
My next sweater will be knit of wool. I haven't decided which route to go. I could go with a superwash wool for easy care. If he was a small dog, I'd go for a nice sock yarn with a pretty pattern. The other option is to felt the wool. Felted wool, assuming it is tightly felted, is water resistant. I could go with the Brown Sheep wool, that reliable old standby that comes in many pretty colors, or I could go with a silky soft Frog Tree alpaca (also in many pretty colors). I haven't decided yet.
Here's the original pattern I used: http://www.cs.oswego.edu/~ebozak/knit/esb-patterns/dog-sweater.html
And here's one that let's you type in your dog's measurements and it will do all of the calculations for you: http://www.thedietdiary.com/cgi-bin/chart_dog.pl
Do you have a furry friend who needs a sweater knit with your own loving hands?
Some Missouri dog trivia. Did you know that the term "man's best friend" was coined by Missouri Senator Vest during a summation in a case in Marshall Missouri. You can read part of this "Eulogy for a dog." http://www.warrensburg.org/drum.htm
posted by Kirsten at 6:32 PM
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