Knitted Pet Stuff

Catnip Mouse

Materials

Worsted weight wool (I always use wool or mohair as my cats seem particularly fond of these fibers)
US size 6 or 7 needles

Directions

Cast on 20 - 24 stitches, depending upon how large you want your mouse to be. Work 4 rows straight in stockinette stitch. On the 5th row (and every subsequent odd-numbered row), decrease one stitch at each end of row. Work until four stitches remain, cast off remaining stitches.

Fold mouse in half (with the wrong side outside) by matching the long sides and sew the seam from nose to tail. Turn inside out. Stuff with catnip and sew the back seam from top to bottom. Securely fasten the seam at the bottom of the mouse and leave a yarn tail. I often attach a few strands of yarn and make a braided tail.

Note: When I stuff a mouse with catnip, I like to first put the catnip in a cut-off toe from old pantyhose (I save old pairs just for this purpose), and tie a knot in it to make a little bag. Then stuff the bag into the mouse body. This way if you have a particularly enthusiastic kitty who likes to disembowel mice, you won't have a mess of catnip all over your house!

Cat Basket

If you don't have cats, it would make a perfect container for your current sock project.

Materials:

3 - 4 oz skeins Lamb's Pride Bulky (85% wool, 15% mohair -- 125 yards/skein)
1 - 4 oz skein Lamb's Pride Worsted (85% wool, 15% mohair -- 190 yards/skein)
Size 11 needles (straight)
Size 13 needles (circular)
Size J crochet hook (optional-see instructions)

Gauge:

2½ to 3 stitches/inch using size 11 needles and bulky yarn

Instructions:

Base -- you'll be knitting a circle which I'll call a "pie". You'll be knitting one pie wedge at a time on straight needles until you complete a circle. (Remember that your cast on tail is on the outside of the pie, not at the center -- it will help if you get confused on the first wedge.)

1. With size 11 needles, cast on 30 stitches with bulky weight.

2. Knit 3, turn
3. Knit 3, turn
4. Knit 6, turn
5. Knit 6, turn
6. Knit 9, turn

7. Continue to follow this progression, knitting 3 additional stitches each time before turning.

8. On the next to the last row of the wedge, you will knit 30 stitches, turn.

9. Last row, slip 1 stitch, knit 29 stitches back to the outside of the pie.

10. Begin again at step 2.

11. Repeat this sequence until you have enough wedges to make a pie -- from time to time, lay your knitting out on a flat surface and check.

12. When your circle is done, bind off the last row of the last wedge. (I used almost all of two full skeins of Lamb's Pride Bulky on the base.)

13. Seam together the first and the last wedge. When you come to the end of the seam in the center, snug up the small hole. (Neatness doesn't count here -- the felting will hide the seam.)

14. My circle was 22 inches in diameter. (If I had stopped here and felted it, I would have had a furry placemat about 15 inches in diameter after felting.)

15. With one strand of bulky yarn and a size J crochet hook loosely single crochet 106 stitches around the edge of the circle -- about every other garter stitch ridge. This made the circle cup a bit around the edges.

16. With size 13 circular needles and one strand of bulky and one strand of worsted, pick up and knit one stitch in each single crochet chain. (You could skip the single crochet step and simply pick up the stitches directly on the circle. I wanted to see how much the circle cupped and the single crochet allowed that.)

17. Join and begin knitting in the round -- alternating rows of knit and purl to create a garter stitch band. Continue to knit for 3 inches after the single crochet round.

18. On the last row, k2tog, k3, k2 tog, k3 around.

19. Bind off.

Fling the thing in the washer and felt until it is the size you like. I used the hot wash/cold rinse cycle and ran it through two 18 minute cycles.

The resulting basket came out an oval shape which I liked but I could have tugged it back into a circle. The opening measures 12" by 7" and the base measures 15" by 12" and will fit a teen-aged sized cat.

I'm letting it air dry so that it doesn't get any smaller. As it dries, the cats are circling it expecting to be chased away. When it's ready for use, I'll spray a little catnip on it and they can have at it.

To adjust for larger cats, increase the stitches in the wedges by increments of 3 -- e.g. 33, 36, 39, etc. and increase the number of picked up stitches. The mohair in this particular yarn created a very "hairy" basket