The Alot Monster – Another Vegan Knitting Spectacle

In recent months I have had something of a personal knitting renaissance where I’ve progressed from knitting simple squares over and over again to actually following patterns and making real ‘things’ from vegan yarn. Due to this, ahem, obsession, most of my friends and family are (un)fortunate enough to be receiving knitware this Christmas.

Amongst the coffee-cup cosies, hats, scarves and hot water bottle covers, my favourite knitted item so far is definitely the Alot Monster I created for a grammar-f(r)iend back in the UK.

Inspired by the Hyperbole and a Half blog that said friend directed me to last year, the Alot Monster is designed to calm down those whose ire is provoked by improper grammar, punctuation and spelling (friends, I am not a regular user of the Oxford comma so please restrain yourselves here). Instead of getting cranky at those who say ‘alot,’ think of this lovely monster… it helps.

Making up Alot

I employed loopy stitch to make my Alot Monster, for which, unsurprisingly, there was no existing pattern. This guy was created using a circular needle and was basically knit as a big tube with some tapered decreases at the neck and then some rapid increases to create the bump of the back of the head. I also tried to add in some bumps for his horns by doing localised increases but these were largely lost in the loopiness and I added fabric horns afterwards anyway.

It’s All in the Stuffing

To make things easy for my amateur knitting self I used a simple knit stitch and worked from the back of the monster to the front, decreasing as with a hat to form his face. I then went back and picked up the stitches I’d cast on originally and worked similar decreases to close off his posterior, using this, er, aperture to shove in some stuffing (he enjoyed this alot). I picked up some bead eyes at Gina’s Yarns and used the mock suede from an old pair of slippers to form cones for his ears, which I then sewed on at a jaunty angle. As with the knitted vegan dogs I have been known to make, alot (sorry, I’ll stop soon) of the personality of the monster is in the stuffing, and I made sure to stitch him a big lopsided grin in black yarn that is somewhat hidden beneath the loops, ready to be found upon nuzzling.

To really finish this guy’s look I wanted to find teeth and claws, and perhaps even fashion him some legs, but, alas, many conversations with bemused art-store employees resulting in no such items being found and I decided he was more cuddly sans legs so left him as he was. I did, however, ensure he has a fun tail that is long and windy, made simply by picking up some stitches at his rear and knitting a long, thin tail-like monstrosity.

Making this dashing chap was rather alot of fun. Knowing that somewhere across the Atlantic, soon to be unpacked at Christmas, is my very own vegan knitted Alot Monster makes me, at least, a little less cranky about commas.

Tagged as: vegan knitting, weird vegan product

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