Notes and mods below:
Uggh. A request. I’m not really sure why my SIL thinks I want to make her sons a brand new hat every freeking year…I guess I could squeak out an, “AWW HELL NO..” but then I’d be that jerky aunt. Uggh. Ugggh…UUGGGHH! I’d never heard of Skyrim. And then I googled a picture and thought, “hot damn! That is WICKED cool.” So I’m a little stoked.

Mods:

due to my loose gauge and his 22.5” head I used one US size less for each portion-if it called for a 4 I used a 3-and so on

One less repeat of hat band

picked up 10 less stitches for the hat-I made sure that the center of the back pattern would be placed correctly due to this.

I still decided to begin the decrease at the same measurement as mentioned in the pattern, since there would be less rows due to the less stitches, I’m glad I did because otherwise it would have been too short.

Used GSR instead of tomato (see notes for longer explanation).

Future mods: During the horns I will separate the first long stretch of K with a P in the middle-I just feel there should be one more purl row…

Notes:

Although I thought to design my own, this one looked nice enough to justify paying for. Hopefully, I won’t have as many issues as others… We shall see. :)

Ok…I’ve gotten through the nose piece and begun the band. Looking at the photo, the picking up for the band should bring you to about the center of the nose piece. Would be nice if that was mentioned. A photo or two of the actual starting of the band would have avoided a little bit of head scratching, but I was able to work through it-so far, not nearly as bad as some of the reviews…although, for a pattern that you pay for, I would expect these things to be covered..so I understand the frustration.

Ok, I finished up the band and even though I used a smaller needle for it (4.0) it was coming out a little longer, and my nephew is at the lower end of the head size there so I decided to stop at one less repeats and ended where the pattern said to end…Nice cable pattern, I like how it looks.

I’ve gotten almost to the decrease portion of the hat. Working up really nice. My only complaint is that with this very tight gauge,those center lines aren’t really showing up so much…they aren’t as defined as I’d have hoped.

All that was written BEFORE I got to the eyes and other parts…. A few photos and better written sentences would make all the difference-the ‘center stitch’ isn’t truly defined until later, which causes confusion. the i-cord bind off is not defined-I do not think that is something that should be assumed people know how to do. If you are paying for a pattern, you should be able to make the item start to finish without having to look up a lot of different things. I already know I’m going to have to look up a tomato thingamagigger…

Sweet Tomoato: Since I hate gardening (aside from actually planting the little seeds in an inside greenhouse my hubby makes for me every spring) I decided to rewrite the tomato bullpoopie. BAsically (since I prefer german short rows and substitute those for W&T) I decided that in laymen’s terms the tomato crap= (short row to 2 stitches before end, turn) x 2 (K to 2 stitches before last turn,) x as many times as you need to get that many ‘gaps’ then follow pattern. (if you do GSR remember your first stitch after turning is a double stitch.

One horn finished, and hopefully I can have this thing done by tomorrow. I will see Mr. Nephew Sunday, so I’d love to surprise him with it! :)

Ok, I feel that since I’ve now completed the pattern (excepting one horn) I can give this a rating. I take this rating thing very seriously. I never want to give a pattern a less than 5 if I can make it from start to finish. BUT considering this is a pattern someone is paying for, I do have a little bit of a higher expectation. If this were just a standard-run-of the mill pattern that gave me this much confusion I would rate it a 3….I’m taking into consideration that this is quite a brilliant design, with a very very well thought out end game. Maybe, it would have been easier to write a pattern for a less awesome hat, but then, we wouldn’t have such an awesome hat. Because of this, I am giving an extra star for creativity bringing my star count to 4. This could, however, be a 5-star rating very easily, by just adding a little bit here and there and a few strategically placed photos and explanations.

completely finished now. I cannot wait to get photos of this little sucker and show my nephew. He’s gonna love it.

For the finishing, I did have to go back and sew the icord in the corners of places so it sat nicely-I didn’t see that it was mentioned in the pattern to do so (but I could have missed it).

I used up almost the entire skein of grey-I was getting a little worried I wouldn’t have enough…but it worked out fine.

UPDATE: Nephew loves his new hat. It fit him perfectly! And I didn’t even kick his butt to try to snag it from him! Go me!