I struggled a bit with the join-as-you-go, but it helped to look at a related tutorial on the author’s blog. It wasn’t 100% applicable, but it helped me understand what I was doing wrong: http://heidibearscreative.blogspot.com/2011/02/african-fl...

I’ve been really enjoying this project, but I hate Simply Soft yarn. I opted to use it because I have a big tub of it and no real plan for it, but it has no give and is splitty. It looks nice, but… I will be using something different the next time I do a project like this.

My final hippo ended up being 23 inches long by 9 inches tall.