Judy’s magic cast on for the ears and nose. Anywhere it told me to work over two needles, I worked over three, because I don’t like knitting in the round over two (I contemplated double knitting but decided not to.)

I stuffed the antlers as I went along and then used the tail to close up the end before fulling in the washer. I can’t imagine trying to stuff it once it was complete (the second branch was particularly a pain to stuff) and I also couldn’t imagine not sealing it off before it went through the wash. There’s really no information about that in the pattern.

Because I used a mohair blend yarn, I’ll shave it once it’s dry because otherwise it’s super fuzzy. I used buttons for the eyes that I had in my jar because the largest safety eyes I had were only 12mm. I put the buttons on before I fulled it and I attached them at the same time (so, through the button shank, into one side of the head, out the other side of the head, through the second button, through the head again, repeat) That helped draw them in so they sit flat instead of poking out like obvious button.

My ears were a little floppy, so I fed a wire inside from the tip of one ear to the other (after felting). It was a piece of covered wire, so it was white, so it’s not really noticeable.

I decided to embellish it with a couple of pom poms made from random waste yarn. I made the pom poms, left them attached to long strands of yarn, then twisted those stands into a cord to tie loosely around the reindeer’s neck.