A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Hogwarts

Last fall, I was able to secure three tickets to the opening night showing of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. One ticket for Kristen (whose birthday party I referenced in the last post), one for her Mom (and my friend) Jen, and one for me. Thoroughly excited to see the movie on opening night, boy oh boy was I crestfallen when I had to go into work and couldn't attend the movie. I did end up seeing it later, but on a much less magical evening.

Fast forward to last week. The DVD of the movie was released on Tuesday. A few weeks prior to the release, I had pre-ordered it on Amazon. As soon as I received it (Woo-Hoo!), Jen and I made plans to watch it with Kristen on Saturday. So, this past Saturday afternoon, I travelled all the way to the historic city of Quincy, MA to watch the movie. I know I'm making it sound like an epic journey, but Quincy is only a 15 minute drive. Being an urban and carless gent, however, I rarely leave the city proper - and Quincy is the BURBS!

I brought along another friend, and we decided against all sense of propriety to purchase our beverages in cans. Jen and I are definately glass container people, but we inexplicably bought a 30-pack of Budweiser cans for the three of us to share, which would still leave some for Jen to enjoy later.

As I said, if I'm drinking beer, it's a Bud-in-a-bottle all the way. One of the main reasons is that it takes me a little while to polish one off, and cans go warm far too quickly. When I was half-way done my first can, it occurred to me to ask Jen if she had any cozies. She didn't. [For the uninitiated, cozies are also called Beer Huggers, Huggies, Can Coolers, Coolies, Insulated Kozies, Koozies, Can Holders or Koolies - those can holders which are usually made of foam to put your beer in to keep it cold.]

Since we were just sitting around, hanging out, listening to Jen's wonderfully eclectic music selections and saving the movie for later, my hands were idle. Jen, being a knitter, has needles and yarn hanging around. You know where this is going, right? I decided to make my own cozy.

I had seen one or two patterns floating around the internet, but I knew with a bit of luck and a little intuition, I could come up with a quick design on my own. The following is a fun little saunter into the world of trial-and-error knitting, and shows the evolution of tweaking a design until the perfect object is created.

In the picture, the bottom right cozy is the first attempt. Although it succeeds in fitting around a can and thus performs it's job, there were three flaws which needed to be fixed: (1) I hadn't cast on enough stitches, and the cozy stretched out far too much for my liking - you can actually see the laddering effect. (2) The bottom was rounded and made the can a bit unstable when put down. (3) I hadn't knit enough rows before decreasing, which left the cozy just a wee bit short.

On the second iteration, I added two stitches to the cast on so it would fit around the can without as much stretch. I knitted two additional rows before the decrease to make the cozy the right height. Then, I borrowed from the hemmed-edge hat design, and put a single purl row across the knitted side of the stockinette before reducing for the bottom, giving it a sharp bottom edge and more stability when in use. However, the flaw this time was that I reduced too quickly, and the bottom was slightly smaller than I would have liked. This is evident in the lower left cozy in the picture.

Finally, by the time I made the third, all of the kinks had been worked out, and a perfect cozy was produced, as can be seen in the green cozy on the top of the pyramid.

The whole process took less than two hours (with a couple of breaks between cozies), and each cozy was almost as quick to make as drinking a beer. When we finally settled in to watch Harry, the three adults had beers that were as cozy as we were on Jen's two funky-delic paisley half-moon couches. Funny - NOW we were ready to go to Hogwarts.

You too can replicate the fine afternoon I spent this past Saturday if you follow these simple directions:

[editor's note: Since double-pointed needles weren't available, I had to use straights, so a seam is required. If you use double-pointeds, you won't have to do a seam.]

Scottie Original Quick-as-a-Beer Cozy
size 11 needles
two strands of worsted-weight yarn held together throughout (for durability, etc. Red Heart Super Saver is perfect for this project)
cast on 19 stitches (you want a stretchy cast on - I used the knit on cast on)
work in stockinette (knit the first row, purl the second, knit the third, etc.) for 12 rows.
purl the next two rows
K1, *K2tog, K1*, repeat from * to * across row
purl the next row
K1, *K2tog, K1*, repeat from * to * across row
P1 then P2tog across row
break yarn, leaving a 12" tail
thread the tail through a tapestry needle, draw it through the remaining five stitches on the knitting needle, and then use it to sew up the seam
weave in the ends
slip cozy over a cold Bud can, sit back, and relax with Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

I'm just hoping Jen doesn't invite me over to make cozies when there'll be a dozen people in attendance!

I'll keep you posted.