The instructions come in one size, at a finished waist circumference of 40 inches. That should comfortably fit anyone with a waist size of 36–38 inches. If you happen to have different proportions, no worries. A plain knitting chart is also included that you can use in conjunction with almost any sweater pattern of your choice. If you need a bigger size than the chart will accommodate, just repeat the sky and rocks on the sides. A great place to find knitting patterns is Knitty. They have lovely patterns for women, men, and children, and they’re all free so it’s a great place to start. If you find a pattern using a gauge of around 26-28 stitches = 4 inches, you should be able to use the KnitPicks Pallette yarn in the materials list. Otherwise, you’ll have to find yarn of a different weight to use.

Download the Pattern

Mario Sweater Vest Pattern (8494)
You’ll need Acrobat PDF Reader, which you can download here: Download Acrobat Reader

Update

We forgot to include a color key with the chart! If you’re having problems figuring out which color goes where, download this: Mario Sweatervest Color Key (152).

Over 100 comments were posted in response to the original post in just five days, so I’m keeping my end of the deal by making a pattern. I’ll try to post it within a week or so. Sign up for the newsletter in the sidebar, and I’ll let you know right away when the pattern is available.

I’m starting the pattern right away, so stay tuned!

Getting a Custom Colour of Yarn

I found the best selection of colours of yarn at KnitPicks, which has almost every colour you could imagine. Almost.

I looked everywhere, and couldn’t find the bright green that I needed for the pipe and small bush, so I ordered an extra skein of white and dyed it with chartreuse acid dye to get the colour I needed. All that to knit a pipe and a small bush! But I think the result was well worth it.

Front

Back

Making the Sweater

I just made up the armhole and neckline shaping as I went along, and held up the half-finished sweater in front of my hubby to make sure the shaping was working. I left live stitches on the shoulders on stitch holders while I finished the rest of the sweater, so that they could be grafted together at the end for a seamless finish, and then picked up stitches along the armhole and neckline edges with a circular needle to knit the ribbed trimming.

The design wraps seamlessly around the sweater from front to back. I originally knit the row of rocks (or are they bricks?) around the bottom of the sweater using a Fair Isle technique, but the whole thing ended up bunching up to about half it’s intended width. So in the end, I cut that section out, knit 16 rows of plain brown, seamlessly grafted the two sections back together again and then embroidered the pink and black lines that make up the pattern of bricks using a stitch that mimics knit stitches.

Take that, Octorok! Eat this, Skulltula!

Taking a quick nap before entering the next dungeon

For those of you who have your own little nerdling to dress up, you can download the free knitting pattern here.

I made this baby-sized Link costume as a baby shower gift for a couple of close friends. Both are huge fans of Zelda, and they are expecting their first child very soon. After posting it on Craftster I was absolutely blown away by the response it received—over 30,000 hits in just one week, and before long dozens of blogs from Geekologie.com to Kotaku.com and even GayGamer.net wrote about my nerdy little outfit! (I love the GayGamer logo, by the way! Would it be inappropriate to call it fabulous?)

You can download the pattern here: Baby Link Pattern (7404). Now you’ll be able to dress up the infant of your choice as Link! Don’t have an infant handy? Make a Baby Link Outfit anyway! Your significant other just might make a baby with you just to be able to dress him/her up as Link!

To view the PDF you’ll need Acrobat Reader. If you don’t have it, you can download it here for free: Download Acrobat Reader