How To Make Your Cat Look Ridiculous for the 4th of July

The "Freedom Cape" is the simplest and fastest way to make your cat (or small dog) look ridiculous for the holiday (or any day, really). It's also fairly easy to get on your pet, and just difficult enough for them to get off that it should last long enough to get a picture!

The shape is just a rectangle, so you can easily add fewer or more stitches/rows to yours to fit your pet.

You Will Need:
Any worsted weight yarn in red, white and blue. You don't need much, about 30 yards of each color to be safe.





I used Lion Brand Yarn's Vanna's Choice (170yd/156m per ball)
#113 Scarlet
#100 White
#107 Sapphire

You will also need a size J/10 hook (6mm hook).

Final Measurements:
11.5"/29cm wide and 8"/20cm tall.

Gauge:
12 sts and 10 rows over 4"/10cm in hdc (half double crochet). Gauge isn't super important, just know that if your gauge differs from the one I listed, the final measurements of your freedom cape will be different from mine.

Note about changing colors: During the red/white stripe section, I didn't cut my yarn between stripes, I left the yarn attached and carried it up to the next stripe to reduce ends. Just watch how tight you're pulling the yarn when carrying up.

Cape:
Starting at bottom of cape, using red yarn and size J/10 hook, ch 36.

Row 1: Hdc in 3rd ch from hook, and in each subsequent ch across - 34 hdc.
Row 2: Ch 2, turn. Hdc in each st across.

Switch to white.
Rows 3 and 4: Work as Row 2

Switch to red.
Rows 5 and 6: Work as Row 2

Switch to white.
Rows 7 and 8: Work as Row 2

Switch to red.
Rows 9 and 10: Work as Row 2

Switch to white.
Rows 11 and 12: Work as Row 2

Switch to red.
Rows 13 and 14: Work as Row 2

Phew!

Now that we're done with that, switch to blue.
Rows 15-20: Work as Row 2

Fasten off.

Stars:
Embroider stars on 2nd, 4th and 6th rows of blue, or, wherever the hell you want to. I ended up with 8 stars per row that I embroidered on, 24 total, because that's just how it looked best. I embroidered mine like little asterisks, although you could be fancier and tapestry crochet them into the blue section, or cut little stars out of felt and sew/glue them on.

Ties:
Attach yarn to edge of top right side of cape. Ch 45 stars, fasten off. Repeat on middle and bottom of right side, and then on top, middle and bottom of left side (or as many/few times as needed to trap your pet inside the cape).



Bonus Pom Pom:
Using all 3 colors, make a pom about 3" across with which to make your other cat look ridiculous.

Happy 4th of July!