Up, up and away (blog 10)

Well friends, all exciting adventures must come to an end and today we find Chalky, Charcoal and Rose in the USA about to embark on their final blog-trotting journey. During the past few months they have travelled many thousands of 'virtual miles' and have now been invited to visit Moo-ness Family in New Zealand where their cousin Baaaa-rry is waiting to show them all the amazing sights in his native country.
Our intrepid trio are understandably feeling quite travel-weary and are sitting down to discuss how they will cover the many thousands of miles to their next destination when suddenly a handsome woolly stranger appears.

He introduces himself as Rudolph the ram. He explains that he works for Santa Claus who is now employing sheep to work for him as he can no longer afford to employ reindeer.
Rudolph has been sent on a mission to find unwanted toys that can be repaired and recycled as Christmas gifts. The trouble is, he's lost his red nose and without it he can't fly.

Rose, as you might guess, has taken an immediate liking to the handsome fellow and offers to help him find his nose.

The two disappear into the bushes and begin searching.

Suddenly Rudolph appears wearing a hideously large red nose which terrifies poor Charcoal.

"What do you think?" he asks
"Horrible!" exclaims Charcoal. "Take it off at once".
"How about this?" asks Rudolph showing Chalky and Rose a long red sausage-shaped nose.

The two sheep have to look away as it looks even worse than before.
"Is this any better?" asks Rudolph showing them a smaller nose that looks like a shiny red berry.

"Much better" they all agree. "That looks like a proper shiny red nose."
"Now for some antlers" says Rudolph. "Santa says I must try to look like a real reindeer" and he balances two enormous branches on his head.

"Much too big Rudolph, find smaller ones" they all tell him.
And so he chooses smaller twiggy antlers and pops them on his head.

Now Rudolph the red-nosed ram looks every bit as handsome as Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer and he takes the friends to see the sleigh full of broken toys that he is taking back to Santa's workshop to be repaired.

They all agree that the sleigh looks rather like a cardboard box. But Rudolph explains that Santa wants to reduce his carbon hoof-print this year and is using environmentally friendly cardboard to carry toys around the world at Christmas.
Then Chalky has a good idea and says to Rudolph "If you take us to New Zealand you might find some more broken toys that can be recycled."
"Let's go there and find out" says Rudolph cheerily. So the three woolly blog-trotters waste no time in climbing into the cardboard sleigh where they sit down amongst the broken toys ready for the journey.

"Everyone sitting comfortably?" asks Rudolph.
"Not really" replies Rose who is squeezed into a corner next to a toy horse and two plastic robots.

"Then we'll be off" says Rudolph. "Hold on tight everyone...... New Zealand here we come". And away they fly.
And so we leave our intrepid blog-trotters as they head off to visit their cousin at the 10th and final blog. Will they ever return home to Flutterby Patch or will they decide to stay in lovely NZ?
To be continued......

Meanwhile, if you'd like to knit your own Rudolf the red-nosed ram you can use my basic sheep pattern found in the sidebar. This fellow is slightly larger than the other sheep so all you need to do is cast on an extra stitch and knit an extra row for the head, body, legs, ears and coat. For example, the pattern for the head tells you to cast on 9 stitches and knit 10 rows so you would change this to - cast on 10 stitches and knit 11 rows. Its as easy as that!
For Rudolph's horns I used pipe cleaners and for his antlers some little twigs from a bush in the garden. His bead nose is attached with a pin but you would probably want to stitch this on firmly, especially if you have children around.