Yes, I am absolutely itching to start the embroidery. No, I will not do it just yet. First, I’m going to block the hat.

Now, someone, somewhere is grumbling that they hate blocking and aren’t going to do it. And that’s fine, you are the boss of your knitting and you get to do or not do whatever you want!

However I, being the boss of my knitting, very much do want to block anything I’m going to embroider on before I work on it and then again when the embroidery is done. That’s because blocking evens out my stitches, and embroidering is easier and more uniform on an even surface (especially for something like this where the radial symmetry of the piece is a huge part of the brain sparkles and therefore sort of the whole point). So if I spend very literally less than five minutes of active time to block this before I stitch on it, my stitching will be more pleasant and my finished product will be better, and that seems like a fair trade to me.

Blocking this just means throwing it in water, either waiting or squeezing it to make sure it gets thoroughly soaked, squeezing the water out, flopping it around a bit to encourage the stitches into place, and plopping it over the headform (if I didn’t have a headform, I’d look for a bowl, and if I didn’t have a bowl that worked, I’d just lay the hat out flat and smooth it out). Then you wait for it to dry. That’s it, that’s all. I’m literally doing it on an instagram video if you’re so inclined.

But you absolutely can do this if you have a bit of clean water and a safe place to lay a bit of damp knitting. And I think you should! But again, you’re the boss of your knitting, and I can’t make you do anything. All I can do is show you what’s involved and explain why I do it. The rest is up to you.