Mr Sssnakey - an easy knit

Introducing Mr Sssnakey!  He's a little tricky to photograph, but he's ever so cute in real life.  I worked on him on and off over the autumn and he made his way on time into Katie's stocking. I am a very slow knitter* so I was very, overly considering how easy he is to knit, excited to have finished him.

The pattern is from Purl Bee and as much as I love the yarn they have used there's no way I could justify buying from overseas just for a wee snake for a wee girl.  I popped down to my local shop not expecting to find anything at all similar - but I did.  Jo, who owns The Bead Shop Scotland**, has recently started stocking a great wool selection and in amongst it all was some Rowan Purelife which was just perfect for this project.  One of the things that attracted me to making the snake was his natural colours.  This is undyed British wool, from British sheep breeds, using its natural colours to create a yarn with subtle colour contrast.  I grew up with British sheep and have been involved in shearing them many times so getting to use the end product like this had me pretty excited!

Mr Sssnakey isn't as long as he should be, probably about half the recommended length.  But given my snail-like knitting it was either that or wait until next Christmas.  I'm not good at waiting.

I have been hearing on the radio today that there may be some snow on the way.  I do hope so.  Apologies to you if you aren't a fan or if it makes life difficult.......I just love snow - even if it does mean digging the car out and not being able to use the pushchair, and a host of other hassles.

* Knitting doesn't come easily for me, I don't really know why.  With sewing I'm happy to experiment and if I do check out a new technique, rather than just bashing ahead and making it up as I go along, I'll generally just refer to it once before mastering it.  Knitting........not so much.  I can't cast on without looking up the method, I can now knit and purl confidently but increasing and decreasing sees me pulling out my notes almost every time (I think I now have the hang of casting off and felt ever so proud to be able to cast off Mr Sssnakey without looking it up!) and anything more than that would definitely need some referencing.  Why?  I wish I knew what the problem is.  Does anyone else have a similar stumbling block?
** When we first moved here John was delighted to spot The Bread Shop and equally disgusted to discover it was actually a shop selling beads!