Knit a Key Fob Cosy

The key fob remote for my car broke so that it couldn't be attached to my key chain any more. I knitted a cover for it, which lasted about a year before it wore through and had to be replaced. Since I was making a new one, I thought I'd document the process. This is a moderately difficult project, especially considering that it really needs to be custom-made to match your particular remote. Skills needed include knit, purl, knitting in the round on double-pointed needles (DPNs), increasing, decreasing,  Kitchener grafting, and possibly duplicate stitch.

• Begin with a long-tail two-needle cast-on. This is like a standard long-tail CO, but alternating stitches on two needles.
• Transfer half of the stitches on each needle to a second DPN
• Knit in the round, increasing four stitches in every other round, until it fits snugly around the remote.
• Continue knitting in the round to cover the remote. I was fortunate in that mine is basically a rectangle. If your remote is shaped like a teardrop or otherwise irregular, you may have to make decreases to make certain it continues to fit well.
• Use purl stitches to outline the button layout. In my case, there were three buttons, so I simply placed two ridges to divide them. These can be easily felt when I reach into my pocket for the remote. More complex layouts might require vertical ridges, which can be made with purl stitches in the same place on every round.
• Begin decreasing near the end of the remote. A symmetrical shape can be accomplished with paired decreases on either end , but I chose to decrease just on the left end of each side, which adds a slight twist.
• Once you get past the end of the remote, go back to two needles, front and back.
• When you get down to four stitches on each needle, knit two together across both needles, then knit back and forth in stockinette stitch for about four or five rows. End on a purl row.
• Leave the last row on the needle and break the yarn, put a split ring over the knitted tail, fold the tail over, and graft onto the row below the k2togs. Use a tapestry needle.
• Hide the starting and ending tails inside the cosy.

Optional decorative finish:

• I used self-striping yarn. I wasn't happy with the look of the wide stripe of light blue, so I took some of the darker blue from further into the skein and used duplicate stitch to make lines demarking the button locations. I don't have a photo of the new one, but you can see what the duplicate stitch looks like on the old worn-out fob.