There’s something not quite right about the top of his head. The pieces didn’t join together the way they should have. I faked it and it shows. Maybe I was supposed to blow that piece up larger than I did.
Having now done a few stuffed animals from the Adventures in Toymaking book, I’m taking a break from it. Working from patterns printed on copy paper isn’t as nice as real tissue patterns. I worry what they’re doing to my scissors and it’s rough cutting through all the layers that accumulate from having to join multiple pieces of paper together to get one big enough for the whole pattern. Not to mention the aggravation of blowing the pieces up in the first place. Inevitably once I’m home I discover that I didn’t enlarge the snout enough and have to make a second trip to the copy center.
Made from Angela’s Cornflower Bookmark pattern for my October 6 x 6 square exchange partner and as practice for thread crochet. Working up to the big thread crochet project! This is the second of these I made but I didn’t take a picture of the last one, plus I starched this one which I think helped it quite a bit.
This octopus was made from the same Adventures in Toymaking book as the elephant. The most fun part of making it was picking out the fabric. The fleece on the top part has little fishes swimming on it and the cotton on the bottom has spirals like suckers.
The worst part of making it was turning and stuffing all those tentacles. The pattern was supposed to be about 25% bigger. It’s pretty big anyway, as you can see, but maybe if it had been a little bigger those tentacles would have been easier to manage.
This is not just an afghan from Afghans by the Alphabet, it’s the cover afghan. So you can compare my result to the professional product.
I handed my friend Sheila all my afghan books and told her to pick out what she wanted. She picked this one. I told her she could have different colors, but she wanted the ones in the picture. I told her there was a lot of yarn in this particular pattern and she offered to pay for it. That wasn’t what I meant, especially since the yarn shown was Red Heart Super Saver so it cost practically nothing. What I meant was a) it would be heavy and b) it would be a lot of work.
Even though she’d said she wanted the yarn in the picture I spent a lot of time looking for an alternative. I’ve worked with Painted Desert before and it didn’t look like the picture to me. I thought they must have gotten a more vivid dye lot or they were wrong about what they’d used. I was afraid if I made it as specified, Sheila would be disappointed. Finally, not having come up with a color combination I liked better, I did a swatch. It looked just like the picture. Guess I should have trusted the book to begin with. The reason the variegated comes out more vivid than it seems on the skein is that the black is constantly running behind it, deepening the tones. That’s why it uses so much yarn too. There are essentially two rows for every row you can see.
What’s not clear from the photo, and which surprised me, is that it’s a flat afghan. There’s no texture at all. The variegated grid isn’t over the black squares; it’s an integral part of the fabric. The effect is striking.
I really love how this came out, although it seemed to take forever and I was glad to have it done. The only downside is that it’s one of those afghans that doesn’t reverse at all. The back is a completely different afghan – very modern art and moody, almost African. Kind of cool in it’s own way.
There are supposed to be 3D clowns on the ears. I made all the pieces and assembled one clown and it was hideous. I don’t assemble things very well but the main trouble was that I didn’t have all the required colors and kept substituting. Like I was using baby yellow and pink instead of bright yellow and red. I wasn’t going to buy six skeins of yarn to make clowns. The whole purpose of making small things like hats and scarves is to use up yarn, not go out and buy more. Turns out clowns look stupid in pastels.
I like the hat (headbad, ear-warmer, whatever you call it). It was my first time crocheting with beads. I didn’t want to spoil it with demented clowns, so I tossed them and the hat is going standalone. These beads have a beautiful irridescent shimmer and without silly clowns on the ears it makes a bright, sophisticated headpiece for an older girl.
I found that I had to use bigger quills to duplicate her work. The elf on the left was made from 2″ quills which is what the book called for but that was making for tedious, cramped work. The other two are made from 3″ quills and I think the more open quality to the quills looks nicer for something like a Christmas ornament. Now that I’m using the needle tool instead of the slotted tool to roll my quills, they come out smaller overall. I haven’t been able to prevent that yet but using a longer piece of paper than called for seems like a good compromise for now.
The hat bobs are fringed. Ouch. I’ve been reluctant to spend $50 on a fringer but if I had to do much more fringing than this I certainly would. Fringing is a shortcut to carpal tunnel.
The faces are painted on. I’m not such a good painter! But the lopsided features give each elf a certain unique charm.
I got an old book called Adventures in Toy Making from a library book sale (actually got it for free because I turned in eight boxes of books for their sale). It’s full of patterns for stuffed animals. This elephant is the first one I’ve made. It’s asymetrical, with the legs being different on each side. That makes it slope a little bit, or else my sewing was just off. But it’s cute. I actually got the eyes and ears lined up pretty well so for once the face isn’t skewed. I think I should have stuffed a little harder. It seems like no matter how much I stuff I never stuff things full enough.
This was my first attempt from Ornament Toppers. It came out OK except the embroidered face is a little crooked. I’m bad with anything freehand. You have to imagine that it’s on top of an ornament because I was mailing this to someone and it was easier to mail without the ornament (which gets glued on). The pattern called for a lot of the pieces to be glued on but I mostly sewed them. I think it will hold up better.
Making clothes for 18″ dolls isn’t as fussy as making Barbie clothes and the patterns are more like real clothes, so this was an interesting change. On the other hand, you need more fabric.
This nightgown was a simple pattern made out of muslim with a lace trim. The entire neckline is elasticized, meaning no complicated collar seams.
This t-shirt was my first time ever working with knits and I didn’t do such a great job. It’s very easy to stretch out the edge of a knit when working on it. That’s why the sleeves are more bell shaped than is customary for a t-shirt. After messing this up, I did some reading up on the subject (wrong order, I know) and I might do better next time, but I have to say that knits are not for me.
This skirt is my pride and job. All the those pleats and I did a pretty decent job of them – not perfect, but nearly. I couldn’t find anything that would make good marks on that fabric, so I ended up doing all the ironing with the pattern still attached instead. That was the way to do it too. I’ll remember that trick for the next time. The only part I don’t like is that it has an elastic waist, which I didn’t realize until I got to that step at the end. It would be a nicer pattern with a real wasitband.
I gave these clothes to a friend’s daughter and she sent me back this photo of her dolls. Aren’t they cute?
These three hats came from Headwear for the Family. They will go to charity. Where is #1, you ask? It’s all crocheted but there’s a lot of finishing work left to do to make the clown heads and I hate finishing work, so it got pushed aside while I started crocheting the others.
This hat has got a lot of yarn in it, more than a skein’s worth. It’s very heavy so it was hard to get the styrofoam head to wear it without tipping over. It’s also a strange pattern in that the bottom band is a little too big to wear comfortably while the next band up is a little too small (the pattern has you essentially doubling the width from one band to the next). I’m not sure how far up the band is supposed to be rolled, but it doesn’t really work that well no matter how far you roll it.
This one is very cute. Unfortunately, I didn’t check my gauge before making it (I get a little sloppy with this kind of thing since I’m not trying to fit any particular person) and it’s a little big for a child, yet it was made in Crayola colors. I’ll just have to hope for a child with a freakishly large head or an adult with a sense of whimsy.
This is a bit of a strange design. It buttons shut across the neck. I personally wouldn’t find that so comfortable. It looks a little tight on the head because it’s meant for a small child and I only have an adult head.
