2 posts tagged “h hook”

(not to be confused with il Giardino del Polpo!)
Project II: Giardino Inception/(quasi-)Completion: Monday, 16 - Saturday, 22 October 2006

I nearly finished Giardino this past weekend, and I feel a little silly. I modeled his face after a face I saw on Flickr of a stuffed animal made by whineyvan. It turns out, however, that it looks a lot like the octopus Ana Paula made! I just found her patterns today... and I think I may end up alleviating my guilt by buying her Koala pattern. (I'm not terribly familiar with the crafting community; would this be considered "craftlifting?" - I ask as I am familiar with "scraplifting." It always seems more in poor taste than anything.)

In the end, I decided that long, curly legs were appropriate; the seemed very reminiscent of an octopus while maintaining a semblance of cuteness. The only reason he's incomplete is that I haven't been able to find any plastic safety eyes that I like; they had some at Michaels and some at Joann, but those were brown (I'd much prefer black) and far too big to use for amigurumi. I was hoping to find some place online; anyone have any suggestions?

Dē Factūrā:

• Body, legs: Lion Brand Homespun in Baroque (790-322); H hook
  
• Mouth: black embroidery thread
• Cheeks: hot pink felt, pink embroidery thread
  
• Stuffing: Poly-fil & Poly Pellets
  

Pattern: 

• Body: crocheted in 12 rounds of sc; 6 - 12 - 18 - 24 - 30 - 36 - 36 - 30 - 24 - 18 - 12 - 6
  
• Legs: chain 16, 3 sc in each chain

It's come time for me to put the crochet hooks and knitting needles away; I have a scrapbook in the works that's to be given as a gift. The receiver's birthday is on the 30th, and I've yet to get the photos printed out. I can imagine that it will be the only crafting I do for the next week!

Project II: Giardino Inception: Monday, 16 October 2006
My cousin just had an adorable baby girl (who happens to be the first great-great-grandchild of my immigrant ancestors - if that makes sense. At any rate, she is the first American great-great-great-grandchild of my furthest-back-root on my family tree, my bisbisnonno Luigi.) to whom I would like to give a homemade Christmas present.

The plan is to make an amigurumi octopus out of Baroque Homespun, which I purchased on sale at Michaels. (Yes, despite countless visits to and oglings at Article Pract, I am still too cheap to buy nice yarn.) I like the overall look and feel of Homespun well enough, but it can be a pain to crochet; the stitches often look split in two.

As I've mentioned, I'm not nearly proficient at crocheting in rounds, so I've been practicing whenever possible. I started crocheting this on the way to class Monday and am proud to announce that I am capable of running down Telegraph while crocheting.

I started out on Monday with 8 sc, increasing by 8 each time until I reached 40 stitches and it became apparent that 40 stitches were at least ten too many. I had at this point been able to form a nice blob that looked like either a pot made on the first day of high school ceramics or a gumdrop. Ripping it out was thus far the highlight of my week. The carnage, however, was extensive, as splayed out atop my backpack.

Once I stopped playing around, I actually got something accomplished today: the body, crocheted in single crochet rounds of multiples of six stitches (6 - 12 - 18 - 24 - 30 - 36 - 36 - 30 - 24 - 18 - 12). Furthermore, he was named Giardino, in honor of The Beatles. I have now to decide how to proceed with the legs, buy some stuffing, and determine the appearance of his face.