I took Luigi to a local knitting group and had a great time chatting while crocheting.  Seeing the projects of the other people was neat; all those knitters and their skills!  My knitting has taken a backseat to Luigi and a pumpkin amigurumi for a crochet-a-long.  This Sunday I’ll be passing on my new casting on and knitting skills to a friend so I’ll get more done on my project.  The way I learned and got comfortable with crochet was by crocheting squares for Warm Up America.  I realized this was a great way to start pattern reading and understanding the basics of knitting too.  I went to the WUA website and printed out the 2 pages of patterns for 7″x9″ squares.  I also visited Joann’s with a 40% off coupon and bought some size 7 needles as per the WUA instructions.  Needle Set Count: 2!  I’m looking forward to spending time knitting on Sunday, hopefully the weather will be nice, as we will be outside.

Back to my friend Luigi.  I started him on September 4th on a sunny afternoon.  I grabbed all my supplies and parked myself out on the deck to soak up some of the rays that weren’t getting into the house (read: house was chilly).  I’m using Caron Simply Soft in Light Country Peach for his flesh tone.  That was the most difficult aspect of starting this; finding the right color yarn for his face.  I didn’t want to use the same acrylic yarn as last year since that would turn out really stiff in Tunisian Entrelac.  The Caron Simply Soft is perfect!  It’s soft to the touch and flexible once it’s crocheted.  Sadly the other problem color I never managed to find in a similar texture yarn.  Luigi-green is also a difficult find.  I’m sure I could have found it online but since crochet (and knitting) depends on the texture and feel of the yarn I wasn’t comfortable just buying some perfect colored yarn online without touching it.  I ended up with Red Heart Super Saver in Paddy Green.  My husband and I went to all the craft stores this weekend: A.C. Moore on Saturday, Michaels on Sunday and then Joann’s on Monday.  Every visit and purchase was also made with coupons!  All my yarns were purchased at half price.  Buying the yarns I needed on a sale weekend was a goal I set once I decided on my crocheted gifts.  All my gifts should be covered for now.

The other day I realized that a pillow has 2 sides.  I should find another Super Mario theme item to put on the back.  I already have an amigurumi 1Up mushroom queued up on Ravelry that will most likely become part of the gift.  Any suggestions on what to put on the back of the pillow?  If nothing comes up as an idea it’ll probably just end up as blue like the background of Luigi will be.  Once I started adding the green squares Luigi started looking more like himself and I should be able to resist calling him Mario.  Luigi has turned into an obsession and I can already feel some aches in my body from sitting in the same position for too long.  I always try to break up crochet and other leisure activities with house chores.  After finishing a chore I have a little reward of crochet.  This works well; I get to crochet and the house stuff gets done.  It’s probably about time I work some more on Luigi…

I started working on the Futurama brain slug.  The large one is very large!  Approximately 6 to 7 inches tall.  It took a massive amount of fiberfill and scrap yarn to fill.  I finished it yesterday and all it needs now is an eye.  The project instructions show an eye cut from felt and sewn or glued on.  I was thinking to crochet some circles to keep it all truly crocheted.  Still mulling that one a bit though.  Might be a fun Halloween costume; add some straps and wear it on your head!  Next I”ll have to try the little brain slug companion.

I joined a Crochet-Along hosted by The Itsy Bitsy Spider.  I have two pumpkins in mind so far; one in an orange sport weight and another in a variegated yarn from my sister-in-law;  I think it’s wool.  I’m half way done crocheting the orange pumpkin and I’m eager to finish.  Last night was a crocheting marathon between finishing the brain slug and starting the pumpkin over the course of 3 hours.  I need some customization ideas for the punkies (a coworker of mine spoke English as a second language and couldn’t say pumpkins- I love punkies!).

I have so many projects in my mind right now!  Along with the current projects in knit and crochet, I have a pillow in mind to complement the Mario blanket I gave my nephew last year for Christmas.  I have my experience from last year and would like to improve on the method I used to make it (square by square/pixel by pixel).  I recently learned how to do Tunisian Entrelac in the round via My Life in Knots.  Entrelac in the round actually produces what is to be seen as diamonds, not squares like a pixel image would be.  I have to print out my image and plan out the colors and what order to crochet them in.  I’m ready to start this project after hunting around for a softer peach flesh tone.  I was finally lucky at AC Moore and found Caron Simply Soft Light Country Peach.  I cannot wait to start this!  I’m sure I’ll have it on the hook by this afternoon!

Speaking of The Snuggles Project, I’ve completed some more Snuggles again.  I’ve been making them all double stranded, one strand always some color of Lionbrand Homespun yarn.  The Snuggles are so soft using the larger N hook and the Homespun yarn.  The purple and pink on the right is Katmcab’s Hexagon Snuggle but without the scalloped edge.  Then I added a scalloped edge to the brown one from the previous post.  I ran out of the blue just when I finished the last bit of the edge- whew- very close call.  I didn’t have another blue like it in color or texture.  Although many of the Snuggles are made with scraps of yarn I really don’t want them too look very haphazard; the Snuggles are intended to go home with the cats when they are adopted from the shelter.  I would hate that the family who adopts it ends up with something ugly and they decide to throw it away.  I’m not all that impressed with the brown Snuggle now but I’ll keep the pretty scallop edge in mind to spice up other Snuggles.  Lastly, I have a Fishy Mat by carly*original designs that I started on the plane returning from my vacation.  I made the blue circle on the plane without the pattern so it turned out a wee bit larger than it should have.  I ran out of the blue Homespun when I got to the tail and decided to make the tail in another color.  I recently attended a knitting Meetup in Newington at Starbucks and one of the group members had brought a bag of yarn she wanted to pass on.  I dug through the pretty colors and picked some Homespun type yarn in bright colors.  I felt it was a nice addition to the Fishy Mat.  After adding the tail I wanted to break up the blueness of the body and decided to add an eye in the same bright colors.  The eye could have been bigger but I’ll do that for the next one.  Now I’m contemplating a mouth.  I also messed around with the tail to make it more pointy and swishy.  One day I’ll figure out how to write my own pattern so I’m not altering other people’s patterns.  It’s on my to-do-list.  Here’s the big fishy: 

After making a lot of Snuggles in May I spent some time making some appliques to add to completed Snuggles.
This one is a Single/Double Snuggle with 2 yarns and a heart added on for extra love!

I wanted to try an oval for a fun Snuggle shape.  This is based on The Perfect Place-mat by Monique MaiGnan.

This is the seed stitch done 2 rows in color A and 2 in color B.  I was going to write a pattern for this but I don’t have the base
chain stitch count right yet.  I’ll have to try again.  I added tassels after a Snuggles group member at Ravelry.com showed off her tasseled beauty.

I hadn’t tried just crocheting a square Snuggle although they are usually square.  This is based on the Cheerful Squares baby afghan at Lionbrand.com.

Lots of the same colors.  I bought some Vanna’s Choice yarn at Ocean State Job Lot for $2 a skein and some Red Heart Super Saver with a coupon at Michaels.  Now that we’re in a new month I’m working on new Snuggle plans.  Katmcab at Ravelry.com has a scallop edged Snuggle pattern I’m excited to try out.  I have a Snuggle tubby in my queue that I’d also like to try but it might have to wait until after summer camp is over.

I’ll probably keep working on the toys.  Any suggestions would be great!  The yellow flower toy depicted below is actually just a flower crocheted twice and sewn together.  I stuffed it with a grocery bag hoping it would crinkle but not much luck with that.  I’ll have to try out a thicker bag to see if it’ll crinkle better.  I’m also thinking about getting some bells or other goodies to stuff into the toys. The mouse and the long purple thing are stuffed with some catnip so I’ve had to keep those from my cats.  I crocheted a fish for them and added catnip; they like it.

I haven’t been sitting idle staring at Pika.  I’ve been hook and yarn in hand staring at his eyeless face crocheting fiercely though.  I discovered I needed an amigurumi break and felt that Pikachu was a good final battle; that is, when he actually gets a face.  After a lot of digging around in the crochet section of the interwebs, I ran into a charity called The Snuggles Project.  The project was created in 1996 when its founder was saddened at the thought of all the shelter animals sitting in their barren shelter cages so she set out to create ‘security blankets’ for them called ‘Snuggles.’  This was a perfect interruption to the amigurumi battle that had been waged in my living room since January ’10.  I managed to crank out 12 Snuggles; some experiments in patterns, some basics, some just plain old experimental everything.  This was a lot of fun!  I even tried out a pattern written by a Snuggles Project group member at Ravelry.com.  Which brings me to my new addiction:  Ravelry.com!  So many patterns, beautiful things, and great yarny camaraderie!  I’ve learned so much between the Snuggles Project and the great stuff at Ravelry.  In the Snuggles pictured on the right you can see some of the fun I’ve had this May.  I learned an ‘Abstract Cats‘ pattern by Teresa at The Art of Crochet, which I’ve had my eye on for a couple months now.  The Snuggles are perfect for experimentation.  I created my own little double crochet pattern that shows a cat face.  You can see the black cat on the yellow background, that was my second time with the pattern but first time with changing colors like that.  It turned out ok, not quite as I would have liked.  The red one is the first attempt at the cat where the outline is made of skipped stitches.  I’m more satisfied with that.  I’ll probably try the same thing again but substitute a puff stitch for the skipped stitch which will create a little 3D cat face, and if you’ve watched any movies lately you know everything is better in 3D!  I also added the seed stitch and the single, double pattern to my crochet repertoire.

After making the abstract cats pattern Snuggle I had to adapt it to make something for MY cats.  I made a cat ‘tub’ with the abstract cats as the sides.  Before I even finished Kes was trying to snuggle in it so I knew I had an instant success.  Now that I’m done she is still interested in it which is good.  We’ll see if the interest picks up a bit when the weather turns to fall and winter since it’s rather toasty now.  I think I should have used a smaller hook for the sides so that it would be a bit stiffer.  The base circle is 2 strands of Red Heart and an L hook.  I kept the L hook for most of the cats around the sides before I realized that a smaller hook would be better.  I changed and it tightened up just a bit.  The cat likes it regardless, she’s just happy that it’s soft and snuggly.

My next project was a small pillow to use for sleeping and upcoming travels.  I’ve had a little stuffed animal since I was 10 that I’ve been using as a support pillow.  What’s so odd is that it took a long time to learn how to sleep with it as a child and now as an adult I’m just not comfortable without the support.  I decided that since I’m starting 30 in the eye I should graduate to a pillow of some sorts.  I’ve had no luck finding a pillow with similar dimensions since the stuffed animal (a cat of course) has a long rectangular shape to it.  After completing the cat tub and seeing an item with purpose, unlike all those cutesy amis, I realized that crocheting a pillow in my preferred dimensions wouldn’t be very difficult.  I had a nice soft yarn from Red Heart called “Soft Yarn” in black that just begged to be used for this.  I looked up how to crochet a solid rectangle and once again found myself at Teresa’s site but this time via one of her Youtube instructions.  I started off with the video but found I needed the written directions as well.   For the back, or other side, of the pillow I decided on a single, double crochet for a nice texture without the boringness of single crochet rows.  I noticed that the solid rectangle still has some gaps since it is in double crochet and as with anything that has corners in crochet; corner gaps.  I bet there’s a way to avoid that, I hope I’ll run into it during my crochet travels.  For the pillow stuffing I decided to take an old t-shirt and make an inner pillow which worked beautifully!  I knew the jersey knit of the t-shirt would be perfect for something that needs to be soft and flexible.  I could hardly contain myself as I sewed up the crochet pillow seams and got ready to put in the t-shirt pillow.  It came out perfectly and  I can’t wait to try it out tonight.

So although Pikachu never got the gift of sight this May at least 12 cats will have nice, homey Snuggles in their shelter cages, my cats have a new bed, and I have a new pillow.