Last night, fueled by an 8pm cup of coffee and a slice of delicious coconut custard pie, I created the progression video of Luigi and Goomba. By 11:30 it was done and ready to be viewed by the world but I felt it would be best to go to sleep. I used Picasa to make the video. It’s a simple video editor but it does just enough that I could get what I wanted. Check it out and enjoy.
It has been too long since my last post. I just browsed through my photos to get an idea of what to write and where to start. I suppose most logically speaking I’ll start at Christmas since the gift giving involved my crochet work.
My nephew loved the Liugi/Goomba pillow. He sleeps with it every night. Apparently he tried to use it 
as a regular pillow but since it’s so big he ends up just sitting up when he tries to lay down. I’m not sure how it’s all been figured out now, I’m just happy to know that he is enjoying it as much as I’d like. He also liked the 1Up Mushroom very much. I have a great video of his stunned face as he squeezed it the first time. I’ll have to see about posting it after asking my SIL (sister-in-law) if that’s ok. I have video of myself talking about the mushroom so at the very least that should make its way on here. I visited sometime before Christmas and got some pictures of the Mario blanket, last year’s present, to show how it is faring. It is well loved as they say. My nephew sleeps with it every night as well. If I were to make the Mario blanket again I would do it differently for sure. For my niece I whipped up a crochet scarf using yarn she dyed before it made its way to me. I crocheted alternating rows of single and double holding two strands at a time. I initially wanted to just do double crochet all the way so it would go faster but I wanted to put a wee bit more effort and thought into it. The yarn was a mess when I received it, ends everywhere! I spent 2 days untangling it into many small balls of yarn. I used a bunch of the balls of yarn for the scarf and love how the variegated colors moved about. Photos!
Other creative endeavors recently include a set of 8 wine glass charms for my MIL (mother-in-law). For the last 5 years we’ve always had to clarify which margarita glass was whose. I finally sat down and figured out how to make some wine glass charms using small bracelet size memory wire. They were fun and quick to make which made it 
nice to make a set of 8. Originally I was considering a set of 4 or 6 maybe but that changed quickly. It’s a fun way to highlight a pretty bead as a 
pendant for the ring and then embellish using seed beads. I used a crimp bead to try and keep the beads from flying off the wire. Some crimp beads stayed put while others still managed to slide around. They shouldn’t go anywhere though, and if they do I’m more than glad to make or repair something. We used them Christmas Day for dinner. Another item made for my MIL is a necklace and earring set using Swarovski crystals and glass beads. It was for my BIL’s wedding on January first. This was nice to 
do as I hadn’t made any jewelry in a while. Photos! I’m including a photo of the ‘wrapping paper’ for my nephew’s pillow. I took a black garbage bag and used a silver Sharpie to draw snowflakes all over it. That was a blast in itself!
Back to yarn. I’ve crocheted 2 Snuggles using a diagonal box stitch. This stitch is my new favorite. It looks great and works up quite quickly! For January one of the Snuggle themes suggested in the Ravelry Snuggles Project group is scraps. I had a great time using 19 different scrap balls of yarn for a diagonal box stitch Snuggle. Another project was a crochet cloche (hat) to go with my new red winter coat. I wanted to make a felted hat and found a great pattern on good old Ravelry called Beacon Street Cloche. I used Patons Classic Wool from my stash. After photographing me wearing the large hat I washed it twice in the washing machine with some jeans so it would felt up. The hat turned out quite nicely and has gotten me quite a few compliments. It is also fabulously warm, which is great right now in Connecticut. Yarn photos!
As I just mentioned I am in Connecticut so now I’ll share some photos of our snow. We had about 8 inches on January 7th (1st photo), then 18 more on January 12th (2nd photo, table was cleared before new snow came) and right now it’s rain on top of 2 more inches of snow. Yesterday we knocked some 3 foot ice sickles off the front of our house and then I ended up playing with them in the front yard arranging them in the snow. I took photos with my new Canon PowerShot, tripod and night time exposures using a flashlight. Enjoy!
All the photos are thumbnails in this post so click them for the full effect!
The Luigi & Goomba pillow had its last few stitches this evening. After some size checking I bought a 27 inch pillow and couldn’t wait to get to stuffing it into the pillow case. I briefly thought about blocking the panels but I don’t think it would have done much since it is acrylic yarn. I started crocheting the panels together yesterday after trimming the tree. I triple checked that I had them the same direction because I could totally see myself getting half way around and then realizing they were facing the wrong way. I sewed them inside out so that the seam would be on the inside for the most part. For the last side I also made sure to remind myself not to just crochet the whole thing closed without stuffing the pillow in, another big possibility. I crocheted a quarter of the way from each corner and then my husband and I stuffed the pillow in. It was a 2 person job for sure! After that I squished it around a bit before sewing the rest of the seam with a tapestry needle and more black yarn. The pillow is very inviting for sitting or leaning on. I ended up skipping the sound device in the corners just because I was too excited about finishing and I didn’t have a good source for purchasing them yet either. Maybe the 1Up mushroom will have one.
In the meantime I don’t have anything for my niece and there are only 12 days left before Christmas. Eeep!
And the Goomba is done! I hosted a little yarn party today and although only 1 guest came out of the 4 confirmed we had a blast anyway. During the yarn party the Goomba got his last few blue squares and then I moved onto weaving in ends. I did a quick comparison of Goomba to Luigi and saw that there was a bit of a size discrepancy. I’d noticed this one time before but didn’t spend any time investigating. Since I’m getting to the finishing of this project I decided to count out the squares along a side of each project. Hmmm, Luigi is 18×18 and the Goomba is 20×20. Guess I assumed incorrectly that Luigi was 20 squares on each side. So to make up for this miscalculation and assumption I have started adding a border to Luigi in the same Tunisian entrelac style. This will add 1 square width to each side equaling 20 squares on each side. Yay! I’m half way through the second side so it’s going at an easy pace.
The Goomba has a small error and I’m not going to share where it is exactly. I’m curious if anyone is going to search for it. If you find it let me know!
The next step after finishing the border on Luigi will be to find a pillow form of the right size. I should have probably planned the project according to a pillow size but I skipped that part. It may require some shifty pillow stuffing. I’d also like to find a squeeze activated voice recorder to add some Super Mario Brothers sounds to it. I’m thinking one module in each corner depending entirely on how much they cost. It might just end up being one. I’ve started browsing for modules online but the lack of the right search terms is leaving me a bit at a loss. I’ve heard that Build-a-Bear carries them and they are currently on my list of last resort(not sure why that is, but it is what it is). Any suggestions for search terms to where to purchase such a goodie?
Remember that crazy hat with all the different spikes? I have passed it on to my aunt and uncle to add to their hat collection for the traditional hat photo. It was a great unveiling and welcomed into the collection. We were all sitting around the table after our pumpkin pie while one cousin went to get the 2 bags full of hats. I had hidden my hat near by so that I didn’t have to go far to get it. Folks were rifling through the bags looking for an interesting hat to wear and while they were distracted a grabbed my hat and pulled it on. I proclaimed, “Well, I’ve got my hat, how ’bout you?” They all looked at me followed by fits of laughter. After the laughter quieted down my aunt asked me if I made the hat and then said it was great. I then told her it was for their collection and she said it was too great for that! She asked if I wanted to keep it as my personal “Hat picture” hat. To that I said that it was for them to enjoy. Plus I can’t wait to see the next photo and glimpse who wears it next. I’ve got a picture of me wearing it and my 89 year old grandma wearing a foam nurses hat. That hat was a lot of fun to make. For some reason I feel it needs a partner using a pink/purple variegated yarn…
I have a new favorite item to wear: my Mobius cowl. One of the knitting groups I’m a member of arranged a field trip to the M.C. Escher Exhibit at an area museum which would be followed up with a group knit-a-long of a Mobius cowl. We all felt it was an appropriate project to do at the Escher Exhibit since he liked to play around with bending perception. This cowl is inspired by a Mobius strip which was discovered and named after a German mathematician in 1845: August Ferdinand Mobius. Check out the Wiki on the Mobius strip if you like. A Mobius strip has only one side and one edge. I describe it as having the inside outside and the outside inside at the same time. I shared it with the second grade kids I was subbing for and they were mesmerized. The whole concept is mind bending in itself, now imagine trying to knit it!
After downloading the pattern (Easy Mobius Cowl by Hayley Waxberg @ Knitomatic.com) I decided for this project I would follow the directions exactly; as in, buy the yarn and knitting needles required. This involved a pre-field trip field trip to a fancy yarn store I’ve been aching to visit. There I feasted my eyes on all that is beautiful in a yarn shop- ooh, the colors, the textures! This was my first purchase of yarn that wasn’t at Michaels, Joanns, or A.C. Moore. I felt like I was graduating, or at the very least attempting to move up on the yarn hobbyist ladder. My pre-field trip was to purchase Manos del Uruguay wool yarn in some variegated color for my knitting pleasure and I was successful. I bought a skein that was a delightful mixture of reds, browns and a hint of purple. I believe it has some silk in it which gives it a kind of captivating glow. From here I needed the right size circular needles. The yarn shop had the right size needles but I knew I could get the same ones at Joann’s with a coupon, which was exactly what I did. I now have Clover brand size 11 bamboo circular needles. Knitting Needle Count: 3- 2 circulars, 1 pair straight. The project also called for a stitch marker; working in the round is easier to keep track of with a stitch marker. I don’t have any stitch markers but figured it’s quite easy to make one using my jewelry making skills. I grabbed a pretty cat pendant and in less than a minute attached it to a nice size ring. It was perfect for the knitting needles and looked pretty hanging in the yarn while working. Nice.
The night before the field trip I decided I should do a test Mobius so I have a feel for it. One of the knitting group members was offering to teach the group but I know how that can go; one teacher with many students who need 1-on-1 attention= waiting. I grabbed some blue Caron Simply Soft, the circular needles my SIL gave me, and threw on the YouTube video for the special cast on method: Cat Bordhi’s Mobius Cast On. It was fun to start and I had I hard time putting the needles down to go to bed. When it came to casting on the ‘real’ thing I was very glad I had done a practice cast on. The ‘teacher’ was free to help others and I also took some time to help although I could hardly hold back my excitement of starting mine.
The M.C. Escher Exhibit was mind blowing, quite literally. When we all sat down to start our project we could hardly focus and we all found we had a headache right between our eyes. We agreed that this may be more difficult than anticipated. Sitting in the museum’s little bistro area we opted to eat some lunch before attempting our Mobius cowls. I had a delightful autumn squash and apple soup with a grilled cheese. I’ve never had this before and it’s now on my list of things to make! After filling our stomachs with the tasty lunch menu we cleared our tables and pulled out our yarn and needles. I quickly recalled how to cast on and then made sure to help others in their casting on. We were all still feeling that headache between our eyes and mine even blew up into full headache. Two Advil made quick work of that pain though. We sat and knit for 2 more hours, chatting and commenting on the effects of the Escher Exhibit. After the bistro cleaned up around us and closed up shop we decided it was probably best we pack up and call it a day. The next day I finished my new favorite thing to wear totaling about 5 hours of working time which is very reasonable.
A quick update on our friend the Goomba. I am currently working on round 12. I have pictures up to round 11 below. He’s so cute!
Oh my, I have neglected the blog again! I took on a long-term 
substitute position which always leaves me exhausted; enough not to blog but not enough to skip crocheting. We’ve had a gorgeous fall in Connecticut. We made several leaf peeping trips on the weekends. I’ve also been attending the weekly knitting group in town and working on many projects during my month away. Knitting has quickly become something else I enjoy and a fun new challenge. The list of things I’ve completed in October is as follows:
- Luigi! (C)
- Homespun Snuggle (K)
- 2 pairs of fingerless gloves (C)
- 2 Mobius cowls (knitted after an Escher exhibit) (K)
- Cat “washcloth” made into a Snuggle (K)
- 7 Warm Up America blocks (K)
- 2 Caps for Good baby hats (C)
Yowza, what a list! The C indicates a crochet project and the K indicates a knitted project. My time seems to be equally split between the 2 craft skills. After I finished Luigi I dedicated a lot of time to knitting as it had captured my interest. I will have to do some catch up blog posts which should happen in reasonable time as I am approaching the end of my long-term sub position. My first order of business will be our good friend from the world of Nintendo, Luigi.
Luigi enticed knitters, crocheters and non-yarnies to ooh and ah while working on it at Starbucks. I was told by one college-age student that I’m the coolest aunt to make this for my nephew. I certainly hope that my nephew will appreciate this, if not now maybe in the future. Either way, I’ve had a blast! Luigi is going to be a large pillow, something great to snuggle on with a book in hand. I’ve decided on the pillow back; it is going to be a Goomba!
I started the Goomba about a week ago and managed to do a round each day for a total of 8 rounds so far. As each round gets bigger they take longer so that will slow down very soon. I’ve taken a few things I’ve learned from making Luigi. Instead of cutting the yarn as I finished a segment of color I’ve just been carrying it along the back. It’s a bit of a mess but I won’t have as many ends to weave in. A knitting group member suggested that I add sound effects to the pillow, which is an idea I really love. I think I may even do 4 different sounds and put one sound in each corner of the pillow. I’ll rope my husband into helping me with this aspect of the project. Any
suggestions on sounds to include? 1Up, invincibility star, the theme song, jumping… So many options. The Goomba isn’t having as much of a pinwheel effect as Luigi did. I’m still not sure what is causing that. I’ll have to find a Tunisian crochet entrelac enthusiast to mull it over with.
The Caron Simply Soft yarn is working out great. It’s so soft and slides nicely which is wonderful for crochet. It wants to split a bit now and then which forces me to work loosely in good way. Tunisian crochet entrelac wants to be a dense fabric when completed so unless I want to give a pillow made of 2 boards I have to work loosely. The fingerless gloves are also made of Simply Soft and I find with everyday use the yarn gets a bit fuzzy. I wonder what Luigi/Goomba will look like after a year of use.
I’m off to squish a Goomba that is on my couch.
Luigi is speeding along with an invincibility star, reaching for the flag. I’m extremely close to finishing the front of the pillow, but even closer to finishing my light blue yarn. I’m so close to running out of yarn that I’m refraining from working on him. His invincibility star will not save him from my lack of yarn. As this portion of the pillow project is nearing an end I’ve been putting it off by finishing other projects.
First I finished my second pumpkin for the Itsy Bitsy Spider Crochet-Along. It turned out much more to satisfaction than my first pumpkin from this pattern. I changed my hook and yarn weight to make a plumper plumpkin. The yarn I used was a hand-me-down from my sister-in-law; a hand-dyed wool in gorgeous fall colors. I love using variegated because the colors are fun to watch as I crochet them; will this green section match up with the last round’s green section? The only risk with variegated yarn is pooling. Pooling in crochet or knitting is when a section of color seems to match up exactly in the same areas creating pools of color in an undesirable way. After joining Ravelry.com I found a thread in the forum with users’ examples of good and bad pooling, featuring mostly bad of course! I had a great time browsing the pages of photos. It’s especially interesting when people knit socks; one ends up striped while the other has pools of the colors all awry. While looking for examples of bad pooling to share here I stumbled upon a Flickr pool (LOL) just for this subject: Pooling Yarn Pool. Since we’re on the subject of Flickr pools, check out the one for the pumpkin CAL (crochet-along): Pumpkin Patch Pool. It’s very neat to see what others have done with this same exact project. I will probably work on making my first pumpkin more interesting by adding some jack-o-lantern features, after all it’s currently where I’m keeping my sunglasses!
Another project I finished was my first felting experiment. I crocheted some slippers and felted them in the washer. I might have felted them a tad bit too much. I’m still waiting for them to dry out completely to test them out properly. I have yet to take a picture but you know that’ll happen soon!
Luigi hasn’t slipped my mind. Since the Luigi side of the pillow will be done shortly I have to start thinking about the other side. I checked out Sprite Stitch‘s blog to see what other Super Mario themed images have been made into cross stitch patterns. I’ll have to seriously take a look and make a decision. I hope that the two sides end up being the same size since the green for Luigi’s hat had to be a different, slightly heavier yarn which I think contributed to the strange pinwheel spin in the piece. I considered a 1Up mushroom for the back but I was going to crochet an amigurumi version of it so that would be repetitive… think, think, think
After a 4 day trip to San Antonio, TX I was ready to crochet again. The last time I worked on Luigi was round 6 at the knitting group. I started round 7 on Luigi, adding in the first bits of blue for the background. Before I knew it I had worked half way through round 8 and wasted quite a bit of my day. I guess I was in some crochet withdrawal and unprepared for how much I wanted to work on it. On top of all that, I’m going to a knitting group tonight and will spend probably about 2 hours working on it then. I suppose I’ll call it travel recovery day. I managed to get some laundry done.
Coming back to Luigi, I think I might go check out the pillows at the craft store to see what kind of sizes I have to play with. I don’t really want to make a custom pillow. As it stands I was thinking a border of 3 blue squares from the edge of Luigi’s head in all directions. At the moment it is measuring over 20 inches across with 1 blue square on the left and right. I feel like this description might seem a bit gibberish, oh well. There’s a strange twisting happening in the squares. It’s not straight when you go along the edges of the squares where they are joined. I suppose there is still some learning to do in regards to tricks in Tunisian entrelac. One thing I have learned is that when I make the chain for one of the lonely corner pieces I go back through the bottom loop of the chain only and leave the other top two loops to be my working side when connecting the square next to it. I pretty much work through the chain upside down. It’s complicated if you haven’t worked on Tunisian entrelac but still a tip I’d like to pass on. It makes the joining edge of the previous round smoother. Too bad I didn’t figure this out earlier! I love how Luigi is emerging as I work on this. I can’t wait to make a collage or video of the project once it’s complete.
Kes on a pile of Snuggles.
I’ve started the Luigi pillow to compliment the Mario blanket I made for my nephew last year. I’m nearly 7 rounds into it and it’s looking and going great. My plan is to make just Luigi’s head and make it into a square pillow. As I’m working now, I’m wondering if I should just continue and make it into a blanket. It will probably be a pillow about 20″x20″. The squares are pretty much the same size as the ones I made for the Mario blanket so it might be neat to have a companion blanket to Mario. Still thinking on this I guess.
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…
After I worked my way around the blanket attaching the squares I then went back and sewed together the other seams. This went rather quickly since there was no need to stop and make more squares. The lack of need to stop also made it easy to sit and work for 3 or 4 hours at a time. I worked a lot on it Thursday before Thanksgiving dinner and then on Friday. When all the seams were completed I did a single crochet border around the blue squares with blue to even the edges. Before doing that I had started adding the black border but noticed some uneven edges where squares met at the corners hence the decision to single crochet a blue edge. After completing the blue edge I added two rows of double crochet in black with a last row of single crochet in black. Then it was complete!
Not quite. I went over the whole blanket meticulously and redid 2 or 3 seams between reds and a couple of peach in the face. I also pulled out a couple tails that were unraveling and hid them better. I definitely see an improvement in my work from the beginning of his face to the blue background. When I give the blanket I will probably include some long bits of yarn of each color in case there is some unraveling after playing with the blanket though I doubt it will be necessary.
The blanket has a bit of an identity crisis in my eyes. Now that I’m complete it’s a bit smaller than I was thinking so really it would be more appropriately named a throw; like something you use while sitting on the couch watching TV. Also the squares are small and kind of tight so it’s not a very soft flexible throw so now it could almost be considered a mat or even something to hang on the wall. The peach yarn dictated the size of yarn to be used in the whole project as it was very difficult to find something suitable. In retrospect I could probably have used a larger hook for a little bit more looseness in the stitches.
Super Mario Blanket Stats
- 22 working days
- 35.5inches x 45.5inches
- 20 x 30 squares = 600 total
- 4 colors
- Channels watched: TLC, USA, AE
I’ve made a video/slide show of the Mario photos using Picasa 3. I’ve never used their video feature and it looked ok in the program now I’m just waiting for Youtube to process it for viewing. I’ll post a link as soon as I can. Now that I’m done with this project it’s time to think about my next project. The school I’m working at is collecting hats, scarves and mittens so I will take a stab at making those.
I can’t wait for Christmas morning. *grin*
[EDIT] Here’s the link to the video at Youtube: Mario Video
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