BitterSweet

As a young child searching for responsibility and some smaller person or creature to play with, what kid hasn’t asked their parents for a dog? You would think any pet would fulfill this need, but no, it’s always a dog. Guinea pigs and hamster are cute and all, but they won’t fully satisfy this seemingly arbitrary urge. I know this from experience – When I was about five years old, I had pet mice, but was this ever enough? Well, was that dessert your mother carefully measured out like it was a potentially deadly substance ever enough after dinner, either? No. Way.

Well, now you can have it all; Your very own golden lab that will never make a mess, never pee on the carpet, and won’t ever demand a walk at 2 a.m. You could even forget to feed this new and improved pet for a couple days and he probably wouldn’t mind at all. Easy to transport thanks to his compact size, and most importantly, easy to love.

If I ever became a parent (Which will happen at approximately the same time as when the sky turns red and it rains flesh eating bunnies) I think this guy right here would be the best first pet for any kid, really. Until they can dress and feed themselves, I sure hope I’m not alone in thinking that they really shouldn’t be entrusted with the well-being of another living creature yet.

Either way, at this rate, I could open a whole kennel by next month, full of little amigurumi puppies! Believe me when I say: Much more are on their way.

Sadly, my busy schedule as of late allows fewer and fewer visits to craftster.org. I miss being about to browse around aimlessly, in addition to being able blog-hop for hours on end. I love reading everyone’s blogs, so it really kills me when I miss a handful of posts from my favorite people. Hopefully I’ll get time to catch up, so please forgive me for the time being!

Anyway, as luck would have it, one of my rare opportunities to poke around the forums immediately yielded a new pattern to consider. Naturally, I figured I would set it aside in my bookmarks and maybe revisit it when things were slightly less hectic.

And of course… I found myself with hook and yarn at hand in a matter of hours.

In no time at all, my neon pink octopode was born. Crawling forth from the ocean with a trail of sea water still marking her path, she appeared to fit into her surroundings about as well as a clown at a funeral. As if she wasn’t odd enough, I just couldn’t resist adding the final detail to complete this absurd image; I believe that little pink bow is quite fetching, in fact. I’ll bet she gets all the neon-colored guy octopodes in the sea.

Such a creative pattern! This is why I love craftster – So many creative people, kind enough to share their ideas and techniques. I think I’ll have to clear more time to hunt for entertaining finds like this in the future.

There’s a lot more than meets the eye with this little bunny… A picture can tell a thousand words, no? Well take a closer look; On the shelf next to it, you’re right, that’s a plain old paperclip bent into some strange contortionist’s shape.

This fellow was created during my recent hospitalization. Nothing too special about that… Except for how it was done. After two weeks or so into my stay, I was informed that my manic crafting was somehow detrimental to my progress, and my worst fear came true – They took away all of my yarn, hooks, and needles. I was near suicide.

So headstrong was I, there was no way I was going to take this torture sitting down. Throwing caution to the wind, I reached for a failed attempt at a crocheted slipper, and began ripping as if my sanity depended on it (Which isn’t too far from the truth.) Soon I had my raw materials, but what about the tools? I first reached for a pen. Attempting to bend the little metal clip into a hook, I found little success; It was far too smooth to actually catch the yarn, and too wide to really fit through any of the stitches a second time.

Moving on with haste, I dug through my drawers and pulled out a pair of tweezers. Unconventional maybe, but who knows? I was willing to give anything a shot. Sadly, it was even less effective than the previous attempt. Absolutely nothing, not a stitch could be made on this limp length of yarn.

I was stuck. What could be a hook? What was small enough? What would bend. I paced; I raved. Something had to be done soon or I would loose it. Crafting is the only thing that keeps me going, my raison d’etre.

Suddenly, I had it. The answer sat gleaming up at me from my desk – A paperclip. Working as fast as my hands could move, I lengthened the piece of metal and fashioned a little hook on the end. It was perfect. In no time, I was crocheting again, and I came up with this, a sweet little pink bunny. You would never have imagined its unusual birth just by looking at this picture, so maybe a thousand words really don’t do this guy justice.

Oh, and in addition? The eyes and nose, those are the insides of googlie eyes cut open, too.

That’s right, The Happy Hooker strikes again! I regret choosing such a subdued color for this bag, but I wasn’t completely sure on my ability to complete it. I mean really, “half-double herringbone” stitches? I’m just a simple amigurimi-ist, I don’t know fancy crochet work! It’s all single crochets and slip stitches for me, thank you very much.

It took many false starts and tearing back numerous rows before I finally even understood what the pattern was instructing me to do. The book is wonderful, believe me, I’m just used to reading diagrams when it comes to crochet, as opposed to written directions.

In making this bag, I was really just testing out the waters, seeing if the current would sweep me away or if I could actually keep my head afloat. Since I somehow appear to have survived this trial, I guess I’ll be keeping my eye out for more challenging projects. There are really so many things you can do with crochet, and I’ve only been exploring one tiny length of the field.

If only more English patterns came with diagrams… I guess my Japanese amigurumi books have spoiled me!