Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls! Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls!
Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls! Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls!
Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls! Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls!
Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls! Amigurumi Amish Animal Puzzle Balls!
Ahem.... Good to finally get that out of my system...
The amigurumi Amish animal puzzle balls (or amamani for short) are exclusively designed by Dedri Uys of Look At What I Made. I have blogged about her patterns many times before - I can't help it. They're great! The animal puzzle ball patterns themselves are available from a variety of sources. The free ones such as the plain ball, or Olive the Octopus, can be found on her website, while the paid ones can be found in downloadable PDF form from Annies, or paperback form from Amazon. Apparently I'm crazy, as I bought the digital download but then decided that I wanted the paper copy of the patterns anyway. (Or maybe they're just that good!)
Currently, I have completed the turtle ball - who we are calling Atuin - for my daughter, and am partway through the dinosaur for a friends' nephew. These patterns are actually much simpler than I originally thought - so much so that I can already complete the basic puzzle ball pattern from memory, without the book to hand. They don't take long, either. Or at least they wouldn't, if I wasn't juggling my nursing daughter as well as my crochet!
The yarn for this project came from my new local yarn store - Westcliff Wools. I had originally planned on using left over yarn from my crochet Christmas jumper four years ago, but I couldn't find it. I assumed that I had used it in my Fugly blanket, and after I had been to the yarn store and bought new yarn I found the original yarn in my wardrobe. Ooops! Still, it spurred me to sort my yarn out into colour coded bags so that I would always know where everything was in the future!
The yarn used for the turtle was a chunky weight yarn - the pattern called for an Aran, but there weren't enough suitable colours at the store in that weight. I did um and ah for a while, weighing up the choice of a funky coloured or a larger turtle, and as much as my friends were pushing me for bright colours, I had my heart set on more realistic colours - well, I have to use my degree somewhere, right? To that end, I left the store with three 100g balls of King Cole Big Value chunky, one eack of Bayleaf, Caramel, and Koala for the turtle, as well as two balls of King Cole Fashion Aran for the dinosaur - one each in Stonewash and Hint of Denim.
The pattern is pretty easy to work up - sometimes in the round and sometimes with rows for shaping - and in total it took me about six days, on and off (though mostly off!) That said, I did get a little confused when trying to navigate the book - Rather than step by step, the turtle pattern starts off with "Make x number of wedges from this page", and "crochet this number of lids from this page", before continuing to give the instructions for the head, legs, tail, etc. In addition, the back leg follows on directly from the front flipper - something that took me quite a while to figure out. The flipper ends with "do not finish off", but you flip over the page and there's a new heading and you're back to "row 1". However, I eventually worked it out, and once I did I had no further issues, and overall I enjoyed the pattern enough that I do plan on making several more. I definitely would like to make the Octopus, and I think the basic ball pattern would make a great gift for future babies.
Except my baby, apparently. The turtle didn't impress her... Maybe my friends were right and I should have made it more colourful?
Ah well, maybe she'll grow into it?
Always on the lookout for new patterns, I jumped at the chance to crochet something new when a friend asked me to make a couple of ninjas for her. She wanted specific ninjas in bright pink and purple - she had seen pictures of them online and fallen in love with them - and I was fortunate enough to find the pattern on Amazon for relatively cheap.
The pattern is relatively simple, although I still don't quite understand the unusual pattern of increases when crocheting in the round. I find that - more often than not - a pattern requires increases every n*6 stitches. This pattern didn't follow that formula. It still works up lovely though, and was a welcome distraction from the multitude of blankets I have been making! The pattern worked up so quickly that I feel fairly confident that I could make several of these in a day, were I not baby-wrangling at the same time. It was darned cute, too! I used scrap DK acrylic yarn and a 4mm crochet hook.
In fact, they are so cute that said baby saw them, and she fell in love with them too!! Have you tried telling a four month old that they can't have something? Ok, she is a bit too young to understand reasoning. I might have gotten away with putting the ninjas high on a shelf while she wasn't looking...but....well....she's just too damned cute as well! I can't say no to her! So against my better judgement I let my baby play with the purple ninja. She played, she drooled, she chewed and she threw the ninja around... Luckily the ninja held up through it all, but I couldn't send my friend a drooly ninja... So I made another one!!
To thank her for letting my daughter claim the first ninja, I also made her a baby elephant, Meimei. Meimei is a free pattern, available from Look At What I Made. As a side-note, this blog happens to be the same pattern blog from which I got the pattern for Sophie, and the same designer who has written the patterns for the Amish puzzle balls I am currently making. I love these patterns so much and will often browse the page looking for new ideas.
There are several elephant patterns by this designer, and they all use the same head pattern. I own the pattern for the elephant puzzle ball, and had previously crocheted the elephant lovey for a friends baby, so I felt confident crocheting this mini elephant plushie.
Meimei herself is easy to make, and as all of the pieces are crocheted into the body as you go, there's actually no sewing involved! Amigurumi often involves a lot of sewing, and the Little Lady Ninjas are no exception - arms and legs must be sewn onto the body, which must be sewn onto the head. It's not a difficult task, but it gets very boring very quickly. It's nice to find a pattern which doesn't need any sewing. One downside to Meimei is that I found it very difficult to place the eyes levelly due to the asymmetric way the head/face is formed. Maybe it's just me - again I used scrap yarn and a 4mm crochet hook, so maybe I just crocheted too tightly for the safety eyes to fit in the right place.
Difficulties aside, she was still an enjoyable make, and I hope she's very happy in her new home!
As I write this, it is the morning of the 17th. My mum's birthday dinner was yesterday, and yes, I did finish Sophie. She absolutely loved her. She knew that I was making her a blanket, and I have no idea what sort of blanket she was expecting. But it was clear from her reaction that Sophie was not it. She seemed genuinely astonished. I couldn't be more pleased.
One month of work, 4 kilograms of yarn, and 175 cm in length
I began Sophie on the 16th March, and I finished her on the 15th April. Exactly one month, on and off. More on than off towards the end, admittedly. And definitely the most badly managed project I have ever done! When I bought the yarn last April, I read the wrong list of yarn. I had intended to make the smaller version of Sophie, and so I ordered the yarn from the 'small' list. The problem there was that I ordered the weight of yarn and used the hook size for the large blanket, which required much more yarn. Had I started Sophie when I received the yarn, instead of waiting until the last minute, then I might have noticed the yarn shortage before my yarn supplier was out of stock of most of the colours, maybe even before Cascade stopped making the shade of yellow that I used. But I'm a bit of a plonker like that.
In the end, I used 49 balls of Cascade Pacific Chunky, in the following colours:
Blue Mist (92) x11
Cotton Candy (18) x3
Spring Green (16) x4
Lavender (26) x5
Yellow (12) x3
Violet (38) x4
Bronze Green (87) x2
Honeysuckle Pink (51) x4
Dusty Turquoise (23) x5
Cream (01) x3
Italian Plum (44) x3
Gold (13) x2
Now that Sophie is finished, I have time to work on my other projects. Once the RSI in my wrists settles down a little, I'm going to finish my sister's wedding gift, and then I have another request for a unicorn plushie. In the meantime, however, I have some paid work to do. The fashion company I worked for up until the end of last November needed some hand sewing done. I am quite pleased that my name came up in the conversation - It does help that my sister works there though. On Friday I took delivery of some vintage army jackets. It is my job to pick the velcro patches off of them, and hand sew a motif onto them. I'll be paid per jacket, so I can't complain. And sitting at my dinner table with an endless supply of tea? Well, I can think of worse working conditions.
I'd better get to it then!
It is over. I have to accept that I can't finish Sophie the way I would like to, and I have to adjust the pattern to fit with what time and resources I have available to me. I feel like I have failed. It's silly, because my mum doesn't know what Sophie is supposed to look like, and it's not like I don't have a pretty impressive blanket to give to her on her birthday. The problem is that I know.
Here is where I got to as of 1am on Thursday morning (UK time):
The problem here is not even time - It is that I have run out of yarn, again. I used almost 4 entire balls of the lighter blue in that butterfly band, and I only have another two balls arriving in my next shipment. I have hit my absolute limit for buying more yarn - I have literally spent as much as I can, there is absolutely nothing left, even if I had the time to get any more delivered. The yarn I already ordered should hopefully arrive today, so I have bout two days to use what yarn I have to get as far as I can. So here is my plan:
First, I will use the yarn I have to finish the band of butterflies - that isn't an issue. But I am completely cutting out the end rows - That end band of blue would need 4 or 5 balls of blue, given the rate that I am getting through them right now. And I have never been a fan of the zigzags/diamonds on the edge - I was planning on maybe cutting those out of the blanket anyway. So cutting down the amount of yarn I need to use is my first step. Secondly, as I have low amounts of most of the other colours, I am changing the colours of the flowers and blue after the butterfly band to accommodate what yarn I do have. I currently get 1 and a bit rounds out of a whole ball. These are the colours I have left:
The leaves that would ordinarily be a light or spring green will become olive green. I plan on keeping the red for the flowers, as I now don't need the red for the edges, and the blue will then become cream.
I have no idea what colour to do the red border. The edging on the pattern requires two colours, and I don't have enough of two complimentary colours. I could use yellow instead of red for the flowers, and then use the red and the dark red-purple for the edging?
I'd definitely be open to suggestions!
I have just completed round 90 of 113 total rounds. This means I'm about 79% done with Sophie, though I only have three days left to complete her.
I have also pre-emptively ordered more yarn - Two balls each of the two blue colours. There's no way I have enough to finish the 23 remaining rounds, I just don't know how much short I'm going to be. I hope that I have ordered enough and that it arrives before I power through the few balls I have left. I didn't want to wait until I ran out before I ordered more because I am on such a tight schedule.
Due to the cost of the yarn so far I'm going to have to get creative with the remaining colours to complete Sophie. For example, I am now completely out of the light green I was using, but I have almost 2 balls of a darker, olive green. So any green rows from now on will be substituted with olive. It's not ideal - Olive will darken the blanket, but considering the olive will pretty much be close to the edge I think I might be able to get away with it. The flowers on the olive are supposed to be fuchsia, but I need the fuchsia for the zigzags around the edge, so I might pair the olive with some cream. It might lighten the look of the olive at the same time.
I feel like all I'm doing right now is trying to work out how best to use my remaining yarn - It's becoming almost like a game of yarn chicken tetris or something!
I took a photo of Sophie laid out across the bed. Please pardon the unmade look - The sheets are in the laundry today! There is no way I can get all of Sophie in the camera lens now, So I might start laying Sophie out on the floor, and standing on the bed? I'm just not sure there's this much floor space anywhere in the entire flat!
Three days left
My mum's birthday dinner is 7pm on Saturday. I'm halfway through round 87/113. Unless I can work some kind of miracle, I don't think I'm going to make it.
It's hard to stay positive through this impending sense of Doom....
So, I am currently on round 77 of 113 rounds of Sophie. This means that I am actually further along than I thought I was - about 68% done - and if I can manage to get 6 or 7 rounds done a day I could actually make it in time for my Mum's birthday. The problem is that I am going so late at night that I start to make stupid mistakes. Last night I had to frog the same round twice over - The first time I had done three and a half sides before I realised I'd been making mistakes in every side. So I frogged it, did two sides, then realised I hadn't quite frogged it far enough and I had to pull it all the way back and start again. I must have spent hours on that one round, which basically was 40 popcorn stitches, 24 (US) doubles, and a bunch of singles. It should not have been that hard, but I was so tired by that point I was making stupid mistakes.
Then this round - Round 77 - had to be pulled back about 250 stitches, all because I missed a sc, ch1, sc cluster. One single group of stitches missed out, that just happened to be at the very beginning of the round. I was not impressed with myself..... Currently mid way through round 77 however, Sophie now measures 49 inches from straight edge to straight edge, and 53 inches on the diagonal. It will be close to five feet when it is finished. I am only five foot six, so it is definitely going to be big enough!
I now have added incentive to get Sophie finished this week, as I have been offered an opportunity of some paid work (from home) from my old employer. Considering how much I have spent on yarn this month I would be an idiot to say no! So at some point I can expect delivery of some jackets, for embroidering the lapels. Fun, fun, fun!!
Well, the yarn for Sophie is here. :D I have spent most of the day trying to make progress on it, to the point where I dropped out of pre-organised events in my game, and I never miss those.
But it's working out, as Sophie is growing. She is now too big to lay out on either my sofa or my gaming table, so photographs are going to slow down purely because the bed is a less convenient place for taking photos! That, and Sophie is getting too big for me to fit all of her in the camera lens... I already had to stand on the furniture. Maybe if I ask my partner to boost me on his shoulders....?
I was quite pleased with my delivery from Love Knitting, who I don't usually use. The yarn came in the same lovely organza bags that Wool Warehouse use, and it was nicely presented. They also included some boiled sweets in one of the bags, and a 10% off coupon for my next order, though the coupon does have a use by date on it. This upset me a little, as I am well over budget for yarn this month and definitely can't be ordering any more yarn for a long while. I would love to, I just can't. :(
I was also very happy with the substituted 'gold' yarn. I obviously would have preferred to get my hands on some of the 'yellow' shade that I originally started the project with, but the new one is definitely a nice yellow, not too disimilar to the original colour. It is more vibrant - more of a canary colour than a gold though. I really don't think that it will look too out of place in the pattern, especially as the pattern calls for a 'Canary' yellow. I just couldn't get it at the time.
I now have 7 days to get Sophie finished, so many things will be put on hold - including my game and possibly my blogging! It's very important to me that I get this done on time - I'm currently on Round 74 of I don't know how many. It doesn't help that I've had to frog almost the entirety of this round because I put my 3 double crochets in the wrong place. ...On every side.... Wish me luck!
I have run out of yarn, again!!! This time I have run out of the colours that I was unable to order the first time around. Wool Warehouse - my usual go to for all things yarny - was out of stock of the other colours I needed, and they are still out of stock now. After some internet snooping I am beginning to get the impression that Cascade are no longer making one of the shades, 'yellow'. While really bloody annoying, this is the risk you take when you buy yarn for a project and then don't start said project for another year....
After some extended internet browsing, I was able to come across another website which had most of the colours I needed - Love Knitting. The only one missing was that pesky 'yellow' shade, which isn't even listed on Cascade's own website. I have substituted 'yellow 12' for 'Gold 13', and I am hoping that the colour change will not seem so obvious, given that the blanket is a host of colour changes. As long as I don't change colour mid row I should be ok.
So I added the yarn to my basket - another 12 balls - and as it was my first purchase I managed to get a discount code for 15% off! That is more than I would have gotten from Wool Warehouse, so I was impressed, but it was a one time only deal. So I don't know how often I will be going to Love Knitting for yarn over Wool Warehouse...
So, here is Sophie as she stands - I am partway through part 8 of 20... Worried about how long the rest of my yarn will last. So far I am blasting through yarn like there is no tomorrow, but hopefully I have enough of the other colours to last....
Because of this extra delay, I have had to admit to my mum that I was making her something for her birthday, but that I don't think it will be ready in time. I've lost too much time on it. Apparently, she already knew... Go figure... Mums, eh?
I am really starting to worry a bit now... April has crept in and I am fast running out of time to finish Sophie in time for my Mum's birthday. I am not really focusing on anything else at the moment - My sister's wedding blanket lies abandoned, and I am two weeks behind on my square-a-day blanket. Hopefully I'll be able to catch up once Sophie is finished....
It is 4 am on a Windy UK night, and I have just finished part 6 of Sophie. I am getting quite achy wrists through pushing myself too hard. If I had started this just a little bit earlier it would have been fine, but I honestly forgot I had the yarn for it!
But oh well - Sitting here typing about it isn't getting me any extra sleep, and it's certainly not gaining any ground on Sophie, so I'll just leave this picture here and run away to bed.
Note the fact that Sophie is now too big to lay out on the sofa, and has now been promoted to the gaming table.....
I don't really have much to say on this right now, apart from how much I love this blanket.
I am following the step by step instructions over at Look At What I Made, and they are incredibly easy to follow. The blanket is working up very fast, although from looking at pictures of the finished blanket (Sophie's Universe) I feel that I may only be about half way through.
I have just finished part 5 of the tutorial, and thought that before I move onto part 6 I would post my progress. All the ends are woven in so far, and the blanket is getting to be quite heavy, but incredibly warm. I am starting to feel a bit panicky about time as I now have less than three weeks before my mum's birthday.
This is what it looks like right now:
Yeah, I'm easily excited, but I'm happy to say that the yarn for my mum's Sophie blanket arrived today!
I had to go to the sorting office and pick it up, but that's ok. It's here, and now I can try and get it finished before the 17th!
I also got my circular needle for the Easter scarf I want to make. I know too well that it will be months before I start on the scarf as it is for myself, but the intent is there! That must count for something. :D
Still no lobster clasps though.....
Disaster has struck! I have run out of at least three colours for my mum's blanket and while I can order more, Wool Warehouse is out of stock of multiple colours, and since it has been a year since I ordered the original balls, I can't get the same dye lots of the colours that are left.
Fortunately, Sophie's Garden is a pattern that lends itself to improvisation! All the colour changes mean that hopefully nobody will notice if the colours are slightly different shades, or if other colours drop out of the blanket altogether.
I have completely finished the first four parts of the photo tutorial now, which means that Sophie's Garden is now complete. When I next pick up my hook, I will be starting work on Sophie's Universe.
So, this is what it is looking like as of writing this, and for once I didn't crop the cat out of the photo because I think it gives a nice sense of size, (This is Wicky, who is just one of my three).
As I am now out of several colours, I am forced to stop working on Sophie. It is a major blow, as my Mum's birthday is the 17th April. I really don't have time to be twiddling my thumbs....
Guess I better pick up my Persian Tiles for a while!
With April looming fast - and therefore my mum's birthday - (and in the absence of any lobster clasps!!) I have had to turn my attention back to Sophie.
I say that as though Sophie is a chore - It really isn't. I love watching Sophie work up, and it's really going to be a wrench to give it away! And after showing Sophie to my sister, my sister has decided that she would also like one, just the same. This is the same sister that I am crocheting the Persian Tiles for though, so she may have to wait a while. It's nice to know that my efforts are appreciated, mind!
There is not much of Sophie's 'Garden' left before I start into Sophie's 'Universe'. I have just started part four of the photo tutorial, and the circle is just starting to square off. I adore the treble clusters that are making up the leaves in the corner - they and the popcorn stitches make me think of tulips, while the bright yellow makes me think of daffodils. I really hope that my mum sees the same things in it.
I have just over three weeks to get Sophie finished - While my mum is currently busy potholing and spelunking in the Peak district, she will be back in time for her birthday.
Fun, fun, fun!!
In my spare time (spare time? That's a bit of a joke, really!) I have been working on Sophie.
She is still working up really fast, and is actually very enjoyable. This is actually my favourite project so far, I think.
With almost every round I am learning new stitches and patterns - which is always a bonus - and the step by step pattern is very easy to follow. I don't think I have enough yarn though - I only bought one ball of certain colours, and I am starting to get a little low on those colours! I have already worked through one complete ball of turquoise, and am low on the deep heather, yellow and purple. That'll teach me to use an alternative yarn!!
I am considering gifting this blanket to my mum. She is going on several trips to cold places in the upcoming year, and I have never crocheted her a gift. All of my sisters have had gifts - either scarves for themselves, or gifts for their children - but my mum has always been overlooked. Here's hoping this blanket rectifies that! It is thick and warm, though getting quite heavy, and very colourful. I think it will be just what she needs when she is whale watching in Scotland, or travelling to the Northern Cape to see the Northern Lights. I just hope she likes it!!
What do you do when you're feeling a bit rough, and none of your WIPs are appealing? Well, if you're me, you start a new one! I guess this is why I have so many unfinished projects on the go at the moment.
I was supposed to go to my yarn meet today, but am feeling a bit rough around the edges, so have opted for curling up on the sofa under a (not crocheted) blanket, and I have picked up a project I intended to start a year ago: Sophie's Universe:
The yarn I am using for this project is Cascade Yarns 'Pacific Chunky' with a 7mm hook. It is a lovely thick acrylic/merino blend, and it is so soft. I love soft, squishy yarn, so I can't believe it has taken me so long to pick it up - I bought the yarn a year ago. from Wool Warehouse, when they had 10% off and I could justify spending almost £100 on yarn!
Technically, I am starting with 'Sophie's Garden', the original square Crochet Along. The pattern, step by step photo tutorial and FAQs, troubleshooting, and other notes can still be found on the website at Look At What I Made.
I haven't been working on this for very long, but the design is working up very quickly. The photo tutorials and pattern are easy to follow, and the yarn is wonderful to work with (although I almost always say that!) I am not sure how large it will be in the end, using the yarn I am using. Nor do I know whether I even have enough yarn. I sure hope so! I'm not sure I can justify buying even more yarn when this is what my bedroom looks like:
Fingers crossed!!
