It’s official, my Amigurumi workshop has been approved for the Anime Evolution 2010, the anime convention in Vancouver BC. It will be similar to the Tsukino Con workshop I did but with a different (ie: easier) project piece as the main focus. I haven’t gotten the timings or dates down yet, but will post as soon as I know. I am really excited about the convention but there is a lot of work to do. Not so much for the workshop (although, sigh, there is some for that) but for the costume I need to whip up (I won’t be wearing it mind you).
Anyone is the area thinking of dropping in. let me know!
Domo looks menacing but is actually very polite and shy.
Domo-kun, a strange yet very polite creature that hatched from an egg, likes to rock, watch tv, hang out with an old rabbit dude and pass gas when nervous, is here for you in Amigurumi form. This Domo is a good medium size, finishes up to around 10 inches tall. Arms should be wired and it’s not a bad idea to weight his feet and bottom for stability. Black safety eyes or buttons are needed for the eyes. I used 8mm which I think were actually a bit on the small side.
I used felt to make the mouth panel because a crochet panel added too much thickness (I did try it and it looked wrong), and to switch colors in the actual pattern and work in the red as I went made a crooked mouth that slanted to the right because of the way the stitches are offset each from the previous row just a bit. I surface crocheted around the mouth to make it look a bit recessed and finish it off. The pattern, as with all of my patterns, is free.
Yesterday treated me to a lovely meal and some fabulous (and rare) yarn stash additions. It was nice too because my mom rules and debuted her second ever needle felting creation, a Noby Noby Boy of her very own. Isn’t he cute?
No new patterns or anything up from me yet, because I was too busy procrastinating and doing these other various horrible things that I have to do in order to earn money to spend on yarn (work, ewww!), but soon my pets, soon, Little Sister and Domo-Kun are coming. I just need to type them up and double check my math (stitch count is such a pain!).
In the meantime, enjoy the awesomeness that is, needle felted NobyNoby Boy, by jojobongbong.
I made this video to illustrate the differences in the final look of Amigurumi, depending on whether a person crochets in one loop or both, and whether the right side or the wrong side is facing out. I see a lot of Amigurumi that are done wrong side out, and it’s a shame because it can make the piece look more chunky, less flowing and “nice”, as it would had they been working right side out.
When I first started out making Amigurumi, I came across the unfortunate and in my opinion, incorrect advice that it is always best to crochet in one loop only, because you use less yarn and your stitches are taller so it takes less time to work a piece up. What they failed to mention is that this technique makes most of your shapes look like chunky messes and that they always stretch and get weird, are too long and you can’t do the invisible decrease. It took a lot of grief, pulled apart pieces, disappointed pieces and confusion on my part as to why I was so unable to make my final piece look anything like the pattern, and why my crocheting looks so Frankensteiny compared to what I was seeing online.
When I figured it all out, it was a lightbulb moment, but I made this video to pass on the wisdom. The balls, each having the same amount of stitches, increases and decreases arranged in the same way, same hook, same tension, yet looking so different. Have a look and figure out which one you’d like your piece to look like.
Because every Big Daddy needs a Little Sister to protect, and since it was requested and hinted many times by my awesome readers, I whipped up an amigurumi Little Sister for my Big Daddy. I took notes and will be publishing the pattern shortly but haven’t time to try to make sense of all the cryptic scrawlings together yet. It was just too exciting to hold off on posting the photos.
Her clothes and hair are in the style of the Bioshock 2 Little Sister, and though I think there is still some tweaking to do, I am pretty happy with it. The Adam needle is a separate piece with a yarn needle stuck in the end. I didn’t give her a face, because I thought about it and decided that anything embroidered or applied was likely to look cartoony and not as eerie and vacant as the Little Sisters are. Not having a face I think, speaks to the altered uniform states all of them are in, not really there at all. She’s not aged or bloodied, to match her Big Daddy, true to a yarn representation of something messy, bloody, dirty and worn, but made of yarn, so none of those things.
Keroro Gunso is easily my favorite anime character; cute, wildly screwy, moody, kind of a little creep, has ambitions to take over the world and appreciates a good WcDonald’s burger. An alien invader from the planet Keron, he and his troop of subordinates are here to take over or destroy Pekopon (earth), though he wouldn’t mind acquiring a few more Gundam models along the way. It was first a manga and has since been made into an anime and move. If you haven’t seen the anime yet, I suggest you check it out if you enjoy comedies and wacky ensemble shows.
Sassy pose
Gunso San is made with wired arms and legs that are jointed using 8mm safety eyes, so he is very poseable. The safety eye joint give something solid to anchor the wiring to as well so he is more solid than wired limbs that aren’t rooted into the body. He is all amigurumi crochet other than the felt star on his tummy which turned out kind of terrible and sadly misshapen. The main body parts are done is medium worsted weight cotton yarn using a 3.5mm crochet hook. The smaller detail parts like his eyes mouth and tummy were all made with half strands of the same yarn with a 2.75mm hook, but could be done in crochet thread or light yarn or felt even.
