Bone Health

My doctor emphasizes the importance of healthy bones, so I made her this bone as a gift:



I followed the bone pattern by Crafty Pants!, who cleverly adapted it from Pepika's heart pattern.

My doctor liked the crochet bone so much, she invited me to make another for her puppy. I gladly sent her a second bone, which likely became a short-lived chew toy. Calci-yum!

May you and your bones have a healthy and happy new year!

Snow Love

The snowmen noggin ornaments went outside today to reconnect with their snowy roots:


By chance, they discovered the joys of winter romance:


A body made of real snow improves eye contact:


Ah yes, there is no love like snow love!

Holiday Noggins

What spells holiday cheer better than disembodied heads?

For this year's Christmas tree, I crocheted these sans-corps ornaments featuring Santa, Rudolf, a gingerbread man and two snowmen (one snowman found an ice cream cone as a prosthetic). A yarn bell sits near the tree's peak:

For the snowmen, I learned how to make french knots for their mouths, a simple stitch that will be useful for future creations:



For the gingerbread man, I originally used french knots of white yarn for the eyes, but they looked eerie for some reason. So beady eyes won over:


For Santa's beard, I used a piece of velcro to distress the white yarn until it looked fluffier:


For Rudolf, I stuffed his muzzle with an L.E.D. keychain flashlight, which lights up when pressed:


For the bell, I stuffed a real jingle bell inside its clapper. Wrapped in yarn, the bell sounds more like a rattle:


All of the noggin ornaments are captured in the video below, including Rudolf's touch-activated nose and the bell's rattle action:

May your holiday season be full of eggnog and free from disembodiment!

Sonny

Today was the first day of snow here, which is good timing for Sonny's debut:


I made this portable sun for Julia, who designed two of the books I had the honour of illustrating: "Who Discovered America?" and "Robots". Over the summer, I shared with her my hesitation about joining the world of crochet...

Along with an invitation to make her something, Julia told me that her teenage daughter--and her male & female classmates--were already using crochet and knitting for self expression. Her pep talk gave me the boost I needed to continue learning yarn-craft.

So here's to sunshine in the face of snow, and to encouragement in the face of doubt!

Woomi

I have attempted self-portraits before, such as in this illustration from wootoons.com:

What would a self-portrait look like if made from yarn? At first, this would be the grisly scene:


It took me three clumsy hours to stitch these pieces together, but this time-lapse video mercifully reduces the process to a minute:

Making Woomi from woowork on Vimeo.

His name is Woomi:



My girlfriend and I brought Woomi outside to re-enact the woowork.com banner image:



This was the first time I crocheted in public, and I felt self-conscious. I'm aware of the double-takes when a guy is seen working with yarn. My girlfriend overhears "grandma" when she's making a scarf on the bus. But those stereotypes will fade as more people of all ages and genders become interested in yarn-craft.

After-all, Woomi is far from an effeminate senior citizen: he plays basketball and practices kung-fu:



To draw a self portrait, focus on the features that make you stand apart. That same approach can be used by anyone following their artistic interests.

Music for Mom

My mom plays the piano and the harp, so I often give her birthday gifts that are adorned with music notes.

To continue the annual musical tradition, I used my new crochet abilities to make her this clef symbol:


The symbol is formed by a long narrow tube stitched together at two points, joined in the middle by a heart nose, with pipe cleaners in both ends for the curls.

My mom liked the musical crochet gift, which now hangs next to her piano with the music note floor mat near the music note wall tile above the couch with the music note throw pillows...

Apple Fever

The food festival fever continued with the 18th Annual Apple Festival at the University of British Columbia. I brought along eight of my own pomme creations, and found them a temporary home on these young apple trees:

Here's a video of me retrieving/picking the apples:

The festival showcased over one hundred varieties of apples, and I submitted my apples as potential new varieties: Bernat Braeburn? Lion Brand Liberty? Red Heart Red Delicious?


The streaks on some of my green and yellow apples were applied with a red stamp pad.

Returning home, my girlfriend spotted a metal doe grazing on a nearby lawn:


He had apple fever too!

Cranberry Concoctions

I'm a fan of festivals, especially if they're food-related. So when I heard about the 13th Annual Fort Langley Cranberry Festival last month, I had to go!

I made crochet cranberries to bring to the festivities, and found a mountain of real cranberries as a setting for this photo:

The festival featured cranberries being harvested, and my girlfriend captured this video:

Here's a photo of my crochet cranberries within this harvest:


My mom bought bags of cranberries from the Cranberry Festival, and she made cranberry sauce from them. She also added them to her unique chili recipe. I couldn't make either dish from my yarn cranberries, so I made this necklace and ring for my girlfriend instead:

From the Shower to the Moon

I made this rocket window sticker years ago, and it remains on my shower window. One morning, I realized that the rocket is shaped like a wider version of the icecream cones I made.

I leapt out of the shower (not recommended) and spent the day completing this rocket:


The rocket's red fins are also icecream cones, but folded in half and stitched together. The exhaust blast is yarn tied to a button, which can be attached to a hole in the rocket's base. The moon and star were improvised from a tangle of yarn, and only look presentable in the darkness of space.

Here is the rocket silhouetted by LED-powered starlight:


And here is the rocket upon landing on the moon:


I like the look of 1950s sci-fi movies, and even made a short film called Reveries and Rocketships in 2001. The 28-minute film can be seen here, and the scene featuring the rocket can be seen below:

Icecream Weather

When I made the heart-arrow, I noticed that its base resembled a cone. So, just in time for the winter chill, here are my resulting icecream cone creations:


My niece has defined the flavours below (clockwise from top): chocolate-chip mint, mango, bubblegum, coconut, mocha, blue raspberry, wild berry, chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla.


I also made icecream cone keychains for my girlfriend's purse, for my niece's schoolbag, and for my sister's keys at the school where she teaches:


The three of them tell me about the compliments the cones receive, which are a joy to hear.

Maybe there is a market for icecream during winter!

Love is in the Air

I wanted to make a heart keychain for my girlfriend, so I followed this pattern. As usual, the outcome differed from my intention, and the heart looked more like an arrowhead.

So here is the Heart-Arrow!


Fortunately, the heart-arrow's cone shape has inspired new ideas on what to crochet. I'll blog about those creations in the next few entries.

Until then, beware of cupid's bow!

Spooks

What ghastly apparition is revealing its spooky form in this photo?


Why it's Spooks the ghost!


I made this ghost for the talented team at YES Mag, the science magazine for adventurous minds. I've been fortunate enough to draw for them and to send them a crochet orange that doubles as a pumpkin. Maybe this ghost can double as a melty snowman during the holidays. Or Snoopy.

Spine-chilling!

UPDATE: Here's a video of Spook's sister ghost, which uses glow-in-the-dark yarn that I discovered from an excellent blog post on Cthulhu Crochet and Cousins. The video also features my first eerie theremin composition:

Frogg

Here is Frogg the Frog (the extra "g" stands for "gasp"... more on that later):

He is partially filled with tiny plastic beads to weigh him down. (The handful of beads might have worked too well... more on that later also).

I also made a fly, adding velcro feet that can stick onto Frogg's tongue:

Yarn insects make delicious snacks :

For this photo shoot, my patient girlfriend and I rented a paddleboat to the lily pads in Deer Lake Park. In the video below, you can see how I nearly lost Frogg to the watery depths below. *gasp*

Dee

This chickadee is my first crochet creation featuring "safety eyes". These snap-on eyes were purchased from CR's Crafts, and they have spared me from scouring the house for matching buttons.


I brought Dee the chickadee to Maplewood Farm for this photo shoot. My girlfriend also recorded me leaning on the ground with all the real chickens (and chicken poo). As you'll see in this video, one chicken might have been interested in adopting Dee's egg:

Sir Francis

This pig stands almost a foot tall, and it was fun to make something larger than a miniaturized elephant or vegetable/fruit product. My girlfriend's dad suggested that I mass-produce my pigs by getting them assembled overseas. Until that day, these woowork creations will be handmade by Woo!

For this photo shoot, I visited Maplewood Farm, where farm animals are on view for kids of all ages. During the shoot, three different children snatched the pig and almost walked away with it. One child saw the pig and urgently whispered to her dad: "take it!" If my overseas mass-production crochet-pig factory opens, I now know my target demographic is 3-year-olds.


The farm's potbellied pig is named Petunia. My pig's name is Sir Francis.

Peanutty

I made this elephant for my girlfriend's mom, who loves all things pachyderm. This elephant shares the same pattern as the green bear, but with a slightly different nose.

A bonus to working on this blog is the chance to improve and share my photography. For this photo shoot, my girlfriend emptied a bag of peanuts onto the elephant as I snapped away. After a hundred photos, everyone and everything was covered in peanut dust.

For the combination crochet/photography/food techies, this is the gear I used: a Red Heart 4mm crochet needle, a Canon Digital Rebel (EOS 350D) camera with a 50mm f/1.8 lens, and a 907g bag of The Produce Stand Salted Roasted Peanuts.

Peanutty!