FO: Minecraft Animals

This was a two part gift that happens to be a set. My boyfriend's son is an avid fan of Minecraft, and when we first got together I asked Nik (the son) what he might like if I made him something. He specifically requested a Minecraft sheep. This started a bit of a deep dive into what patterns for Minecraft were available, and I landed on Sheep From Minecraft by Olga Novytska.

The basic shapes are fairly simple to construct, but I had to use different yarn than was recommended. The pattern is for fingering weight, but I just didn't want to crochet that tiny, plus I was working from stash, so I used sport weight yarn (Serenity Sport in White and Patons Astra in Medium Tan) with a size D hook. The pattern certainly came out, but I had one heck of a time keeping it square. 

The inspiration pic I was going by is definitely all rectangles and squares, but I find that translating right angles into crochet always leads to a more rounded look despite my best efforts. The only way I've found to reliably make amigurumi squared off is to add plastic inside, but I wanted this to be squishy and potentially washable.

So this sheep is a bit less "8-Bit angular" and a bit more "poofy like an actual sheep". That's ok because it's still obvious to any Minecraft player that this was meant to be a sheep.

The face is entirely cross-stitched onto the face piece, which was another interesting challenge. I cross stitched as a kid, but never on a crocheted (i.e. lumpy) background. I had to pull it out a few times to get all the stitches spaced evenly, but I'm happy with the results. I think it looks very close to the game.

So that was Nik's Christmas gift and it went down with great success. So much so that he made another request - could I make him a Minecraft chicken to go with it? His birthday is the very end of February, so I went back to the internet in hopes of finding a chicken pattern I could use. The problem is that no one has a Minecraft chicken pattern available :/  So I decided to freehand my own.

Since I wanted this chicken to be proportional in size to the sheep (and use the same size yarn), I decided to make the body using the sheep's leg pattern. I then just estimated the size of the head, attaching it the same way as the sheep.

The yellow parts were a challenge because I didn't have any sport weight yarn that was close to the right color, so I had to use worsted weight with the D size hook. The yellow is Vanna's Choice in Mustard and a scrap of Scarlet. The beak is just along oval and the feet are basically crocheted i-cord with fan stitches at the bottom. Is it perfect? Certainly not. But was Nik happy to have a chicken? Absolutely.

I went to visit the boyfriend in March and brought the chicken with me. Nik was thrilled to have a set and really liked how it came out, which is really all that matters.

So my slight foray into pattern design was a successful, and I'm just pleased that Nik was so happy. It's hard to connect with a young boy when you live so far away and hardly ever see him, you know? But this was a year ago that I made these things and he still loves them, so that's got to count for something. Yay for being able to make a kid feel happy and special :)

And with this, I've officially posted through 2021 lol. 2022 makes coming up next!

Summary:

Yarn: Sheep - Patons Astra in Medium Tan, Deborah Norville Serenity Sport Weight in White, Vanna's Choice in Mustard and Scarlet

Pattern: Sheep from Minecraft by Olka Novytska

Notions: Embroidery floss