FO: Little Giraffe

So after making Christmas gifts for about 2 months straight, I wanted to make something frivolous for no reason, lol. 

It's hard to get more frivolous than a random toy you don't need (plus you don't have children), isn't it? I loved the Little Giraffe pattern by Susan B. Anderson back when she released it in Making magazine last year, so when she released it for sale as an individual pattern I snapped it up. She was advertising kits that included the pattern along with come of her new yarn line to make it up in, and the color combinations were lovely, but I already had two of the exact colors she used in a different yet equivalent yarn - perfect! My giraffe is made using Cascade 220 Superwash, so it is still a superwash wool toy - making it a little extra special to me since I always use acrylic. As soon as I finished my Christmas gifts, I cast this on.

The pattern is completely seamless, so it has you start with the garter stitch bum - isn't it cute? Then you move up to the point of the legs, make the legs, then resume knitting them into the body. I've made some of Susan's seamless toys before, and it can be a bit fiddly, but they come out so neat and smooth in the end it's definitely worth it. You also don't end up needing to keep track of a bunch of little pieces as you go either, which is nice.

Next you start the color work, which was what I was most excited to do. I've done only a little color work before and those pieces always turned out too tight across the floats, so I wanted a small project to practice on now that I know a bit more about what to do. It's not perfect by any means, but I'm pretty happy with how this color work lays. After about halfway up the body, I added a white nylon stocking with poly pellets in it to give him some weight. I definitely recommend adding the pellets because I don't think he would really sit right without them - he wants to lean forward a lot as it is, so without that extra stability I think he would always tip over. I also always put the pellets in nylons and tie it closed because I'm paranoid about them coming out and a baby eating them. I want these toys to last and be safe. So you knit the body, then stop to make the arms, then knit the arms into the body and close it up.

My one complaint about the color work is that the pattern changes in the middle of the tummy. Suddenly two of the circles are right on top of each other and every time I see it it looks like a mistake, but this is the way the pattern is written and how everyone else's look too, so I know it wasn't a mistake. If I made this again, I would adjust that just for my own sanity, lol. It's cute just the same though.

Next you make the head from back to front. I love that the color work continues there - such a cute touch. You stop again to make ears and horns, then knit them on as you go. The final touch is to embroider the now and eyelids (he has eyelids! - look at them!). I love the eyelids and think they look great with his slouchy body shape.

It took me a few weeks before I could embroider the nose since I had to dig out black yarn and I was moving at the time. Technically the pattern only has a nose, but I thought he looked a bit overly sad so I added a little smile :)

Isn't he so cute? He is in an honored spot on my étagère so I see him everyday in my sewing room. I really love how classic Susan's toy designs are, and I plan on keeping this for when I have kids. I've now made 2 giraffes designed by her, lol. And I'm no huge giraffe lover, I just thought they were adorable designs and had to make them. I also love the hug-able size of this guy - I know it's hard to tell from the photos, but he's about 10" tall. This is definitely an heirloom toy, and I'm so glad I made him up.

Summary:
Yarn: Cascade 220 Superwash in Aran and Smoke Blue (leftover from this and this)
Pattern: Little Giraffe by Susan B. Anderson
Notions: fiber fill, poly pellets, white knee high nylon stocking

Finished Object Friday: My Not So Itty-Bitty Giraffe!

I'm seriously so excited about today's finished item because it has been a long time coming. I finished my giraffe!

This is the (Not So) Itty-Bitty Giraffe pattern by Susan B. Anderson. I made this using the Craftsy Class by the same name. This is my first ever knitted animal and it feels so great to have it done :)

Here is the back view. I think the back is what really makes him look like a giraffe (due to the spots).

When putting the spots on, I decided it looked better to go with a kind of grid formation, and I ended up making 10 spots to accomplish this. Those spots took so much longer to make than I think they should have lol. Also, just to let you know a neat little fact, "horns" are actually held up with pieces of plastic straws inside! Pretty cool, huh?

Here's the side view. I did end up making his first leg a little too long - the pattern says to knit the yellow until lit measures 6.5" and I went to 6.75" and I couldn't be bothered to rip back so I just made them all that length. This made me have to attach them a smidge higher than the class shows you, but I really don't think you can tell if you don't know. He is definitely "not so itty-bitty". When seated like this, he measures a little over 13" high, and if I hold him up so that the legs are extended he measures a little over 20" tall. I just love his big, huggable size. He is very squishy from the poly pellets in the nylon combined with the poly fill and wool yarn. I love how wool is so springy in the animals - I know that sounds weird, but make one and you'll see what I mean. I used the Class Yarn Kit from Craftsy to make this which included 2 skeins of Cascade 220 Superwash wool in Daffodil and 1 skein in Orange. I ended up using 1.2 skeins of the yellow and 0.4 skeins of the orange, so I have a bunch left to make other things with. The poly pellets have also contributed to his weight - this is no light giraffe. I'm sure it won't be drug around by my kids until they are a little bigger, but they will love it sitting with them :)

For his face, I just used a strand of Everyday Soft Worsted in Chocolate. I spent a good deal of time on the face just to make sure he finished off well and I am really happy with the end result. Because I made this for my future children, I wanted it to be very durable, so everything is knotted on and I hid the knots as best as I could in the bars between the stitches or under the body parts and you really don't see them, which I'm very happy with. I just love his little face :) 

It's amazing the response I got to this animal when I showed him to my family. Everyone just wanted to squish and hug him and play with his long legs. Even my nephew is a fan - he was obsessed with the pompoms :)

I am so happy to have this finished and it feels like such a big accomplishment! I started making this on July 12th, and I have been diligently working on it until August 7th so it took almost a full month! I will say, my knitting is definitely faster than it was when I began this. I am also really glad that I bought the Craftsy class to help me make it. I learned a lot of neat techniques and it really helped take the guess work out of some of the pattern. Could you make this without following the class? Sure, but for a person who has never knitted an animal before it really makes the difference between a pleasant experience and a long headache. I am so proud of my guy and I know a lot of that is thanks to Susan's instructions in the class, so I would recommend the online class to anyone - I definitely give it a full 5 star review :) Now I have knitted animal fever, lol, and I can't wait to make another (smaller) one next.

So that's my big "FO" (finished object) this week. To see the objects others have finished, check out Tami's Amis blog :)

WIP Wednesday

I was so determined to finish up my Not So Itty-Bitty Giraffe last night, but making the spots took so much longer than I thought it would! I was bummed. I have it all finished except applying the spots to the back and embroidering the face, so hopefully I will get it finished tonight. In the meantime, here is a little teaser photo:

I just love him! I can't wait until he's finished - it feels like such an accomplishment :) I'm already planning what animals I want to knit next (very dangerous), so I need to hurry with this one lol.

Also, I forgot to post a picture of how my ac unit installation looks from the outside. This is the window that is now covered with wood and permanently propped open for the exhaust to escape, and, as you can see from the photo, you would never know it was different! It just looks like a white curtain from the ground, which is what it looked like initially anyway. You can barely tell that the window is open either. I call this a job well done :)

So those are my wips for this week. If you want to see what others have going on, check out Tami's Amis' blog!

WIP Wednesday!

It's that day again :) I'm still working on the same wip from last week, but I have definitely made progress :)

Now my Not So Itty-Bitty Giraffe looks less like a gord and more like a giraffe :) I've started the legs - you can see the half finished one laying down there. I was really doing well with it and I suddenly got a little bored. I just needed to switch it up a bit. So I set my giraffe aside and started on a project I had lined up.

It's a fox! Technically I finished him last night so he's no longer a work in progress, but I had a pick of his pieces so I figured I'd post it :)

That's it for my projects this week! If you want to see what some other bloggers have going on, head over to Tami's Amis' Blog and look around :)

WIP Wednesday!

So, this has been the busiest week I can remember having in a seriously long time. I know I say things like that a lot, but believe me when I say that before they were exaggerations because this last week takes the cake! I had a maternity photo shoot, my birthday dinner, my friends telling me they were coming to town, frantic cleaning for said friends, work, Justin's nephew's wedding, my sister's bridal shower, my friends arrive, dog issues that culminated in taking my friends' dog to the emergency vet at 12am,  playing with a 3 year old, going to my brother in law's birthday party, editing maternity session before baby was born this morning. Phew. There's probably more to list in there, such as lots of baking, but suffice it to say it was a crazy week. Most of those things happened this Saturday, and most of them were good things, it was just very hectic to have them all at once lol.

In spite of the craziness, I still have to have a project for the little bit of down time I have at night. I have a few other projects planned, but I had ordered yarn and it didn't arrive until Monday; in the meantime, I finally started my Not So Itty-Bitty Giraffe :)

I purchased the Not So Itty-Bitty Giraffe class from Craftsy way back when. I'd always loved it and then they discounted it to $9.99, so it was mine. Since then I have been acquiring the supplies to make my own giraffe. I bought the kit of yarn from Craftsy too so I could be sure it would come out just like their example. The kit included Cascade 220 Superwash yarn - 2 skeins of Daffodil and 1 skein of Orange. I had the needles and stuffing, I even had the book (Itty-Bitty Toys by Susan B. Anderson - not a requirement since theclass includes the pattern, I just bought it because I liked the other patterns). I was just waiting to get poly pellets and my husband bought me some for my birthday :)

Anyway, I started it last Tuesday night and I am addicted! It turns out I don't get bored of the knitting when it's for a toy - even when it's a large project. I was afraid it would end up like my sweaters and shawl languishing in my project bag for months. I managed to knit the whole bottom on Tuesday and from then until now - even with my craziness this weekend - I have the body about 3 rows from finished!

This is my first time using polly pellets in an animal and I got a little creative. You never want to put the pellets directly in a toy that is for a baby since the pellets can pop out occasionally and they are a choking hazard. So, you can sew them into a sack or a sock or something to enclose them inside. I had heard of putting them in nylons from Stacey Trock's class so that was what I decided to do. I tried just pouring the pellets into the my knee high stocking, but that was a bit of a mess - luckily I caught it before they went everywhere. This inspired a stroke of genius and I went down into the kitchen to grab my canning funnel to control the pellets more. It worked like a charm! I highly recommend using one of these if you do poly pellets at all - the funnels are only a few bucks and man did it help!

So, I filled the stocking up until it looked good. Confession - I tied a loose knot and stuck it in the giraffe first to check and I ended up taking some pellets out before tying 3 knots in the stocking and cutting the excess. The stocking was a fantastic idea! Because it's stretchy, it was easy to squeeze it around to fit through the small hole and then it went back to being round when it was inside. I put a little poly fill along the bottom, then the stocking with pellets, then stuffed it up with poly fill the way Susan shows you to in the Craftsy class and it worked out great.

Now my giraffe looks like this. I could have gotten the body closed up last night, but I'm trying to get myself back into a normal sleep schedule so I was responsible and went to bed just after the stuffing. I will have that piece finished tonight when I go home and then I can start making it look like a giraffe instead of a large pear lol. I'm really happy with this project so far - I was worried about knitting animals since I'm so used to the speed of crocheting them. I thought I'd get bored and not want to finish. Not so! The knitted amigurumi world is now my oyster and I fully plan on making plenty more knitted animals. I guess I'm just a toy maker at heart :) I really love the Craftsy class and it has helped alleviate any anxiety I had since I have someone there to show me everything step by step if I need it. It really makes a difference on the first animal, trust me.

That's my WIP for this week. To see everyone else's, head over to Tami's Amis' blog and check it out!

Crochet Update: It's a Giraffe!

My good friends, Heather and Kevin, told me they were going to come down to Florida for their vacation this year. I was stoked! They have a 3 year old daughter (whom I have never met), so of course I had to ask what her favorite animal is to make a welcome gift for her. Nothing wrong with buying a kid's affection, right? Right. Apparently, she loves giraffes, so I finally got to use the pattern I had :)

Isn't he cute?! I made this guy using the Giraffe pattern from Crocheted Softies by Stacey Trock. I used some butter yellow colored Red Heart Super Saver yarn I've had since I don't know when (that means I might have bought this in high school - holy cow) as well as Everyday Worsted yarn in Chocolate Brown.

The actual pattern doesn't have the little mouth piece - It's kind of hard to see in the photo, but it's there - I added it from the Alpaca pattern from the same book. I think the mouth makes them a little friendlier :)

His spots go all the way around. I tried to make them as evenly spaced as possible - the ocd freak in me really came out on that - but with all the decreasing it was pretty difficult so the neck is not as evenly spaced. Oh well, I doubt that a 3 year old will even notice :)

And look at the little tail! The pattern has you make it all in one color, but I liked the contrast of using the brown.

So, I was finally able to hand over this giraffe on Saturday to its new owner. Morgan definitely liked him. She named him Buddy 2 - her favorite toy is another giraffe named Buddy so when we asked her what his name was she called him Buddy 2. lol I take that as a good sign. After they left on Monday, my friend Heather (Morgan's mom) sent me this picture. I think this seals the deal and I know she likes him. I'm so glad this gift was a success :)