Introductions...

This is Hazel:

She is 5'4", on the thin side (for now), and does not like long walks on the beach because that would be immanent death.

Otherwise, she is pretty normal for a rainbow trout.  I will finish her up soon and then make up a large hook and fly to suspend her from while in installation.  She has an extra pocket in the upper pallet of her mouth, so it should be a painless install.  That seems like it is missing the obligatory sacrifice to the art-gods, so I am sure there will still be crisis and material damages.

Hazel is here to serve as contrast to Hemingway in pattern construction.  This was her pattern sketch (yes, it has turned into scratch paper for other notes and yes,  she is wearing a hat and carrying a purse... as do all fish):

This is my internal interpretation:

As with the coelacanth, I started the trunk with the head, and the head started with the mouth.  However, I made all the appendages, the fins, first.  This was so that they could be stitched onto the trunk (sausage/body) as it was constructed.  I try to put on the appendages as soon as the attachment space has been stitched into creation on the trunk.  It is easier to applique when you have full access to the reverse-face of the base-fabric.  If you were to postpone appendage attachment, you would end up closing up your access holes into the inside and that elusive reverse-face.  Plus, you might forget about what you are doing or lose the limb.  I have done the later and felt like quite the idiot.

Provided I do not lose them, the soon-to-be-attached fins:

Fins attached to the reverse-face of the base-fabric:

Hazel's head en fillet... quelle dommage:

From Pattern to Pieces: Find the Starting Point

Alrighty, there was the pattern, then the break for snacking, misusing philosophy, and now pieces are slowly knitting crocheting together.  Bummer on 'knitting' being an actual activity, est-ce pas?

Also, tailoring and sculpting terms will be used interchangeably in this post.  I am very sorry to be mixing the two, but if one genera more accurately describes the motions or the end-goal, then that was the default.  'Accurate and Obscuring' should be made as a labeling sticker.  Onward!

Pattern:

Starting to form:

How does one pick a starting point?

Well, that is a great question.  I have had some trial and error over the years and many a project on which I am banking that 'it is the thought that counts' and 'my Mom will love it and love me, no matter what.'  Confessions aside, just look at any form and start by separating out the appendages from the trunk.

On the fish, the body/sausage is the trunk and the fins are appendages.  Appendages are joined onto the trunk, so decide what you want to make first.  I tend to make appendages first.  Basically, those all MUST be there and if I run out of yarn/materials, then there is no recourse (unless you are gifting this to a 3-year old who will still love a three-legged wombat).  That being said, if you suspect an impending material shortage as you work on the trunk, then the wombat is more stubby and the 3-year old thinks it is more cute.  We all go home happy.

As you work on appendages, start working on the end point, or what is the solid, plane of yarn, farthest from the joining (the seam) of the appendage to the trunk.  Consider Hemingway's eye:

Facing outward

The backside

It will join (the seam) at the start of the socket and the solid face, farthest away from this, is the cornea covering the pupil.  So, working circularly, start at the pupil, work out to the iris, and finally add on the surrounding, orbital flesh.   If that don't church up acrylic yarn...

Still, this does not help categorize the body segment to be deemed 'the head,' further complicated with a mouth cavity, possibly nostril holes.  Think of the entire form/animal/shirt/whatever as a misshapen ball (a sausage is a rolled-out ball, right?).  This ball has to have a start and an end.  Assign both positions to the mushed ball which is your trunk.  The head may as well be your 'start' end.  But maybe I am just an optimist.

Actually, the mouth is the true start, as it is where, from the perspective of form, the top of the ball, as the head, dimples in on itself and becomes an internal projection.  I guess this is a mobius strip for an intestinal tract connecting to dermal covering.... but I wasn't planning on being that accurate.  So, my mouth has an end/back-wall before things get too grotesque.

Starting point identified: mouth.  Then finish the head and move on back through the trunk.

I am not going to do appendages (fins) first on Hemingway because the Coelacanth has lobed fins.  These lobes make the fins big, meaty parts of the body.  It would look funny if they were clearly attached, as opposed to limbs that seem to ooze out in fleshy protuberances.

I have another fish, a river trout, that I am working on for an art installation.  This has a simpler construction.  It is farther along, but the piecing and seams are simple and clear.  More on that coming...

The Old Man and the Coelacanth

Seattle is dangerous.

Okay, that is totally unfair BUT that is totally a Coelacanth attacking Seattle water-traffic.  For those of you playing at home, it is Koch's 1891 bird's eye of 'Seattle and Environs' (crickets??? seriously, historic print collecting is a pulse-pounding hobby).  The plastic Coelacanth is preparing to nom on the forerunner to the ferry pier.

Anyway, I am on a new crocheting venture involving said fish.  This one is to be donated for a fundraising auction.  I am thinking his (?) name shall be Hemingway and he (a 'she' Hemingway seems like a crime against nature and daiquiris)  will be locked in battle with a crab, aptly named 'Old Man.'  I am sure my high-school lit teacher is right chuffed.  Shout out to Mr. Dryer.

Now, refunds with receipts only...

Apologetics for Retreat

I am banking on the title justifying/gilding the following ramblings
(and the squid adds a certain, something extra):

Well, it has been a healthy pause in posting.  I have been thinking that it was a retreat, but as I contemplate the olive in the bottom of my beverage, I am confident that the return to writing is the true double-back, regroup, and rally.  My hope is not to recover lost ground but to move along a different path.  I believe that this withdrawal *ahem* break has allowed for a more directional perspective.  Mainly, I am pretty smitten with the Pacific Northwest.  Before, I was making work while living here; now, location is a perspective and starting point in any project--- the jump from environment to habitat, if that makes any sense.

So, different things coming and that is as much of an explanation as I can articulate with any degree of sober conviction.  If the aforementioned didn't pass muster for Apologetics, then you can take it up with my olive.

Welcome to my dojo

Hello there.

Every mountain goat needs a lair, someplace epic.

Perhaps a hollow mountain?

Say what???

Just my size.

Y'all come back now, hear?

This little goat is yet to be named.  He is just a quick, little, commissioned gift.  While it seems illogical, I think working smaller is more difficult than working large.  You end up using thinner yarn and a smaller hook.  So ultimately, there isn't a huge reduction in the number of stitches and it is much more demanding in the whole concentration/motor skills department.  It does use less materials, though.  I actually used wool yarn for this project.  I have a stock pile of uber-small wool skeins (abandoned to me by my mother... who is apparently much smarter than I and knows not to use these yarns for her projects anymore) and I am always trying to use them up.  Even though they are fine quality, virgin wool it is very hard to use.  It is much 'stickier' on the hook .  I guess the friction is good because it holds the knots and stitches together...but I seem to take twice as long on each stitch. 

I am sure there is some wisdom on the merit of these slow stitches that is fitting for a mountain goat dojo.  Perhaps the goat could be a consulting sensei?

Sheep Done

Normally I just make things... you know, you have a vision and then you execute it.  This time, though, I had a bit of a much needed reality check.

 

I had been fretting a miscalculation in the expansion of the boucle yarn which made the sheep over double the expected size.  In my grand scheme, there would be a semi-rigid batting structure, which would strengthen the legs and allow the sheep to stand.  Of course, this growth spurt in the sheep's body made for too much weight on the leg supports.

The sheep was destined to remain forever on its side, like some fluffy, barnyard, serpentine Venus.  Which actually is kind of alluring, but not quite the grand statement I was going for.

Then I hatched a plan to put in wooden dowels as a core inside the batting structures.  The sheep would stand, grand and indomitable.  But then I had a bit of an epiphany.

I was show-and-telling the sheep in progress to the child of one of my friends.  What happened was the much needed reality check.  This little boy went up to the sheep, gave it a big hug, and then sat on it... and then hugged it some more.  I had been so caught up in my vision of a standing sheep that I forgot how kids want to play. 

Ultimately, this is a gift and the recipient should always come first.  The sheep needs to cuddle-able, first and foremost.  Something squishy to use as a pillow and a plaything.  So she should be seated and soft, huge as she is, errr, big boned and voluptuous.

It is so easy to forget the whole 'form follows function' when we are making things independently and unchecked.  I am embarrassed to say that I was going to ruin all future potential for snuggling and play with my wooden rods.  I guess that this is just a good reminder not to make things in a vacuum; sometimes the romantic vision can overshadow the original intentions. 

I am so glad that little boy sat on that sheep (though mom was pretty mortified).

And now, on to the next project!

We're going to need a bigger boat

The sheep was supposed to be done today.  But then, as always, things happened.

I started stuffing the body and the yarn for the body just kept expanding and expanding (I normally don't use the boucle).  Turns out that the sheep is now to scale and that my support system in the legs is now grossly inadequate.  So I need to rig something else up and I should finish and start accessorising within a few hours.  I think she needs a beret and a scarf.

I am kind of amazed at how big the expansion was.  It seriously doubled in size once it got stuffed.  See:

This sheep is going for a baby gift and it should out weigh the child for the first few years of its life.  While I enjoy giving ridiculous presents, this one was a bit unintentional.  It's like giving someone a killer whale; it's awesome....but now I have a killer whale...

Sheep Update

Call me a traditionalist, but I thought some legs were in order.

In order for the sheep to stand, there must be supports in the legs.  I always try to keep all the materials in stuffed animals wash and dryable, so the support system should ideally be somehow fabric and fiber based.  Here I am using rolled up fleece (left over from a Halloween costume) that is tightly bound with yarn.  Besides, I feel there is some poetry in the sheep's internal stuffing being fleece.  Okay, bad poetry.

After the head got finished, I started adding on the floof.  My methods for the body are almost always the same.  I like to work on the dorsal side first, anterior to posterior.  The only exception to this is anything with radial instead of lateral symmetry.

It has been a while since I used yarn like this white boucle.  I forgot why I hate using it so much.  There is just so much fluff that I can't see where my stitches are.  This means that I will need to focus less on the number of the stitches and more on the general shapes that I am making.  I suppose that this is for the best and will force me to be more sculptural.  The good news about this yarn is it makes big stitches.  So hopefully I will get done soon.

Back to work!

Suddenly... SHEEP

I was making a sheep as a baby present and then the baby came early... so it looks like it's going to be all sheep all the time for the next few days.  No complaints though.  Making toys is always really gratifying.  Even though all the crocheting is giving me the very attractive 'sausage fingers' look.

Feel free to make a Godfather reference.  Okay, so I always start with the limbs and work towards the trunk.  Right now I am finishing up the head.  I love this awkward time when it looks really ugly and un-cute.  From here, everything that you add to it, makes it look more attractive.  It is interesting how faces look so strange when certain features that we expect to see are missing.  It's like looking at someone sans eyebrows.  Just a little detail that when missing triggers a, "burn it, burn it with fire!!!" response.

Fast forward an hour or so, and a little floof on top of the head makes a big improvement.

So I am going to go back to crocheting.  I just need to settle on a show marathon.  I have been flip-flopping between Top Gear (BBC) and River Monsters lately.  The end result is I want a Jag and I am developing a fear of fish.  Maybe I need to find something more pastoral...something bucolic and sheep-y?

I have run out of Persimmon Puns....but it's finished!

We use the buddy system here.

The intrepid persimmon pair is all finished.  But wait, who is that?

A bit closer...

Closer...

I figured that he could live in the pocket I built in the tops of each of the persimmon. I think his name is Steve.

Somalee Odd Bird

Oh, hello.  So nice of you to come by.

This bird has seen things.  Maybe.  I can't really be sure of that.  Somalee Odd Bird was the first crochet animal that I ever made.  There are many mistakes, many that I will never point out.  Let's just say that there was a big learning curve when it came to understanding the expansion of stitches in rows and perpendicular joints.  Still, it was made with much love.

Odd Bird was made in honor of a dear friend and someone who I respect tremendously for her artistic skill and general awesomeness, Somalee Banerjee.  And she also digs quirky, imperfect things... which means that I can just bank on the fact that she will like my creative mistakes.

Also, this is the only animal that I ever made with button eyes.  It turns out that you aren't supposed to make toys with button eyes, in case a toddler decides to chew on it.  While I am going to try and restrain the snark here (I am attempting to cut back on my toddler jokes), I will say that I am disappointed to omit buttons.  They just make everything cuter.

So here she will stay, in her natural habitat:

Check out some of Somalee's artwork:
http://www.somaleebanerjee.com/

Sam

This is Sam.

I started making crochet animals about a year ago.  It just seemed like a natural extension of the academic training in anatomy that I got in art school... and it gave me something to do while watching late-night Netflix.  That being said, Sam was brought to you by the first five seasons of Futurama.  Since I don't use patterns (who likes following instructions late at night?) having a solid understanding of anatomy is essential.  Of course, you make changes to make things cuter/more-snuggle-ready, but it does help you come up with a game plan.  I like to think of everything as variations on a sausage, just odd shaped 'tubes' with things attached.  It is also good to get the head and limbs done first.  Then you attach them up as you work on the body.  I normally finish up on the posterior and ventral side of things.  The exception to this rule is anytime you are working on something that has some form or radial (as opposed to bilateral) symmetry.  I did squid and a turtle that was based more on expanding, then contracting circles.


My current crochet projects are a set of persimmon pillows and a sheep (wedding presents and baby present).  As soon as I settle on a movie marathon, they should be more underway.

Animal Anatomy for Artists: The Elements of Form

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780195142143-0