Sackboy I

Here he is, in all his glory!

The original Sackboy. I am by far not the first to make one, but I did think of it on my own, before I knew others had done it.

He makes me very proud, even if he's not perfect - his arms and legs are disproportionately long. But other than that, I was super pleased with the final product here.

Made with Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool, black felt, a pink piece of Foamie, a working brass-tone jeans zipper, buttons, and accent stitches in LB Wool-ease Oatmeal. He's got a wire-frame skeleton, made from an old notebook, so he's fully poseable - even his thumbs.

I call him Sackboy I because he is the first of several planned ones. I already have two requests from close friends that I will honor, and during the construction of those I will be writing up a pattern with pictures that will be available on www.etsy.com. I'll make a note here when it's up. I considered selling these myself, but honestly it's a work of love - I don't think I could make enough money for it to be worth the time it took to make this one.

The next iterations will have a few other improvements - while the zipper on this one works, he's stuffed so full, it's hard to zip or unzip. The legs and arms will be proportionate, the body a bit larger, and I would like to add wire framing to the face so other expressions are possible.

Just like the real thing, Sackboy I gets around.

He digs the music. And this gives you a good idea of what size he is.
He's also really good with animals. Spiff likes him, anyway.
He gets a kick out of gaming. Unfortunately he can't play LBP at my house, though.
And one last standing shot, waving to the world.

Dreaming of an 8-bit christmas . . .

I have minions at my day job. And to thank them for doing the otherwise thankless job, I made them Christmas presents.

Cue images!!

What we have here are fleece hat versions of Mega Man, Proto Man, and a Tanuki suit. There are precedents - the people wearing these hats have photoshopped images of themselves as these characters on our door. Yes, I'm serious.

These were sewn, not knitted - once again I'm not even following my own rules. Sorry. But at least I think they enjoyed them, and it made me feel so deliciously nerdy to have made these.

If I get any requests, I can draw up a simple pattern. Each hat only took a few hours to cut and put together; just as much time was spent figuring them out as making them, probably.

Worst Knitter Ever

I keep letting other things get in the way of my creative passions.

Like, you know, life.

I didn't even update the blog for a while, which is ridiculous.

Anyway, here's a minor list of what's been going on:

Finished the awesomeness. I have a hand-knitted, wire-framed and thus fully poseable Sackboy of my very own. He's about 9 inches tall, and slightly out of proportion - his legs and arms are too long, compared to his body - but he's only the first of several. I have a lot more I want to say about this topic, perhaps later, once I get some really good pictures.

Started on something for myself, finally - a neckwarmer/ruff kind of thing. I had a small hoard of several skeins of Bernat Felting yarn in Gardenia, which is an absolutely gorgous colorway, and I didn't know what to do with it, until I was inspired by seeing some work by the featured crafters on Etsy - there are a lot of neckwarmers out there, and it made me want one for myself. So far that one's mostly done with knitting, it just needs finishing work. Rather than knit it as a tube in the round, I did it as a flat rectangle, and I'm going to attach some shell buttons so the closure will be adjustable. I guess it's kind of like an artsy scarf more than a neckwarmer. I started in on some matching armwarmers, but the bulky yarn looks a little weird for that, so I don't know if I will finish them.

When I get home I'll add pictures for everything I'm discussing here.

And now it's Christmas, and I feel like I failed. I started in on a sweater for someone, but just today I decided to give up, because there's no way it will be finished in time. It's working up really fast with size 15 needles and Caron's Simply Soft Quick, but not fast enough. Even if I just didn't sleep, it probably wouldn't be done, so I decided to set it aside and enjoy the holiday. I will finish it up for the next gift-giving occasion.

I think there's a philosophy in that - knitting should be fun, not work. When I find myself begrudging everything else I'm doing, because it takes time away from a project that I really don't even want to look at but feel like I MUST finish, it makes for a crappy holiday. Really, the philosophy here is one I've failed to learn for years now - start sooner than I think I will need to. On EVERYTHING. Today I went and bought a gift instead, and I feel amazingly better with that pressure off. Now all I have to do before Christmas is my regular day job.

But I am le tired . . .