Red Snapper Hat

I was starting on a new idea for another dragon hat, when I used up a full skein of red and realized it wouldn't work.

not long enough to be a dragon...

This is mainly because I started the pattern assuming I had more yarn of the same color red, when I did not. So instead I made it into a fish hat, as that is the base pattern I use. Since it was red I decided it should be a red snapper, as it is a common fish in Animal Crossing.

a red snapper

reworked into a fish

To that end, I decided to make different pectoral (side) fins than the pattern calls for to try and get it more on model to the actual fish. These I modified from a leaf pattern, but instead of doing them evenly I would make one side longer and the other shorter to get the tapered fin shape.

I then also embellished the tail fin to have a bit more a pointed shape on the top. Making those little picots on the tops of the shell shape really helped tie it in to the fins.

I also made the dorsal (back) fin to match the same sort of shape of the actual fish with a rounded end and spiky front. I do think this might have been larger, but I was running out of time and dark red at this point.

I also decided to give him eyes with pupils, but I made them look off center so it could look alive or dead depending on your outlook.

With yet another of these hats done I am reminded of how easy and fun they are, though somehow I always feel that my husband's fish hat is the best one I made.

Difficulty: Easy
Time to Complete: 5 hours

Sushi Fish

A cousin-in-law (relationship terms are confusing...?) is graduating this month. She is going off to study at the Texas A&M Galveston where they do marine biology stuff. So, I wanted to get her a present and thought I would make her a little something silly and appropriately themed.

I've had this pattern for a Fish that turns into a sushi roll for a while now... I have no idea how I found it. Today when I went to look up the pattern, so I could get a link, I saw that the blog site it belongs to is entirely in spanish. The site is Irka! The pattern seems to be the only one on the site that is in English, but if you speak/read spanish there are a ton of adorable flower dolls on there in the Free Patterns tag.

There a few small issues I had with the pattern, maybe because of how it was translated. Also to note... I remember that "y" is "and", but had to look up "cad" which is spanish crochet abbreviation for "chain". On the body of the fish, in round 7, I think it needs to be an increase and then 4sc. And somehow at row 12 I still had 22 stitches instead of 24. Anyway I ended up doing two rounds of 22 and then immediately doing the increase row to 24 and skipping the two 24 around rows since I think I did two extra 22 rows... since it isn't super size important I figured I could fudge a little.

I used a bunch of colors that I had lying around. This is a great yarn consumption project. I had a kind of smallish ball of the orange and I was worried I would not have enough of for the fish body. Turns out that was more than enough. There were no suggestions for hook size, but since I was using all worsted weight yarns, I used my go to H/8/5.00mm hook.

So here is my finished fish. I gave it dead eyes since I stink at embroidering round eyes, and safety eyes might be too bulky to allow the transformation part. (Colors: Orange, Light Yellow, Green, Black)

dead fish :(

Once again in the sushi part, I had trouble making the bottom of the sushi roll part, but just kind of fudged to get it to be the same size square shape. Also, when I counted, both squares had 28 sts on the outside not 36... somehow I messed that all up.

Instead of making the rectangle nori wrapper, I decided to just start on the edge of the top piece and crochet it right onto it. So I did 28 stitches in back loops only to get a crisp white to green edge. Then did 6 rows of 28 around for depth. At this point I was really worried that my fish would not fit inside the sushi piece I was making...so I added another thickness row to make it 7 rows high.

unstuffed roll

Then I made sure I turned that roll part inside out and stuffed it into the fish mouth, lining up the hole and the mouth. I used the orange tail from the fish to sew the sushi opening inside the mouth. I like to when the roll is stuffed in, that the orange stitches inside the white look like teeth inside the fish maw. Plus then it just looks like a crocheted fish toy... In case you have vegan friends I guess.

*boop* boop* insert fish noises here

When the sewing is done the roll then can be pulled out and comes out right side out. Like so:

what is that fish kissing??

When the roll is stuffed with the fish you have two options: a) all in where the tail and butt look like fish, avocado and cucumber, or b) tail out for a more tempura fish roll look. Ha!

I know what I'm having for lunch today.

Time to completion: 2-3 hours. Skill level: super easy.
Final thoughts: Would make again for sure. Might do a little rewriting of the pattern for my own use, but really good pattern and so fun.

BananaShark

So my brother, he is a cute one. He loves the weird and silly parts of the internet, like the Alot. So when he found this picture of a shark banana toy, and asked if I could make it, I said of course!

Since there is no pattern for a shark banana I just made it. I did spend some time thinking about and writing out the pattern before I started and I think that helped. So, let's dive in!

Colors/Items needed:
Brown (tiny bit)
Yellow
Light Yellow
Blue or gray for shark
White for under body
red for mouth (tiny bit)
small black safety eyes
5 mm hook
embroidery/yarn needle

Start at end of the banana closed.

Banana:
Using brown, create a magic circle and do 6 sc into it
do two rows of 6 stitches,
switch to yellow,
two in each sc, 12
one row 12
two sc in one, sc in next, repeat, 18
one row 18
two sc in one, sc in next 2, repeat, 24
one row 24
two sc in one, sc in next 3, repeat, 30
maintain row of 30 for 10 more rows,
Now you can start making the open peeled bits. Since we have 30 stitches, and after studying the picture, see that the three fins stick out the joins, we know to make 3 peels that are 10 stitches wide. Use front loops only to leave inside loops to attach the blue later for the shark body.

Outside Peels:
sc into 10 sc front loops only, chain 1, turn,
sc in each for 15 rows, then do rows of decreasing
sc2tog across (5)
sc across and turn (5),
sc in 2, sc2tog, sc, ch 1 and turn (4),
sc across (4)
sc, sc2tog, sc (3)
sc across (3)
dc3tog to end peel, bind off

Don't Slip! HAHAHA

For the next two peels simply join your yarn back into the same row and use the front loops only like before to make the next two peels.

Note to self: If ever do this again, make the open peels the long way rather than short way, meaning chain out 50 then make two at top to get the rounded top and sc down the chain, turn and come back up and do another increase at top of row. Make it as wide as the 10 stitches and anchor each turn in a stitch. Will look more banana like then. I think.

Make three inside peels, in the light yellow yarn:
chain 10, plus one to turn, sc in each for 15 rows
sc2tog across (5)
sc across and turn (5),
sc in 2, sc2tog, sc, ch 1 and turn (4),
sc across (4)
sc, sc2tog, sc (3)
sc across (3)
dc3tog to end peel, bind off
Use a single crochet around the outside edges of both pieces to sew the inside to the outside. Do this before attaching blue for shark body. Once done, I also added an extra row of single crochet in the row right above the joining row to give the three petals some support and to help mask the join of "banana" to "shark."

Thumb is on the extra row above the line that is the back loops only row.

Once peels are done with their insides and outsides, next make the fins!! Make three fins for the shark. These three fins are positioned on the body at the spaces the three peeled bits meet on the banana. *NOTE: I stopped at that last row of 18 stitches on the body of the shark part, to attach the fins to the completed body. This helped in sewing them on and making sure that the eyes are in the right place when you place them on the body.

Dorsal fin:
magic circle, four sc
2sc in each, 8
2sc in next, sc in next, 12
sc around for three rows, 12
flatten the finished piece and sew the bottom closed
bind off leaving long tail for sewing to body

Flippers:
magic circle, 4 sc
sc in each, 4
2sc in each, 8
sc in each, 8
2sc in one, sc in next, 12
sc around for three rows, 12
flatten the finished piece and sew the bottom closed
bind off, leaving long tail for sewing to body

Now that the fins are done, you can attach the blue for shark body in open back loops of the peels row.

Shark Body:
use open back loops from peels, sc one in each of the 30 stitches
2sc in next, sc in next 4, 36
do 8 rows of blue 36
stuff banana so far and shark body.
sc in next 4, sc2tog, repeat, 30
one row 30
sc in next 3, sc2tog, repeat, 24
four rows 24
sc in next 2, sc2tog, repeat, 18
two rows 18 *here is where I stopped to sew the fins on the body
sc in next , sc2tog, repeat, 12
add safety eyes!!
sc2tog, 6
close off

Now for details:
White underbelly of body piece is like the inside petal pieces but shorter:
chain 8 plus one to turn,
one sc in each for 10 rows (8)
sc in next three, sc2tog in one, sc next three (decreased to 7)
sc in two, sc3tog, sc in two (decreased to 6)
Bind off

For the Mouth:
Make two red half circles: chain 2, 3sc in first chain, chain 1 and turn, 2sc in each of 3 sc, bind off
and one white half circle which is a little larger: same as above, but add one more chain and turn, third row is 2sc in one, sc in next, repeated, then bind off.

Sew white half circle to the decreased end of the white underbelly. Then sc from wider bottom of white belly piece, up the side to the mouth half circle. Once at the mouth start picot stitch one in each of the sc from the half circle, to form teeth.

Picot teeth: slip stitch into sc, chain three, do one single crochet in the second chain from hook, slip stitch back into same stitch started in. Should make a little pointy shapes. Do that around the mouth, slip stitching to move to next stitch. once at other end where mouth ends and underbelly starts go back to single crochets down the other side. Bind off.

Teeth!

Sew two red half circles together at long seam. Then sew one of the half circles into the space of the white mouth with teeth on it. I recommend sewing it down with white thread so it isn't seen on the outside. For the other half of the red mouth, attach white yarn in one corner and make the same picot teeth around the 6 mouth single crochets.

Once you have the mouth and underbelly done you can sew that piece to the body. Tip: Hide all the tails of yarn on one side of the belly piece and sew that side to the body so that the tails are hidden between the two pieces. Sew the top mouth to the body, but leave the bottom jaw free to BITE! I did put a few stitches along the jaw line across the body to keep it snug.

Done! This project actually only took me 5 hours or so. Really fast. But if you are new this might be a lot longer. I think it came out pretty cute and close to the picture for just making it up. Just goes to show how easy amigurumi is.

Banana Butt.

30DC-MG: Day 5: Mermaid

Mermaids... a popular and subject of a lot of drawings. So I drew mine. Lin Kohaku was a character that I created a long time ago for a One Piece inspired dnd game. It never went anywhere but I like her anyway.

Final Fish and Dragon Update

So I think I can safely say (fingers crossed) that I have made my very last fish hat. This final one was for my husband who has wanted one from the start. It consumed the last of several skeins so it was good to do and now he isn't left out.

Final total of fish hats made: 8

Since I was getting out a lot of yarn, I thought I would also tackle the matter of my Dragon hat's nose. Been meaning to add something to give it one to help the face feel more finished. So I started looking for a way to make the kind of cloud bubble shape I wanted. After not finding anything I liked, I then started looking for leaf patterns or tree embellishment patterns. Tried a Gingko leaf shape and didn't like it. So I went back to other leaf patterns.

Looks better with noses.

I finally settled on a maple leaf pattern. I thought at first that if it came out large enough that I would use the two lower sides of the leaf for the nostrils and leave the top for a nose ridge. But they came out pretty small so instead I made two (without the stems) and used one each for the nostrils. I sewed them down and then added black lines for the holes.

Just a shell stitch worked into the space and connections between the red and orange row.

I also added a bit of a neck ruffle down the side of the head to give the face a bit more definition and to add a bit more detail to the hat. I have a feeling that this scarf might be something that I continually add on to... Keep thinking about making the tail larger or adding legs. Or some sort of embroidery to the face, scales maybe?

More Fishes and a Little Me

Sorry for the absence... I went on vacation for a week to visit some good friends for the 4th of July. Ate good food, saw Foamhenge, drank wine, watched fireworks, etc.

I of course felt the need to make them Fish Hats of their own as a kind of "thanks for having us" gift.
One I made with a teacher in mind and the other is a Ghost fish, since she likes ghosts.

The Ghost fish with black hole eyes.

The teacher fish, so called because I see pencils when I look at this one.

My good friend is also a crocheter... person who crochets.... whatever. And I was surprised on the last day of our trip with a pair of Little Me's as I call them now. In case you do not know us, they are meant to look like my husband and I.

I could not be more thrilled. With my blue hair and the button eyes I have been told I look like Coraline, which only adds to the awesome! I plan on doing one thing to mine: making some tiny glasses for her.

My new traveling companion.

Fish Hats Everywhere!

So a few posts ago I mentioned that I was working on a new crochet project. Little did I know that that one project would balloon so out of control!

I have these good friends who are crafty and just a little bit weird like me, so I thought it might be fun to make them a wedding present, rather than just buy something. They like camping and the outdoors and I thought what more fun than to make them something to wear on those cold nights.

Fish Hats by Knitty

I had seen this pattern a long time ago, but I have forgotten how to knit and love crochet too much to switch back, so although I had the pattern, I never made any.

So I set about looking for a new pattern, but in crochet. I found this Fish Hat pattern by Angels Chest on Etsy and loved it because not only was it colorful and cute, but the shell stitch really got the look of fish scales. I also really loved that the pattern was fully photographed and had the full pattern written out in every size I could think of! Handy for people who hate doing math. It is also written in rounds so that I don't have to sew anything on but the three body fins and eyes. Great for beginners too; uses slip stitch, single crochet, half double crochet and double crochet. I have now made 5 fish hats from this pattern. The hardest part is the front head area and that is the only part of the pattern I do not have memorized now.

This girly hat was made for my sister in laws 7th birthday. Made in bright colors for the girliest of princesses. Used a variegated yarn to bring together the different colors. This hat was made from the 5T to Preteen size. This hat's eyes are black 6mm safety eyes since I had some lying around. They were very hard to get through the layers of yarn so I did not use them again.

I think it was a hit. Everyone was shouting "It's eating her head!"

These two are the ones off to the weird friends I mentioned before. I used girly, but less girly colors, for the wife to be and a very masculine green blue and brown variegated yarn for the husbands. The wife's is adult size small and the husbands is adult size large. I was really happy when my own husband tried it on and it fit him perfectly! Since these are my weird friends, I had to make the fish be dead.

These last two are the unexpected pair... I was working on the wife's hat while getting my hair dyed, which takes a long time, and the stylist saw what I was working on and commissioned two more from me for her grandkids. I couldn't say no. Her grandson is big into Spider-man and she asked his to be in those colors... I took it a bit farther and did the whole body in red, the butt in blue and then added the black lips, crocheted half moon shapes and outlined them in black for eyes and then used a combination of single crochet and slip stitches to attach the web lines across the whole thing. I'm actually really proud of that one. The lines were the hardest part. Both of these are also in the 5T to Preteen size. The girl's one she asked to be in pink, purple and yellow. So I used two different yellows I had and a variegated yarn with similar colors again. Of course for a young girl I thought I couldn't have dead eyes, so she got lashes and black circles.

My husband still wants one of his own, so I will be making at least one more fish hat. After that I have this really cool idea for my own hat. Excuse the horrid picture of the doodle, but you should be able to get the drift. I am very excited and it will loosely be based off this pattern.

Husband won't go with you to A-kon? Make Good Art.

Today's title is a reference to Neil Gaiman's recent speech to a group of students graduating from a school of the arts... Haven't heard it? STOP RIGHT NOW AND CLICK THIS LINK! Seriously, if you are an artist in any way, you should hear this.



Now that that is taken care of, A-kon was this weekend. With blue hair, naturally I wanted to dress in a way that might just be recognized by other nerds at the con. First thought was to get streaks added to my blue hair and go as Vinyl Scratch aka DJ P0n-3 (saw 3). But I couldn't seem to find a white shirt that wasn't see-through to paint her cutie mark on. Next thought was Ami Mizuno aka Sailor Mercury (saw 1) But I'm not sure I could manage to pull her off without just getting a sailor scout uniform.

Next thought was summertime Coraline. The idea was to use this fairly recognizable outfit but "summertime" it. I made myself a dragonfly hairclip like she wears.

Got a blue tank top and tried to add white stars like her sweater with fabric paint. Thought I might string the button eyes I have on a string around my neck to add a bit more emphasis on the movie, though I think her looking stone would work equally well. A blue jean skirt and some blue sandals would complete the look. It would be less cosplay and more fashion-inspired-by. At least I feel like I could wear it everyday and no one would be the wiser. HOWEVER, the white stars never came out white and my bleach pen attempts there-after turned out pink. So that was scratched as well.

In the end it was just blue hair, a comfy shirt and skirt, my vibrams, my con bag, and my backup costume: the pipe fox from xxxHolic. Maybe next time I can find some Chobit ears and just pretend to be a persocom.

The Con Bag Before

Items on con bag: Mouse from Spirited Away, Rainbow Dash, BPRD patch, Angel Beats patch, Kodama from Princess Mononoke, Pins: handmade round metal pin that looked kind of like a kodama head, Ravenclaw, Pisces, Kissyface, Innsmouth is for Lovers, Mrs. Auditore, Grand Caymans, Dr. Cat, Japanese Temple, Monorail Cat, True Dungeon 2010, Pirates of the Caribbean medallion. (To be added: Fifth Element patch)

The Con Bag After

New Items Added: Ouran Host Club Patch, Pins: Totoro, Flameo Hotman, We Do the Weird Stuff, fat Rainbow Dash, Sailor Mercury and Symbol, Pabu the Fire ferret, Mr. Toast, Its the Quenchiest, Marceline the Vampire Queen, Appa, Haruhi from Ouran Host Club, Mokona, and Be the Leaf with Tenzin's son Meelo from Legend of Korra

Agent Sonar

Lana Jackson.

That name is not known to any of my fellow players in my husbands Cthulhu campaign. Instead she is Agent Sonar. But hey, even a half-human-deep one hybrid needs a vacation now and then. Just a quick painting in photoshop. Wanted to play with getting a scaled look to her skin. I am slowly discovering the use of layers and more layers to get an overall effect. Plus it makes going back and changing her freckles an easy thing when they are not drawn in the same layer as her camouflage stripes.

Here is a previous painting I did for my entry into the campaign. Agent Sonar serves as a diving instructor to the other players for now. Cool things to note: Because she is assigned to most missions in water, she has special weapons as a result: two H&K P11 underwater pistols and a modified spear gun. She has webbed hands and toes, the ability to withstand pressure to a certain depth, the ability to breathe both water and air, increased hearing underwater and bulgey-fish eyes with nictating membranes. Fun! 

my logo

So just fyi, and for me... but this fishy thing is my logo. It's an A and an M which are my initials but stacked so that it looks like a fish. So yeah I put it on all my stuff so I know its mine and it's a fish cause I'm a Pisces. OK.

Update: This design was originally going to look more like the artist Albrecht Durer's signature, but after turning the page sideways to draw more I realized that it kind of looked like an angelfish. I have always been a big fan of fish and aquariums so it seemed kind of natural to have my signature reflect some of my interests. The Pisces thing only helped solidify it in my mind. This logo has gone through a few changes, primarily being simplified, but of late the M has changed to an S to reflect my married name.

More Lin

Hell again and welcome to the encore of Lin Kohaku. She was only a head before and now. Now she is whole. I'm working on a color version in Photoshop, but here is the black and white line art. I drew her today at work in pencil on vellum paper which is lovely for drawing btw. So yes, that's all.

Lin Kokahu
ink, graphite on vellum
July 2007

Nori Nori

Last but not least is Nori Nori. I like her name, it's from the latin name for the spotted eagle ray. I was working on a lovely watercolor of her, but screwed up on the eye and made the mistake of trying to fix it and so ruining her entire head... so I'm heart broken at the loss of my watercolor, but luckily I had scanned the original. So here she is. Not too overly ray-like, not like Lin anyway. I thought of making her head ray-shaped, but that ray is not so pretty in the head and has a BIG beaky thing, hence the eagle part of its name, so no. Anyway, the idea is to have a fisher-person who is a mermaid who fishes with a hook and line cause it's a silly nostalgic overly complicated human way to do things, but extremely fascinating. Also she fights with a ball and chain, but not a ball, but an anchor, hence the anchor in two of the images... no its not based off that chick from that one video game as my brother pointed out, as you can see I clearly haven't played the game or know anything about it... but no. Right, so she's in graphite and ink. See you all next time I've got new stuff!

Lin Kohaku

Alright, so here's my second post today. This is Lin Kohaku. Her name is taken from the fish shes based off which is the koi variety called kohaku. Then I remembered that Haku's real name, in Spirited Away, is something something Kohaku, so I had to pick her first name from that movie, and rather than Chihiro, I picked Lin, because I like her personality better for my mermaid lady here. She was drawn in graphite, watercolored and then inked. Shes a cutie no?