A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…

It was bound to happen. The Star Wars critters have come to fruition.

“Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope.”

It all started with a princess with a message.

And a tough-talking ship captain.

And his furry best bud!

The princess may have seemed like a helpless soul in her holographic message, but she’s a tough cookie.

“Aren’t you a little short for a storm trooper?”

There’s also some romance in the story! The princess falls in love with the tough-talking ship captain. There’s some awkward moments involving other men, but I’ll gloss over that for now.

The three best buds fly around the galaxy, fight some baddies along with some religious dudes (and dudettes), and all is well in the world galaxy.

Ok, so obviously there’s a LOT of simplification in the story here, but I gotta work with what I’ve got. I’ve avoided making Star Wars characters of my own for a while because crocheted Star Wars characters have been done before, and pretty much done to perfection. There was something intimidating about making my own without having them look like the same song and dance everyone’s already seen on the internet. Otherwise, I’m happy to announce that these are the first 3 critters I’ve made for my upcoming Comic-Con 2013 adoption lineup! If you’re going to San Diego Comic-Con, I’ll be scattering little critters around for people to find as I have for the past two years. Follow me on twitter or facebook to track the drops when the time comes, otherwise stay tuned to the blog to see who else I’ll be dropping around sunny San Diego in July! Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a crap ton of crocheting to do. HOOKING TO THE EXTREME.

Mini-Chewie adapted from LucyRavenscar’s pattern for Chewbacca! Still one of the best crocheted Chewies I’ve ever seen!

Monkeying around

One of my co-workers asked about me making penguins or monkeys a while back. Her birthday was coming up, so I felt that it was only appropriate that I took some of this information and put it to good use.

Monkey!

Credit for this lil’ monkey goes straight to Joanna Ma’s awesome pattern for this lil’ cutie.  LOVE all the little details, from the little bananas down to putting a wire in the tail so that it can curl and shape however you want it to. If Planet of the Apes starred these little dudes, I think everyone would die from a cuteness overload. THE CUTE. IT KILLS.

Pattern for monkey scaled down from Joanna Ma’s pattern for Kiki & Ayo from the Crochet Me 2012 calendar.

안녕!

There’s something prowling about…

…it’s Lady Rainicorn!

She’s just strolling along, making new friends.

After a long day of playtime, rainicorns like to take a nap.

Going to Dallas this weekend to visit a friend I haven’t seen in a while. She recently gave birth to a gorgeous baby boy named Jacob. I figured with a strapping young lad named Jake in the household, it only seemed appropriate to have a Lady Rainicorn around too. And with that, I leave you all with this video:

Lend a helping a hand

On Monday, I was dreading that I’d be starting an 8-day work week. By 1:50 pm CST, that 8-day work week seemed worlds away from the troubles happening in Boston. Then all sorts of other crapola started rolling in America, and well, can this all be over already? Please?

If you haven’t done so already, please lend a helping hand to those in need in Boston, West, TX…or just anywhere, really. Leave a nice note on a stranger’s car. Help an elderly person carry their groceries. Pay for someone’s coffee anonymously (this is my own personal “happy vibes” act that I do when life is making me nervous). Whatever it is you do, just pass on some good vibes in the world. Goodness knows we could all use it this week.

Snail mail = smiles all around

Last summer at Comic-Con I met a kind gentleman who found one of my critters. Turns out he’s an illustrator for children’s books and he gave me a signed copy of one of his books.

Several weeks ago, I got a lovely card in the mail from him:

And what did I find inside?

STICKERS!!!

I especially love the ones of the ninja and the wild thing from Where the Wild Things Are.

Who doesn’t love some 8-bit fun now and then? You can check out more of Hilary’s work at his blog and at thebrothersleung.com. Thanks for the stickers, Hilary!

No, little fishie, you can NOT have any ham.

My friend Celina and I share many interests, one of which is Miyazaki films. However, there’s one particular movie that we’ve agreed to disagree on:

What the hell, I didn’t remember Matt Damon being part of the English cast?

She loves Ponyo. I don’t. Did I miss something? I was REALLY excited to see it when it was released. It had a rating of 92% on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert gave it 4 stars. I was ready to be thrilled by another adventure through fantastical worlds and quirky little creatures that only Hayao Miyazaki could conjure. Instead I sat through 1.5 hours of a little girl shrieking “HAM!!” (it got old really fast) and watched a mother give Honey Boo Boo’s mom a run for her money for parent of the year by nonchalantly abandoning two 5 year-olds in a dangerous flood (“You’re a big boy now! Buh-bye!”). WTF? Miyazaki films tend to have their eccentric moments, but usually it’s all those little oddities that make them so endearing. This one was just BIZARRE. And what the hell was going on in that one scene with the baby? I couldn’t find the clip to show to everyone, but for anyone who’s seen the movie…you know the one I’m talking about. Face. Assaulted.

Nevertheless, that didn’t stop me from making a little Ponyo. Because Celina rocks that much.

Ponyo!

Ponyo, hanging out in her little green bucket. Before she goes into that awkward in-between frog-fish-human hybrid mode as she morphs into girl-Ponyo.

HAMMMMM. PONYO LOVES HAM!!

Never did understand that obsession with the ham. The kid hasn’t even tried bacon yet. That shit will change your life. Nevertheless, I can say I’ve got another Miyazaki critter under my belt!

Ponyo adapted from the free pattern by Anne Gee White!

To infinite, and beyond!

So a couple of weeks ago I signed up for the Infinite Scroll project by Art House Co-op. It was free, and it seemed like fun…they give you a template, you draw something having to do with outer space, and your drawing will be connected with a series of other people’s drawings into one crazy collective space scroll. So yesterday I came back from a late shift at work, and was playing an intense game of Plants vs. Zombies (I’m SUCH a productive member of society, I know), when I thought “Oh hey, I should probably start on that space scroll thingie.” I check my e-mail for the template, and OH CRAP IT’S DUE TOMORROW. Soooo…as a last minute drawing, I came up with this:

It’s a big, geeky universe.

Did I stay up wayyy later than I needed to to throw this together? Probably. But you know what? It’s nothing stellar, but I’d say it turned out pretty okay for a last-minute art project. And to think I thought I was done with all-nighters after I graduated from school.

Turning lead into gold. Or something like that.

So the little critter that was giving me grief because of his long flowy hair last week? It’s done! And it’s already been handed off to the intended party, so public photos will no longer spoil the surprise.

Everyone say hi to Ed! Ed, say hi to everyone.

My sister asked for an Edward Elric from Fullmetal Alchemist as a birthday gift to someone close to her. This became a challenge for two reasons: 1) he’s got long flowy hair, which I’d previously expressed why this is an issue, and 2) I’ve never actually watched Fullmetal Alchemist. I think I remember watching the first few episodes, and I’d seen some snippets here and there when my boyfriend marathoned “Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.” I kinda got a basic gist of things from seeing it in passing (they make stuff from chalk circles, a kid’s trying to get his arm back, etc.), but otherwise I was essentially blindly making a character. And you know what? I like a challenge every now and then.

The hair. THE CURSED HAIR.

“…you want me to transmute a cheese pizza out of some rocks? That’s not really how alchemy works, dude.”

Google image searches were obviously a big help in making this lil’ dude, but there’s always a feeling that I’m missing something when I’m not familiar with the little nuances of the character. It wasn’t my first time making a character I wasn’t familiar with…I didn’t know much about Brobee when I made him a while back, but I felt like watching a few Youtube videos of Yo Gabba Gabba was enough to give me the general idea. Fullmetal Alchemist seems to be a much more complex story, so I guess it made me a little more nervous not knowing as much about the character. In the end, the intended recipient recognized little Ed (whew!), and more importantly, he loved his new birthday buddy! Woohoo! A huge sigh of relief was let out, and with that, little Edward Elric found a new home.

A hairy situation

First off, I’m back from Canada! I didn’t freeze! Hooray! My twitter feed makes it look like all I did was hop from one Tim Horton’s to another, which kinda indicates where I found all the free wi-fi in Toronto, haha. I can assure you, I did much more than just hang out at Tim Horton’s, and I had a grand ol’ time.

Anyway, in hookin’ news, I’ve been working on a critter for my sister as a birthday gift for someone close to her. The thing is that the character she wanted has a full head of hair. For anyone who’s been following this blog long enough, you may have noticed that there’s a significant lack of critters with long, flowy hair. There’s a reason for that: putting hair on a critter is a ROYAL PAIN IN THE ASS. Allow me to explain:

For all my fellow hookers out there: IS THERE A GOOD SOLUTION TO THIS?? It takes me FOREVER to get a good full head of hair that won’t end up massively poofy, and it’s incredibly time consuming because I end up having to fine-tune it strand by strand. I also have the misfortune of being picky about the material I use for hair too…I don’t like using yarn because it’s thick and makes things look even poofier (and too Raggedy Ann-ish), but certain threads are too thin and make the hair look super flat (also, they tend to fray easily and make things look ugly over time). Blah. I can’t post photos of the work in progress because it’s a birthday surprise, but if anyone has suggestions, please enlighten me. At the rate I’m going, a character like Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII would make me want to yank my own hair out. Any help for this hooker?

O, Canada

I’m headed to Toronto for a wedding! I haven’t dealt with below-freezing temperatures in a LOOOONG time, so I’m hoping my warm Texan blood doesn’t freeze up there. And with that, I leave you all with this bizarre video of William Shatner singing the Canadian anthem: