Pattern Notes for Stitch - Lilo's Friend

^..^

Oh, YEAH?!  Just try and MAKE me!

As requested, I'm making my pattern notes for Stitch (of Lilo and Stitch) available.
                                   (for more pics and Stitch's story, please see previous post)

This isn't a complete pattern, but most of it is there and I've spent the past few days cleaning it up and filling in some of the blanks. But it is still an incomplete and untested pattern. But it's free so I guess you're not risking much.   ;o) 

I won't be making another Stitch, so I won't be bringing this to any further level of completion, but if you find any glaring errors or come up with improvements that you'd like to share, please email or comment and I'll pass the info on.  :o)

You'll find the link to the PDF for Stitch's Pattern Notes on my patterns page.  You can click on the “Patterns and Tutorials” link at the top of this page or just click here.

Stitch is knit in the round (I used two circular needles) and his torso, 4 arms, and head are knit in one piece. Legs, ears, eyes, nose and color patches are knitted separately.  There are no seams. I would not suggest this for a beginning knitter. But determination is a wonderful thing.  :o)  I have included links for tutorials for some of the techniques I use.

I know that some of you totally enjoy these larger projects (Yesterday, I saw an etsy listing for a crocheted Mickey Mouse, and a Snoopy too, the size of a 10-year-old child!! WOW!), but since I really dislike making these larger ones, I have promised myself to make only the smaller peeps from now on. The larger ones take so much time, and I don't like to devote so much of my time to one project. There are sooooo many more peeps that I want to make, and that I have on my list as requests, So this was my last of this size.  It was a labor of love for our nephew.

Back to the wee peeps! Yay!

Oh, my fingers are itching to knit another Hello Kitty ...
I'm just dying to make one after seeing a totally adorable crocheted one that K and J Dolls has available! But I have too many other peeps that I need to get to, so I don't know when I can squeeze her in. Drat!

Here's my one and only Hello Kitty, made in my early days of toy knitting (made for an adult - thus the bead bling).

The one by K and J is just wonderful! I love their designs! If you crochet your creations (I don't, because of hand issues), and if you work from patterns (I don't do that either), you should definitely check them out!

A last note... I'm just finishing up a new pattern for Elmo (it will be for Cookie also), using a more standard toy knitting approach than my original doubleknit pattern. Though the original was easy to do, and it was fun to use the doubleknitting, I really prefer the results of doing it this way. It's neater all around. The stitches are tighter and you have better control over the increases and decreases. (doubleknitting by nature is looser because of the slipping of stitches) I'm just finishing making one more Elmo using the pattern (another request, but a good opportunity to test the pattern again) and then I'll post it.

Okay, I know you want to know where to find that giant crocheted Mickey Mouse pattern! Heh heh.
He's here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/Chonticha
along with a bunch of other wonderful designs! Including a super adorable crocheted Lilo AND Stitch pattern! This designer is so talented!

And here's the link for K and J Dolls' Hello Kitty,
http://kandjdolls.blogspot.com/2010/09/kimono-kitty-by-theresa.html
and to the rest of their patterns. I just love everything they do!
http://kandjdolls.blogspot.com
http://kandjdolls.etsy.com/

Oh, pfui! In getting the links, I just read that they’ve had to take down their HK patterns due to a complaint by Sanrio. :o/ Well, you can still use the photos as inspiration, anyway. That’s what I do.   ;o)  It’s certainly reasonable for Sanrio to stop people from profiting from their property, but wouldn’t it be nicer to ask the transgressors for a percentage of their profit instead of robbing the world of such cuteness? *sigh* She did such a great job of designing those HK’s!  :o/

Hope you're all having a great week! It's raining here, and in Sunny Southern California, it's a welcome relief! I love the rain.  :o)  Especially after that scorching week of Indian Summer we just had.

Wishing you all the Best!

Animated Amigurumi Peeps - Stitch (but no Lilo)

                                                                                                                                         ^..^
FINALLY!!! A very belated gift for Tony's April birthday (yes, APRIL! I'm so behind!)
  Update: Pattern now available!  See the following post (link to the pdf is on the patterns page):
    http://theknittycat.blogspot.com/2010/10/pattern-notes-for-stitch-lilos-friend.html

- Stitch -
the little blue alien from Lilo and Stitch




Oh did this guy give me trouble!!! He's much larger than my usual, and with that huge head, it was like wrestling with a fat blue baby!! :o) Four arms, 16 claws, 8 toenails, 16 big TEETH!! Whew! He took me AGES! I started him in February, and just finished him last week!!! (okay, yes, I did make a lot of other peeps in between, but he was so exhausting for me to work on, I had to keep putting him aside!) But he's finally done and Tony really really loves him! So it was all worth it! Well ... now that it's done, it was worth it!! ;o)

I'll never do it again! I've sworn off making large peeps and I'm sticking to small and tiny ones! :o) Okay, my friends say they've heard that before... but this time I MEAN it! Really! Honest! heh heh

I knit Stitch from the bottom up. His body, arms and head are knitted in one piece with the medium blue yarn, and his legs, ears and nose (and color patches) are grafted on.

here he is with some of my photo references


Aren't those marvelous buttons for his eyes?!
I tried sooo many different things and was not happy at all, then my dear Hubbard came home one day with these beauties! :o)

and here with more photo references


and from the back showing his tattoos(?) Well, his dark blue markings.
I'm not sure what exactly they are.


Did you know that Stitch had a little nub of a tail? I didn't till I started researching photos! :o) I forgot to take pics of the bottoms of his feet, but they have blue circular patches (you can see them a little bit in this pic above) - knitted in, not sewn on, since I could do them in the round while I made the circular bottoms of the feet.

And so you can see his relative size - here he is in my hand and from the side
(see the notch in the top area of his ear?)







    Just for reference... this is the size of
    peep that I like to make!  :o)

Cookie Monster Peep

  





Restraining his enthusiasm!

(and another notch, in the bottom area of this ear)

You can kind of see in this picture that he's nice and squishy.
Nice and cuddly, except for his giant button eyes! :o)

With two layers of knitting and curled around at the bottom, even as large as they are, the ears came out surprisingly poseable. :o)


RAAAAARRRRRGGGHH!

heh heh

Something about his big open mouth seems to fascinate people. :o)
Everyone wants to stick their hands in it! heh heh




including ME!


I told Tony that Stitch is like that wall sculpture in Rome (Boca Della Verita - the Mouth of Truth)...
If you tell a lie while you have your hand stuck in his mouth, he'll BITE it! ;o)

Almost a Pattern
I don’t have an actual pattern for Stitch (and won’t be writing one), but I did discover, just last night, that I made LOTS of notes as I was knitting him, which I had totally forgotten doing. I wrote out nearly everything I did, but not quite - there are missing bits. I did not complete the head decreasing instructions, and did not note how I made the patches for his tummy and back. (Frankly, I didn’t do such a great job on those patches anyway - you could do better, I'm sure.)

I may make my notes available in a pdf later, if folks want them.   
UPDATE:  Pattern now available. See this post for pattern information

Color Patches
As you can see, there are a lot of color patches on Stitch. I'm dreadful at knitting colorwork! I just hate doing it, and it never looks neat to me, so I usually avoid it very carefully! heh heh But since Stitch had all these different shades of blue, I had to work out something. As usually happens, I try various ways of knitting the color in, and wind up chucking that idea, and making separate patches of the colors and grafting them on. :o/

Weeks after knitting Stitch's color patches, I recently was working on Snorlax for Matt (see next post for Snorlax and Jigglypuff) and came up against my nemesis again... colorwork! I made a determined effort to find a good way to do intarsia in the round, since I always work in the round (intarsia worked flat is not such an issue). So I did a bunch of research, and tried a few things out, and was - again - very dissatisfied!! Well, in my opinion, it seems there isn't a "good" way, just work arounds. Gave that idea up and relegated myself to another set of less than satisfactory patches to stitch on. But then I came up with a better way to make the patches! I was very pleased with the outcome on Snorlax and wish I'd discovered the idea while I was making Stitch. But better late than never, I guess. And I'm less disgusted at the thought of making another peep with color patches again! But I'll still avoid it when I can!! ;o)


Update: you can see how I made his teeth and claws in the pattern, which is now available.  
See the next post (the link to the pdf is on the patterns page):
http://theknittycat.blogspot.com/2010/10/pattern-notes-for-stitch-lilos-friend.html

Teeth
In case you're wondering how I made Stitch's teeth (all 16 of them!!) ... since I reeeeaaaallllyyy did NOT want to make sixteen little pieces and sew each of them on (YUCK!) I tried a few different ideas and settled on knitting them from side to side (actually in the round so they'd be 3 dimensional) in a long strip, using short rows for the shaping (details in my notes). That worked fine! :o) They're two strips of teeth, which I later sewed into his mouth. After grafting the teeth in (using kitchener stitch) I still felt there should be some overlap of his blue lip onto his teeth so I went around his mouth, pulling the blue fabric over the teeth and stitching it down. Yes, it was tricky with that big blue head attached to the big blue body hanging off of what I was sewing!! heh heh My hands still hurt!!!

Claws
For his claws and toenails I knitted short I-cords and pulled them in between the stitches of his paws and feet. For the toenails I used one I-cord for each foot. For each foot, I pulled the completed cord through every couple of stitches, over and under, horizontally. For his claws I made one I-cord for every two claws (two for each paw, making four claws per paw). I pulled the finished cord into one stitch and out another, a couple of stitches over, and stitched them in place to ensure that they wouldn't pull out. That worked extremely well, and I used the same method for Snorlax's teeny claws (see next post).

Vox.com
One last note:
Today is Vox.com's last day ... so goodbye to vox ...
and HELLO! to blogspot.com! :o) So far I'm quite happy with how well things work here! Yay!

Cute Sackboy for Sale! & Oscar the Grouch ...

Or ... what to make when you're feeling grouchy ... Oscar of course!

Sackboy Peep on flickr

I get quite a few emails from folks asking to purchase a knitted Sackboy like the one I made for Matt, but considering the fact that my poor Hub is still (a year later!) waiting for me to make one for him, I don't think that's feasible - even if I would ever consider selling any of my peeps (wouldn't that be slavery??). As most of you know, I only make them as gifts of love, for friends and family.

But... I have found a solution for those seeking to purchase (rather than make), a Sackboy ...

for sale at amazon.com!

Click here to go to the page where you can buy a Sackboy

Cute, huh?!  :o)

I had planned to make a Sackboy for my Hub's birthday last month, but life intervened and things have been kinda crazy for a while - so no Sackboy Peep yet. :o/   So when Matt mentioned seeing this little guy at thinkgeek.com I had to check it out. As is usually the case with thinkgeek, they were sold out by the time I got there, but I found them at amazon.com!  Yay!

And, YES!  My hub now has his very own Sackboy!  - just to tide him over till I can make one for him - he still wants my peep version.  ;o)   Don't feel too sad for him, I've made him dozens of peeps!  Just haven't gotten to Sackboy yet. Someday I'll get caught up on my peep posting and you can see some of his collection. Okay...  That may never happen, but I can TRY!

This little Sackboy from amazon.com is made out of knitted fabric but (sadly) is stuffed with something rather firm, and isn't soft and cuddly, but he's very cute for display!  We love him!

Click here to see all the other cute Sackboys (and girls) at amazon.com

So what peep did my Hub actually get for his birthday this year?

Oscar!

Oscar the Grouch

(The Muppet from Sesame Street for anyone who doesn't know him)
Or "Garbo" as I tend to call him when I can't remember his name.   ;o)




I had to restrain his enthusiasm as he was so excited to have his photos taken.  ;o)  You'd think he'd be used to it, but he says that Elmo and Kermit and Cookie usually grab all the attention. 

He goes along with my Hub's other Muppet Peeps, Elmo and Cookie and Kermie, whom you've already seen all over the place, and Grover, whom I made for his last birthday, but haven't posted yet.

Oscar has a little friend, Bitty Kitty, whom he loves very much, and he's not grouchy with her at all.  :o)

Bitty feels very comfortable and secure when she's with Oscar.




Oscar Loves wee Bitty Kitty and watches over her carefully

Bitty Kitty is very very tiny

My Hub says I should show you the large photo as well, so you can get a good look at her.  :o)

Yep, Oscar's trashcan is a bit (!) small...  Duhh... I was knitting away without looking at his can (no pun intended!  Hee hee) and got a bit carried away with his size. He's knitted all in one piece, so the trashcan was bobbing about, below my needles, and still I never noticed!  Heh heh


         "UGH!  Tight fit!"

Happily my Hub loves him, just as he is!  Yay!  And so do I.  :o)

Hope you've all had a lovely summer!   ;o)


You can find posts about the other Muppet Peeps here, and pics of lots of the peeps here: www.flickr.com/knittycat