blogdogblog

Itsy-bitsy-teeny-etc.

Thank you so much for the lovely birthday greetings; it made my week all the more delightful to hear from so many of my favorite bloggers. I decided on Tuesday that I'd like to go back to blogging every day because you are all so wonderful! Yet here I am, an entire week later, hustling up an entry. Onward! To the itsy-bitsy-teeny-etc. content! Let's Go!

So! Did you realize that, unlike knitting needle sizes, the higher/bigger the stamped number is on the crochet hook, the tinier the hook is? A US 8 steel hook is 1.5 mm, but don't take my word for it; use this handy conversion chart, and oh ! btw! take a look at the crocheted wire flowers while you're there. Now, back to the 1.5 mm hooks. . .

Dearly beloved longtime readers of the blogdogblog know that when I quit writing in the third person, we are usuallly in the grip of a powerful obsession. It's the Amigurumi thing, and apparently, I'm not alone in my appreciation of knitted and crocheted anthropomorphic bunnies and such.

What makes them so weirdly appealing? I grabbed a hook and some crochet cotton and after stabbing myself repeatedly while trying to single-crochet in the round, consulted awesome Austin knitter and crocheter CyndiLou, got some less pointy pointers, and made this boy and his dog.

Okay! What an excellent way to practice crochet! (Hey Lace Knitters, take note of the magic ring start for crochet.) Single crochet worked in rounds at a very tight gauge is extremely sturdy; I think the possibilities for using it for textile structures and functional objects are much greater than with knitting. There's something about feeling the thread curving into shape under your fingers while you merrily hook around that lends itself more to ideas of architecture and sculpture than sweaters. Yeah! That's what I think! And I can understand why someone might find it difficult to stop once ideas began to take shape under the crochet hook.

Tapestry crochet, with its multiple threads and colors, extends this idea in a fine-art direction. Well and good. But I don't see how you could not like an amigurumi-dude.

Naturally, perhaps, I may be a bit behind in catching this wave . . . there's already an Amigurumi-along to enjoy. Japanese crafters seem to have advanced skills in cuteness. Clover.jp has free pig, bear, fish, mice, frog, and mushroom patterns, and there is a free bunny pattern here and a free puppy pattern there.

Visit the Amigurumi Flickr gallery at Gourmet Amigurumi even if you're not the least bit interested in anything crocheted; the work there could make a curmudgeon grin. Don't you love Flickr? Other people's photo albums are like other people's blogs—how marvelously human we are when we reach out with our long blogging, picture-snapping hands! I adore the stuff. And the humans, too. Which reminds me of that other amazing online space where I lose all sense of myself: We Feel Fine. I've been looking at it for months and it still gives me shivers :-)

If I resumed blogging on a daily basis, we wouldn't have to wade through these long and hyperactive posts, would we. . . we'll give it further thought while we are soothing our sore fingers around chilly tumblers of lavender lemonade.

Hey! You know who isn't very amused by single-crochet cuties? The Gang of Fur, glowering with accusing eyes over the dinner bowls.

Laters!