So my first two students to reach Ultimate Prize Box asked for custom crochet items. They are brothers and love my crochet stuff. The projects they asked for didn’t seem too difficult and I agreed.
The first wanted a Bendy in some form. He wasn’t sure what he wanted, a hat? a plushie? a keychain? He decided on a puppet. Now I just had to figure out what a Bendy was!
Oh, that’s a Bendy
I’m a sucker, I know. Wasn’t I the one who said I wouldn’t take anymore special requests from the kids? I would make crochet prizes and the kids could either pick what was available or not, but no more special request. Yeah, well…we all knew that wasn’t going to happen. I had made a crochet LOL emoji hand puppet for the Ultimate Prize-box and a student wanted it, but he said it looked like a girl.
Who you calling a girl?
Ok, I’m a girl.
He hinted he sure wished he could have an emoji puppet but with a red shirt instead, so it could be a boy. I didn’t want to work on the Charizard project I had going on anyway, so I agreed to make it for him.
Naturally, and in that case, he wanted a money emoji puppet instead, with shorts. Ok, ok, that would be fine. Blue shorts, with shoes. Uh huh. And with hair. Wait, what? It’s an emoji. Do they have hair? Or better yet, a green mohawk! Now I’ve heard everything. 🙂 Continue reading
I’ve been crocheting a lot of things for our ultimate prize box at work and realized I haven’t shared them here. Let’s start with the yellow, heart-emoji puppet that looked like a frog. A student (5th grade boy) picked that one but then asked if I could remove the heart eyes and replace them with black circles. Here we go, I thought.
I asked him if he wanted to trade it for something else and he said no. I was flummoxed as to why he picked that puppet if he didn’t completely like it. I told him it is what it is and if he didn’t like it, there were tons of other items to pick from. He said no, he wanted to keep it. But could I change the eyes? Argh! I really, really didn’t want to change the eyes. I asked him if I didn’t change it, would he still want to keep it. He could still exchange it (this was the third time I made that offer). He was adamant he wanted to keep it. He went off and played with it. I still heard him saying (not to me) he wished the eyes were black but he still liked it.
A few days passed and he brought it back from home and was playing with it. You know what happened. I felt bad about it. He’s a really nice kid. I told him I would go ahead and replace the eyes. He was so happy. I haven’t done it yet but it’s in the queue.
But I like my eyes!
I made another emoji puppet after the frog (heart emoji wannabe) fiasco. This time, I was determined to make it look like an emoji and not a frog.
No frogs here!
Why do the kids keep saying I’m crying? I’m laughing!
I think I did a better job. Making the body a different color made a huge difference. I made the head a little rounder too. None of the kids have picked it yet but I don’t doubt one of them will. After all, we’ve only had four kids make it to Ultimate Prize Box. Two picked toys and two picked my crochet creations so I think I’m doing pretty well. 🙂
So this happened.
What happened?
It was supposed to be a heart emoji puppet. I made it a little differently than the other puppets. I’m trying out different mouth techniques until I find one I really like. I want it to feel comfortable in the hand and open nicely.
I messed up on the heart eyes. I wasn’t getting it right so I had the brilliant idea of tracing a heart directly on yarn as a guide. The plan was to embroider the eyes and cover up the marker. Yes, I used a marker. Foolish. It bled through the yarn! Anyway, I digress. That didn’t look right either so I went back to the drawing board and crocheted the hearts, but now there’s an outline of the marker! I pretended it wasn’t there and the kids haven’t mentioned it so I’m going to keep pretending I don’t see it. 🙂
Open wide!
He started looking less like an emoji and more like Pac Man and then morphed into a yellow frog with red heart eyes. Can’t win ’em all. The kids still like it though. I know this because they keep grabbing it, running away and squealing. So into the ultimate prize box it goes.
Yay! Ultimate prize box!
I handed over my finished puppet to her new 5th grade owner after a day of celebrating our 5th graders. I said a few words about how much I will miss them, because I will. Two of them have been with me since kindergarten. That’s six years with the same students. It’s always bitter sweet to see them go, knowing most of them will disappear without a trace as they move on to middle school. Sometimes, they come back to visit or I run in to them when I’m out and about, but for the most part, on the last day, they’re just gone. I give them a big hug on their way out the door and wish them well.
So I said a few words, said my farewells, handed them their crocheted graduation caps and we partied with cake, pizza and a movie.
I finished the puppet and handed her over to my student before she went off to summer glory.
She didn’t turn out exactly as I pictured her but she’s alright.
She’s kind of sassy!
My student seemed happy with her and I know the puppet is going to a good home. This particular 5th grader has become a great crocheter and wants to take crochet with her to her new after-school program next year. Some of our 5th graders from our school continue on in our program at our sister school. I had started crochet there years ago when I worked the summer program. Many of the students loved it but it died out quickly with no one left to run it. This 5th grader certainly has the chops to get something up and running over there. She has leadership qualities that I know she’ll put to good use to teach the students there how to crochet.
When we go back in the fall, I’m going to hook her up with the supplies she needs to get started. Hopefully that means I’ll still see her sometimes and she won’t disappear without a trace. 🙂
I’ve been trying to finish the girl crochet puppet for my clever 5th grader. I only have until tomorrow to finish it so I’m cutting it close! Most of it is done, but I still have to do the face and hair.
I can’t see anything!
I’m taking it back to work today where I will finish if off with the student’s input.
The head came out a little smaller than I would like but hopefully she’ll look better once she has a face and hair. My student wanted her to have a tongue so I made sure the inside of the mouth had some pink. I’m getting better at making the inside of the mouth. This third attempt is my favorite.
yochet 