My wonderful friend, who has supplied me with many of the succulents in my garden, wanted a couple of crochet Pikachu’s for her grandchildren. I have received an abundance of cuttings from her garden that have bloomed into such lovely plants in my own garden that it was a pleasure making the toys for her.
She said her grandchildren loved them (hopefully she’s not just being nice).
I finally got the Pokemon Charizard done. His legs took me forever.
I wasn’t sure which direction I wanted to go but I finally settled on an idea after much trial and error.
When I attached his arms, the kids went nuts and wanted to play with him, but alas, I had a critic. A third grader told me he was too cute for Charizard. “Charizard is NOT cute,” he said. I didn’t aim for cute, I aimed for fierce, but I got ‘cute’. I can live with that.
Grrr, I’m not cute, I’m fierce!
It was the same for the wings. Thinking and frogging. This has NOT been one of my favorite projects. I honestly don’t know why my heart wasn’t in it. I’ve been trying to get him done since before Christmas of last year! I made him at work so I’m limited by time constraints. But still… It has more to do with motivation. I did a lot of ‘thinking’ on this one and it’s awful hard to think when managing 40 kids (excuses!). I started and stopped constantly. I frogged back quite a few times too.
I would get started, didn’t like how he looked, tried a different approach, stopped again and then picked him up days or weeks later. I even got easily diverted by a crocheted puppet. Normally when I have a project going, I tell the students they have to wait until I’m done before I even consider their project, but not this time.
But that’s all over. He’s done!
One of my students asked if I could sell her a Pikachu so she could give it to her brother for Christmas. I had never made a Pikachu before but I told her I would try. I didn’t have much time since our Christmas break was looming and I only had few days left before then. Add to the mix that I had about another hundred projects I needed to finish but I really wanted to get this done for her. She and her mom are two of the sweetest people I know. I just had to get it done.
I approached the project in my usual way. I spent two days thinking about it. I know! I had no time to waste but it was a necessary step. I looked at cartoon illustrations as well as Continue reading
Leading up to the annual craft fair at the elementary school where I work is always insane, mainly because I usually decide to participate at the last minute (shame on me). This year I did the same thing. I wasn’t sure I had enough pieces to fill up a table and I certainly didn’t have enough time to make a bunch of new pieces. But a week before, I agreed to do it and then it was a frenzy of trying to create items the students would enjoy. In that week, I managed to make four Pokeballs, two poop emojis, eight doll purses, and two smiley emojis. That was it. Luckily, I still had some dolls and hats lying around that could fill up my half of the table. My lovely, artistic, amazing and super talented daughter had the other half filled with her artwork (bad mommy that I am, I didn’t take any pictures).
My booth at the craft fair at Promenade Elementary School
I noticed that there was another booth that was selling crocheted toys and they had a really nice setup with some really nice things. I felt too inadequate to actually go over there. I had a tiny table with a mish-mash of items. My daughter went over and checked out the competition and being the good daughter that she is, told me my stuff was more unique. Well, it was definitely that. None-the-less, I did better than I had in previous years. I only had a few pieces but I focused on things I thought the kids would like and I knew my students would come check out my booth no matter how small it was. Almost all the items I specifically made for the fair sold. I wish I had had more time to make more Pokeballs and emojis. Those sold out fast with the kids wanting more. The poop emojis didn’t last long either. But most exciting of all was that I sold the Elsa doll from Frozen and that red-headed doll in the top right of the picture (above).
Great picture of Elsa taken by a PTO mom.
I always get a little thrill when I sell one of my dolls AND no one tried to talk me down on the prices. One of the hardest parts for me is pricing my items. In previous years, people loved the work but thought they were too expensive. This year, the items just sold! I was so happy.
The making of some of the items on the table were chronicled on previous blog posts. The tooth with the toothbrush (sold), the Pokeballs (sold), the purpliciousdoll in the top row, the Christmas doll with the purple hat, the face emojis, the Elsa (sold) and Anna dolls, and the superman doll.
An added bonus of doing the fair is that I get to see my students, past and present. Lots of hugs were dispensed that day. My favorite part is when they tell me they still have and value something I made that they either got from our prize box or that they purchased from a previous craft fair. How wonderful is that!
I’ve gone emoji crazy. I made another one and plan on making many more. They are so easy to make and whip up so quickly with the added bonus that the kids love them.
A kinder wants me to make the emoji that’s laughing so hard it’s crying so that will be the next one.
For good measure, I also made another Pokeball. The Pokeballs are almost as quick and easy and popular as the emjois so there will probably be a few more of those rolling around soon. The kids want different colors so I made this purple one. I added the M because apparently it’s Mega ball or something. How am I supposed to know that?! They keep me on my toes. 🙂
A sure fire way to get students interested in crochet is to make fun things in front of them. Since I tend to make fun and whimsical things anyway, my maniacal plan works perfectly. Just recently, I was making something for the prize box that many of the students wanted. A student who never expressed an interest in crochet suddenly wanted to learn the craft. Seeing me crochet helps them to envision themselves making all sorts of things they didn’t think were possible.
The students were all very excited when they saw me making these.
I’m not taking personal requests from the students anymore but I am taking suggestions (they are personal requests that I turn into suggestions) on what to make. So far, I have made an emoji with sunglasses, a YouTube pillow (I had to ask for clarification on that one), and a Pokeball (this was the project that inspired my student). They were all simple to make and worked up fairly quickly. Continue reading
yochet 