Stuff I Don't Get: Crocheted Food

I love amigurumi. At least, I love the finished product that is amigurumi. They're so cute and kooky, and I love kooky. But the process of making amigurumi... I just haven't been in a hurry to make any more after the first two, because the tight gauge is hard on your hands. I play with yarn because it feels good, so something that doesn't feel good is low on the priority list no matter how cute the finished object is. But I still love looking at amigurumi and amigurumi patterns.

But there's a popular type of amigurumi that's just lost on me: the cute little food with eyes. Especially cupcakes. I see them everywhere. And yes, they're cute. But when I look at them all I can think is, "mmmm, cupcake." If I crochet a cupcake, well then I'm going to want to eat a cupcake, and if I keep my crocheted cupcake around, I'm going to end up either eating cupcakes all the time or craving cupcakes until I go crazy. And I don't even really like cupcakes that much. I mean, I like cupcakes, but they're not chocolate mousse or tirimisu or something like that. If I'm going to put myself in a position that's going to lead to me craving desserts, cupcake doesn't even crack the top ten.

Fun with amigurumi

The first meeting of the amigurumi group at Needle Nook was a smashing success. I had worried it would just be the organizers staring at each other, but we had a full table. It was a very fun, relaxed atmosphere (it's hard not to have fun when you're looking at cute, cute amigurumi animals). And bawdy too! I was supposed to blog some of the naughtier moments, but now I can't remember exactly which ones I promised. Two words: willy warmers.

I'm getting close to finished with my first amigurumi -- the cat (but of course!) from Ana Paula Rimoli's Cat and Mouse pattern. I've just got two legs and the ears to go. Of course, I've run out of yarn, but providentially I was using the leftover yarn from my Cupcake sweater. The gauge was off on the first sleeve I made for that sweater, and I almost threw it out a couple of weeks ago, but now I can just frog and finish. For the finishing touch, I'm ordering cat eyes from Suncatchers Eyes, an amazing website I found through the amigurumi group on Ravelry.

It's kinda ironic that I'm so taken with amigurumi right now, considering they use single crochet, my least favorite stitch, and the gauge is so tight that crocheting them is kinda hard on my hands (I'm thinking about making felted thimbles). But all the cute little creatures I want to make keep me going. I'm normally much more of a process crocheter than a product crocheter; I primarily crochet for the pleasure I get from the process, and the finished object is just a nice bonus. But I've always loved cute little toys -- so many times during my childhood, I came up with an idea for some little doll and begged my grandmother to make it for me. I wish I could show her the things I'm making now.

Haven't gotten much crochet or knitting done tonight, but I have a good excuse: I was watching my alma mater, Vanderbilt, whip our cross-state rivals, Tennessee, who just happened to be ranked the #1 basketball team in the nation. Heh. When Tennessee beat Memphis on Saturday night, I turned to the Mad Husband at the buzzer and said "good. That means Vandy will get to beat another number-one team on Tuesday." We'd beaten the last three number-one teams that came to Memorial Gym, so I knew it was just a matter of time. And thank you for indulging me, because I know this paragraph is complete jibberish to most of you.

Ribbon yarn and other crochet hazards

This week at the Crochet Liberation Front forum, someone was asking for suggestions on patterns to crochet with ribbon yarn. I've been planning on making the Bay Blue Hat from The Crocheter's Guide to Yarn Cocktails for a while and in fact had bought the Berroco Zen yarn for it just recently, so I decided to bump it up in the queue and report back to the CLF.

Somewhere along the way when I seriously got into crochet and started shopping at yarn stores instead of Michaels, someone must have told me that ribbon yarn was not good for crochet. I say "must" because I don't specifically remember someone saying it, but for quite a while I've had a sense that crocheting with ribbon yarn is something to be avoided at all costs. But the Bay Blue Hat was cute, and only required two hanks. And now I had incentive. So today, I accidentally fed the yarn to a pug, shrieked, retrieved the yarn, and then got started.

Initial impressions of crocheting with ribbon yarn:

• The ribbon yarn is going to twist. I can't imagine a way around it. So I figure either you can put on your thinking cap and waste a lot of valuable crochet yarn, or get used to it.
• The twistiness makes counting your stitches hard, so if you lose count on the base chain, you're screwed.
  
• Foundation chains are even more unpleasant and time-consuming with ribbon yarn. I spent a lot of time wondering if I was even stitching in the right place.
  
• This may just be particular to Berroco Zen, but... here, have a look at the structure:

See how the yarn is constructed, with three threads running lengthwise and all those little ones running between those threads? Yeah. Holy snagging on my crochet hook, Batman. I'm starting to understand why we leave this stuff to the knitters.

All that said, crocheting with the ribbon yarn did get easier as I got used to it, and, perhaps more importantly, as I got past the foundation chain and had distinct stitches to stitch into. Despite an initial suspicion that the ladies behind Yarn Cocktails were just knitters out to get our money, I'm liking how the hat's starting to look. That said: I would not recommend ribbon yarn for process crocheters. If you like the look of the finished object, it may be worth the frustration, but if you mainly crochet for the sensual pleasure of yarn running through your fingers (does that sound dirty? It's not supposed to), I doubt that ribbon yarn has got what you need.

Actual pictures forthcoming at some point. (I've recently learned that half the people who "read" this blog don't actually read, just look at the pictures, so I'm trying to react accordingly. Don't say I never gave you anything.)