The original pattern in the book just calls for the front and back of the head to be sewn together, but other books from the Magic Scrubber series have a sponge inside, so I decided to add a sponge to this one, too. It certainly makes it a bit more robust and I reckon a bit more useful as well. As the yarn is pure acrylic, it should be pretty hardwearing, faster to dry than natural fibres, and it should last a good long while.

I decided to give this as a gift to my friend Nettie, who has a pronounced love of all things slightly bizarre – especially plastic dinosaurs. I reckon there’s no one better to appreciate something like this!

I chose the owl pattern, and made it with felt eyes instead of plastic ones, as it would be for a newborn baby. I also added a rattle inside, by putting some beads into a little plastic spherical container and nestling this in the stuffing. The container is from one of those vending machines that looks like a gumball machine, which you sometimes find in petrol station loos (usually containing a wet wipe or a fuzzy brush). I knew it would come in handy for something & I hate throwing away plastic, so why not recycle it!

As the current fashion seems to be for really bright almost fluorescent colours, I made this one in fluoro pink, with a grey leaf and purple centre. There’s no sewing involved: it’s all about cutting the pieces carefully then slotting the inner petals in place through the leaf/outer petal. The actual making of it was easy, but the cutting took the most time as you have to place the slots in exactly the right place. I think it looks pretty cool! The best thing was that when I gave it to Lucy, she was wearing a fluoro pink T-shirt, so it matched her perfectly.

By far my favourite book has to be the rather wonderfully titled ‘Happy Small Goods of Crochet’, in which I really want to make every single thing. From slippers to shawls to bowls, book covers, bags, hats and loads more. The really cool thing is that Japanese crochet patterns are pictorial rather than written out in sentences, so as long as you know what the stitches look like when drawn, you can follow the patterns… although being able to read hiragana/katakana does come in handy.

My first project from the book I started while I was there, using a Japanese yarn which is also wonderfully titled: it’s called James Dean. What this rebel without a cause had to do with wool is beyond me, but he looks good on a label regardless. Here’s the finished result:

When I get a chance, I think I will line it with the denim bits I had leftover from  making the crochet bowl from jeans. Since I didn’t use the ‘bum’ from the jeans, I think I can sew those ‘cheeks’ together to make a liner for the bag that incorporates the back pockets for handy storage. Sweet.