Do you recognize me?

I made this fella for my mom a year or two ago and have no memory whatsoever about the pattern. When I post him on my site I would love to include the pattern source, if I could remember it. So if you recognize him and know where the pattern came from please let me know! Oh, and he is knit, not crocheted. I know the loopyness makes it hard to tell what is going on.

Pig and Amigurumi

Miss Piggy is done! She turned out so cute that I've been asked to teach a class on how to make her in April.

This little creature is an amigurumi, or at least thats what the magazine says. According to wikipedia, the definition of amigurumi is:

" Amigurumi (Japanese: from amu (編む, to knit) and nuigurumi (縫い包み, stuffed toy) is the Japanese art of knitting or crocheting small stuffed animals and anthropomorphic creatures. Amigurumi are typically cute animals (such as bears, rabbits, cats, dogs etc), but can include inanimate objects endowed with anthropomorphic features. Amigurumi can be knitted, but the vast majority of amigurumi are crocheted.

Amigurumi are usually crocheted out of yarn. The simplest designs are worked in spirals. In contrast to typical Western crochet the rounds are not usually joined. They are also worked with a smaller size needle in proportion to the weight of the yarn in order to create a very tight-looking fabric without any gaps through which the stuffing might escape. Amigurumi are worked in sections and then joined. The extremities are often stuffed with plastic pellets to give them a life-like weight, while the rest of the body is stuffed with fiber stuffing.

The pervading aesthetic of amigurumi is cuteness, or kawaii. To this end, typical amigurumi animals have an over-sized spherical head on a cylindrical body with undersized extremities"

In googling the topic I discovered a website with some really cute amigurumi patterns for sale called at RoxyCraft.com
Free patterns can be found here (they aren't as cute though!!)

Stress Relief

Its midterms time and so I'm stressed out about exams and papers. Thankfully we get a week off for spring break once all the exams are over (just one more week!)--guess what I am going to do with my time off? (here is a hint, it requires the use of two sticks and a ball of yarn...) In an attempt to survive until then I have started a new project or two...just little ones though! I got the spring edition of Knit Simple in the mail yesterday and it has patterns for the cutest crocheted stuffed animals including a pig that I just couldn't resist. I'm not sure what an "amigurami" is but it sounds fun! I haven't crocheted since I was in middle school but after looking over the basic instructions again my fingers miraculously remembered what to do. Its amazing how much faster crocheting is than knitting but it seems to make my hands cramp up more. Anyone else have this problem? Of course at the same time as I am starting this funny little creature into the shop walks one of our instructors with an adorable bunny that she made from the book Last Minute Knitted Gifts and reveals to me that they also have a pattern for an equally cute elephant. And since I have an odd attachment to elephants ofcourse I can't resist. So now I have two stuffed animals in progress. I don't have any need for stuffed animals. But who can resist. Plus, I have been working hard this week and deserve something fun...check out progress here.