P is for Playing in the Park taking Photographs

I know my neighbours occasionally think I'm weird. A grown women who walks around the neighbourhood with random knitted items (often toys) and a professional looking SLR camera taking photos of said knitted objects in weird places.

I took these photos in November last year when I was blogging about The Little Poppets in the Park. It's a pleasure to give these guys there chance to shine finally. The photos were taking at the kids playground at the end of our street.

I'd like you to meet four knitted cats we have made. The Blue and White striped one is Geelong Cat also known as Half Cat, made by the Head of the Household for his brother to celebrate Geelong's 2011 AFL premiership. (Yes, that's right. My husband can knit!). Next to him is Flat cat also made made by the Head of Household. The gray cuddly one is the Unobjectionable Cat I made for my daughter's friend and fellow blogger, Louise formerly of Raspberries in Winter. Louise made a gorgeous little video of him exploring his new home but I'll have to ask if I can share it as she is a budding professional photographer and is very careful about how she shares her work on the  internet now. The final one is Ami, an amineko amigurumi. You can read more about Ami and Flat cat in An Infestation of Cats.

So here they are checking out the slide.

Having a very cosy swing together.

And just hanging around on the jungle gym.

Of course its not all fun and games at the park. I swear Louise's cat pushed Half Cat. There were tears and soothed feelings required after this.

I'd like to especially acknowledge the photographers assistant here for expert cat wrangling. 'Cos we all know this is not the easiest thing in the world. It really needs a trained professional Cat Herder.

A present for Louise

 This is for Louise of Raspberries in Winter. Louise is really the person who got me into blogging. I've loved reading Louise's various blogs over the last few years. Louise is a gifted photographer, a fellow crafts-person and a great procrasti-baker (Procrasti-baking, a term coined by my eldest daughter, is the art of baking to avoid studying). Louise just has a way of chronicling life in our part of the world that is sometimes quirky, beautifully illustrated with cool photos and always interesting. She also did good tutoring via proxy for a novice blogger. So thank you Louise for lots of things and congratulations on your recently celebrated Blogiversary.

So a present for Louise? I think today I might tease you a little before I reveal the finished item and its story. Obviously it's a knitted item because that's pretty much what I do. Lets see if you can guess what it is from the following work in progress clues...

Knitted fuzzy bits and pieces

 

Is it a bird?

Is it a plane? Only joking? Looks like penguin.

Alright the next one will give it away...

It's a cat!

Louise's dad is a notorious cat hater. (See Louise's post Cat Cat Kitty Cat from July this year). As a real one was out of the question (although Mel did offer to lend ours to her for a short term visit), I decided I finally had reason to knit a particularly cute cat pattern from my To be knitted list. So here is an unobjectionable cat that Louise's Dad can live with. No allergy problems, no sleeping on his favorite chair, no fur everywhere and no scratching the furniture. No need to feed it. Just cute and cuddly.

The pattern is from The English Woman's Weekly. I though this was cute from the first time I saw it but it is knitted from a specialty yarn. The pattern calls for Sirdar Snowflake Chunky which was really only available in Australia for a while about 10 years ago and so it took a while to find a suitable substitute. I've knitted this in Bella Baby Sooky. It was knitted on 4mm (UK 8) and 3mm (UK 11) needles.

The cat joined the exodus to the park and had its photo taken along with the Little Poppets. I also thought it was a great way to showcase the absolutely gorgeous display of gladioli in my front garden at the moment. Enjoy the cat and the flowers.

(P.S. If you want to see how the cat is settling in at Louise's see her post here).

Cat rides horse

 

 

These are species gladioli rather than the cut flower variety

An Infestation of Cats

For some reason, my house seems to have become infested with cats. Not the real variety, though there is one real one who thinks it owns us and deigns to live in our household and demand attention, food, worship and the Head of the Household's chair (even if he is trying to sit in it). No, I mean cats of the stuffed and knitted variety.

Two of them in particular have been hanging out in the lounge room the last few weeks demanding their turn in the spotlight so they get to be the stars of this post. Here are Flat Cat and Ami.

From left: Flat cat and Ami

I have to admit I didn't knit Flat Cat. He is the Head of the Household's work. My mother in law, having only sons, taught them all to knit. Occasionally (I think just to prove he still can) the other half knits something.  I did however sew Flat Cat up and stuff him.

Flat Cat is a very easy knit (but a fair bit trickier to sew up), as he is made up from a series of knitted garter stitch squares and has minimal shaping. His pattern comes from a book my mother gave my kids when they were first learning to knit: The Australian Women's Weekly: Knit a Square and Make a Toy. This is such a great idea. Everyone who first learns to knit tends to make garter stitch squares and short of making a granny rug out of them, what else can you do with them? As well as the cat, the kids made a duck, a mermaid and about half a parrot...

Flat Cat Flat out on the table

Flat Cat's front

Flat Cat's back

Flat Cat's very existence appears to periodically offend the real cat and so Flat Cat required some injury repair and rehabilitation recently after the cat decided to 'kill' him somewhat enthusiastically and leave gaping holes in his limbs. Oh well, it gave me a chance to practice my darning skills. (Thanks to my Oma and my mum for having the patience to teach me to darn. I still darn the work socks that seem to develop holes in the toes whilst still brand new everywhere else).

Darned arm: Complete with Gravy spot due to son photographing cat on dinner table after a roast dinner!

Reattachment of tip of tail

The real cat, Cara - contemplating killing the photographer

Ami (short for amigurumi) was my first ever attempt at making an amigurumi. "Amigurumi is the Japanese art of knitting or crocheting small stuffed animals and anthropomorphic creatures. The word is derived from a combination of the Japanese words ami, meaning crocheted or knitted, and nuigurumi, meaning stuffed doll" (Wikipedia). Amigurumi are typically crocheted tightly in a spiral or in the round. When I was hunting the internet to find a pattern for something cute, I kept coming across this particular cat, Amineko. Ami means crochet and Neko is cat in Japanese. Two things put me off initially though, the pattern was in Japanese and whilst there was an English translation it used diagrams and I'm used to written instructions. I'm also nowhere near as competent crocheter as I am a knitter. However, I figured the only way to see if I could do it was try.

Here is the Japanese Language Home page for Amineko's creator, Nekoyama. A link to the Amineko pattern can be found on the right hand side of the page (it's in English). Nekoyama asks that people who link to the pattern don't link to it directly and I'm respecting her request. The English page has diagrams and clear photos of every step of the process can be found on the Japanese page. Whilst there are other people on the internet who have translated this pattern into English (and are often trying to charge for it), we should respect people's copyright and use the original.

Part of the charm of Ami is how he is stuffed. Only his hands and feet are stuffed with the rest of the limbs including his tail left un-stuffed to allow him to be poseable. The base of the body is stuffed with pellets which allows him to easily sit on any surface.

Amineko even has his own book these days

 

There is sort of internet tradition of photographing your version of Amineko in weird and unusual positions. See the Flickr Stream Amineko's World for examples. So with special thanks to my son the photographer, here are Ami's adventures...

Just Hanging Around

Lemon Tree very pretty...

BFF Forever