Year of Ami, week 7, G is for...

Grass, and for Gull!

The Gull is crochet (from a Japanese pattern!), and the Grass is knit.

Goodness gracious, last week was a bit of a grouse-fest, with all the pattern goofs, for both our goodies. Almost makes a girl want to give up.

But, I'm sure we're going to glide right through this next group.

In an earlier post, I mentioned that Snuffykin has worked on translating some Japanese patterns, and offers some help for us to do the same. Thing about Japanese patterns, they generally graph it out, so you don't need to read the language, just decipher the diagram. We're doing something small, only two parts, so it should be easy. It's actually a seagull, but we'll just go with gull, got it?

The little flower on it's head (in the pattern photo) is a silk flower, but if we're feeling generous, maybe we'll crochet one instead.

This is a Japanese pattern, and if my links above don't give you a partially-translated-to-English version, go through Snuffykin's journal, and follow her directions for getting there yourself. If you still have trouble, please let me know, and I can email you a link. That said, the gull is entirely explained in diagrams, so for that, you should just need the pdf, which you can get from either the translated or original, by clicking on the last set of underlined (linked) characters.

Be sure to check Snuffykin's comments on her whale translation for an explanation of the symbols used for the gull chart. See also this chart of some international crochet symbols from Stitch Diva. And this helpful information from DMC on working with charts.

If you're feeling really brave and talented, check out Snuffykin's list of Japanese Ami links, too.

The Grass is a MochiMochi Land bit of gratis genius. She suggests a wool yarn, and felting. If you don't have 100% wool, don't get grumpy, just go with whatever green yarn you can grasp, and go without the felting. He'll be a bit more grande, but still gorgeous.

She mentions that someone had previously worked out the directions in the round, no seams to sew up (except the bottom, I'm guessing, because you need to stuff it after you felt it), but, that someone has since left the blog-o-sphere, so someone else needs to work it out again. I'm a big fan of no seams, so I think I may just be that next someone. I'll keep track of my mods so I can share with everyone, if that works out for me.

*update* pics of my own creations added after-the-fact