Think of this as a page for inspiration! Here you'll find items that I have made in the past, everything from the typical hats and scarves to teddy bears and ponies!
Don't see something that inspires you? Perhaps you already have something else in mind? I take pride in working with people to create unique items, that's how all of this came to be!
This was a Christmas gift for my Dad. I go to Southern Illinois University, and my dad is really proud of that, so I came up with this design. The school's letters are on the front, our Saluki paw print symbol is on both sides, and, well, that little dot in the back isn't the most creative thing, I was experimenting with new ways to do the back seam of the hat. This hat could easily be made in your school's (or business') colors, with your logos on it.
Special Feature: See how the accent colors show through the main white background of the hat? Cool, right?!
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This is a very basic design, a ribbed scarf. It can be made with any color combinations, any size stripes of color, any number of colors, and with or without fringe at the bottom.
Special Feature: Infinitely customizable!
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This hat was made for a member of Phi Mu Alpha, one of the many Greek organizations on campus.
In this design, a patch featuring Phi Mu Alpha's letters has been sewn onto a standard toque (a toque is the style of hat with ear flaps, braids, and either a pompon or tassel on top, this toque features a tassel) which has been striped in their colors. This hat is extremely customizable, not only by colors or the symbols on the hat, but by the size of the patch, length and size of the braids or a lack thereof, and the inclusion of either a tassel or pompon, or neither atop the hat.
Special Feature: The extra symbol on the back of the hat! That's a special symbol of the Phi Mu Alpha fraternity. Your hat could easily include your special symbol!
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But it's not just about school and Greek spirit here! This hat was requested by a friend who loves both mohawk hats and rainbows! That isn't my friend in the picture, however, that is my ever-willing model, my brother. Anyway, my friend specially asked for a toned-down rainbow. What a challenge! After much thought, I created this design!
This is one of my favorite creations along with my Fluttershy pony, the Panda Hat, and the Seaturtle. I love making these!
As with any item I make, this one is fully customizable. Perhaps you'd like to see some purple up in the mohawk. Braid length is always easily changed. You don't like a certain color of the rainbow, maybe you hate yellow. My first question is going to be "Are you the Green Lantern and can I have your autograph?" but then I'll tell you that that's easy as pie.
Special Feature: Mohawk hats certainly don't have to be rainbow. They don't even have to be complicated to be awesome! Here's one I made for another customer using only black and two shades of gray. This hat also features mattress stitch edging.
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For those of you who aren't Bronies, this is Fluttershy. For those of you who are Bronies, I'll gladly wait until you're finished squeeing at the screen. (It's ok, I understand. Imagine the squees whist being in the same room as her!)
Ok, are you (and everyone you called into the room) done squealing with joy? Good. Here's some more pictures.
Now you should be advised that ponies (and Fluttershys in particular) take quite a while to complete. Just getting her mane right was at least two weeks of work. However, she was my first pony, I was blazing a trail, so now hopefully all future ponies will be much less stressful. Heck, even if the next ponies (I fully intend to make every pony and Discord someday) are stressful, I have Fluttershy around to hug. What could possibly be better than that? So feel free to order a pony, knowing it literally comes with love in every stitch.
Special Feature: Now that I have a typical pony down, you can get any pony! Feel free to ask for O.C. ponies, too! I'll definitely need a picture, though.
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Dice bags! Boy can dice bags be fun. Infinitely customizable! All you require to declare something a dice bag is a pouch area and some way to close it.
This dice bag features a basilisk as defined by Pathfinder (as opposed to Harry Potter's basilisk which was really just a giant snake). Note that it has eight legs. Don't like basilisks? Man, this pouch can have ANY motif on it! It could be a snake or a heart or a troll or a trollface, it so doesn't matter! Any color, any texture, buttons, zippers, hidden compartments, dots instead of stripes, checkers of color, crazy stitches, dice bags are one of the easiest items to completely personalize! They also make excellent gifts, as this bag was.
Special Feature: Did you notice how the basilisk's tail becomes the drawstring for the bag?! You have no idea how excited I was when I thought that up.
This dashing young fellow is Harold the Otyugh.
Not sure what an Otyugh is? Don't worry, neither was I until I started playing tabletop role-playing games. An Otyugh is a creature which forms mutually beneficial relationships with societies, happily eating all of their waste for as long as they provide it. Note how Harold is dutifully guarding these old pizza boxes. Well with their gigantic mouth-to-body ratio, an Otyugh seemed like the perfect candidate for a dice bag! That is, until I accidentally made him over a foot tall. Not so easy to carry to your weekly game session. Originally he was meant to be about six or eight inches tall, and that's the size I would make any other specialty dice bags. Obviously I was having so much fun making him that until I put all the pieces together I didn't realize the horrible error in gauge I had made.
The moral of the story is to always check your gauge. Or not to enjoy your projects too much. Wait, that doesn't sound right...
Anyway, in considering a dice bag like the one listed above, consider also a dice bag in the form of your favorite creature! Be it the dreaded Teresque or the cutest kitten.
Special Feature: Poseable arms with kung-fu action*!
*Figurines do not and probably never will feature kung-fu action. Poseable arms and legs are always an option, however.
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Another favorite of mine, fingerless gloves with mitten hoods!
These are honestly some of my favorite items to make. I've done this pair and also a mismatched pair that it would seem I never took pictures of. Amy fail. Any color pattern for gloves or mittens can be easily adapted into a pair of these.
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Why not a matching set? These two items were both made for the gentleman on the right. There are two separate pictures of the items because he ordered these two items separately. He liked the hat he ordered so much that he ordered a scarf to match it. I'm very flexible like that. Coats, hats, gloves, scarves, blankets, potholders, tea cozies--all can be ordered to match each other or to match something you already have, like an item of clothing you own or the color of your kitchen.
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This Panda Hat was a sneaky Christmas gift for my ever-willing model, my brother. He really loves pandas, and has everything panda-related you could ever think of in his collection. But he did not have a hat! But I couldn't spoil the surprise of this gift, so I told him he was modeling this hat for a customer from school. It worked perfectly! He was so envious of this hat that he went to my mom and begged her to ask me to make him a panda hat. He was so surprised on Christmas and so happy with the hat.
Special Note: This hat could easily be made into any sort of animal, not just a panda or a bear. This could easily be a cat or dog or bunny or dragon, whatever you like. Also, did you see on the right picture that the earflaps have tiny little claws? I just thought it was too cute of an idea to pass up.
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Stuffed Animals are a spectacularly fun challenge for me. This particular Sea Turtle was the biggest challenge of all because my deadline was 48 hours from my starting it. I slept about 5 hours in two nights. I found inspiration for his shell at Planet June's Blog. You'll notice that my turtle is quite different, which is why I say inspiration.
Special Notes: Do you see those eye ridges? Damn, that is some excellent shaping.
I beg of you not to order something 48 hours before a deadline, the lack-of-sleep hallucinations aren't good hallucinations.
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The Anniversary Bear was ordered as an anniversary gift. (What? No!) When you compare this bear to my LGBT Pride Teddy Bear you'll see a great improvement in my shaping technique.
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LGBT Pride Bear was one of my very first stuffed animals. He's rough, but his spirit is there. He's meant to encompass the symbolism of the LGBT Pride flag.
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OMG, pics of me! Well, pics of me from senior year of high school. I made the shawl here as part of my costume as Yente from Fiddler on the Roof. It's an excellent piece of my early color work.
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Ribbed scarves are both warm and very easy to customize. Variables for these scarves include colors, thickness, length, and the inclusion of fringe.
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Another of my early pieces, this is the "Feltes" hat below without Feltes' name on it. Here it is just a zigzag hat.
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Phone pouches are quick, cheap, and can be made in any color or texture.
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Any item can be customized with a name. (Coming soon, a second hat with a name in it.)
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Here are two custom baby blankets that were ordered by some friends of mine. They wanted one blanket that included the colors of their respective fraternity and sorority and one that was simply "girly." So I came up with these designs for them.
The first blanket includes the colors of Phi Mu Alpha (red, white, gold, and black) and Sigma Alpha Iota (red and white). How conveniently coordinating. The blanket was knit diagonally in garter stitch with a crochet border.
The second one was requested as "a blanket with girly colors." While I'd like to state my official position on colors is that society has unfairly limited colors based on imposed gender roles, I didn't let that get in the way of what my friend/customer wanted. In fact, I allowed that to enhance the design. Instead of limiting myself to pastel pinks and lavenders, included are pink, purple, orange, yellow, and white, equally spread through the blanket in chevron stripes of double-stranding.
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This is a pocket scarf before the pockets were added. I wanted to post it as an example of an interesting stitch. Haven't found a name for this stitch, but I guess it would be 1x1 stockinette and garter stitch ribbing.
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I made this Water Bottle Cozy for my reusable water bottle. While I was working, it was getting all dinged up, so I wanted to protect it. It also has the added bonus of insulating my bottle and keeping it cold longer. Ironically, this cozy covers the design of the bottle and I spent a ridiculously long time picking out exactly the bottle design I wanted in the store. I think I'll make another that shows the design.
The Past Projects page is always a work in progress! (Not to be confused with the Works in Progress page.) Check back often for more of Amy's creations!
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