Week 4: puff balls!

Oops! Totally forgot to post this yesterday. I swear, it was written, but I hadn’t put the picture in. (Even though it was taken, see, I procrastinate!)

I’m totally obsessed with making these little guys. Last week, I made 24. This week, I’ve made 22.
I use fun fur for it, but you can use any sort of eyelash yarn.

Then for the soot sprites (the black ones) I use a little bit of extra white for the eyes. Along with black safety eyes.

Pattern:
Eyes:
5 sc in a magic ring. Don’t pull the middle super tight cause you want to be able to shove the safety eyes through that hole.
2 sc in each stitch (10 st). Tie off leaving a long enough end to sew it to the body.

Body:
5 sc in a magic ring
inc all around – 10
inc, sc. repeat around – 15.
inc, 2 sc. repeat around – 20
inc, 3 sc. repeat around – 25.
3 rows sc around.
dec. 3 sc. repeat around – 20.
dec, 2 sc. repeat around – 15
(you may wanna stuff and place the eyes now)
dec, sc. repeat around – 10
dec around – 5
tie off.

Don’t worry too much if your numbers do not match up. As long as you get a ball shaped blob at the end, you did it. XD It took me forever to get used to working with fun fur, and there are still times when I completely mess up adn I end up with too many/too little stitches for that row. I just keep going and try to adjust accordingly as it becomes nearly impossible to tear it out.

One little tip, at least for me working with fun fur, the fur tends to go in one direction on the ball when you pull the ends, right? I try to use the end with the fur going away from me instead of towards.

Another thing, is that I had been looking at something called The Crochet Light
It’s literally a hook that lights up when you work.
I read a review on it a while ago, and had been thinking about it since then. Mostly in the mindset of, “I don’t think I’ll ever need that.” When I was working on the little soot sprites, the black fun fur is nearly impossible to see to crochet. Something about darker yarns and the lighting needing to be better. Anyway, I had a coupon and decided to go hunt it down at my local craft stores. I knew I saw it at one. It took me a while to find it, really, but I did.

So the review I read said that the hook was “bendy”
I didn’t find this to be so. It’s not as stiff as an aluminum hook, but the review said that they were worried about breaking it. Maybe because I wasn’t trying it on a thicker, heavier yarn, but I definitely didn’t feel like that. It bends slightly, but so slightly that if I wasn’t looking for it, I probably wouldn’t even notice.

The other thing is that the light isn’t SUPER bright. Oh, it is totally bright enough that it completely helps with seeing the stitches for the black fun fur, but I don’t know if I could see enough to crochet with only it as a light.. maybe for something that isn’t pitch black, but I tried the other day with the black fun fur to see how it would work, and it did, but i definitely didn’t feel that comfortable working completely.

The other thing that really surprised me, maybe because I’m so used to my aluminum hook that I decked out with fimo clay, is that the crochet light is light. I honestly had to hold it for a moment and twist it around trying to get used to the lack of weight of it.
They are rather expensive though, I do have to say, which is why I only picked up one in my favorite size. To me, it might be good for long car rides and it is definitely worth it for the black fun fur, but I still go back to my nice thick heavy hook all the time, so it is not replacing my regular hook.

The one thing I do dislike about it though is that when I use it, the yarn rubbing against the plastic (is it plastic? it feels like plastic) hook makes a strange sound. Nothing obnoxious mind you, but enough of a sound that I do notice it. I also worry about the battery life of the little batteries inside of it (another reason why I go back to my hook all the time) and the priciness of the single hook just makes me cringe when I think of owning a whole set. Maybe one day, but as of now, I’ll stick to my one novelty hook for projects where there is no way I can see the yarn without it, even in the brightest of lights.

Anyway, I hope that helps anyone who has been thinking about these. It is rather nice, and it does work. I also like that the handle is nice and thick (and a bit flat) so that it’s not too much of a jump from my fimo adjusted hooks to use this.

Happy crafting everyone and I hope you have fun with your own little soot sprites/puff monsters