Pronoun Trouble

Brain: Hey, you know what we should do instead of taking a shower right now?
Me: What.
Brain: Type up some crochet patterns! There's several we've been meaning to get to, and that's including the first of our FTH patterns that is nearly done.
Me: ...Listen. I need to shower. It is very important that I shower, and today that also includes washing my hair. I will take a moment to go grab our pattern book from the crafting nook and put it next to the laptop so we can type up a pattern or two, but we can only start transcribing after the shower. Understood?
Brain: ...Fine.

Me: *finishes showering* Okay, time to type up patterns now!
Brain: Nah, don't feel like it anymore.
Me: ...Flames. Flames, on the sides of my face—


Edit: Ha-ha, the hippo pattern is now typed up! Victory for me! 😈

At long last, it's done!

This crochet pattern is for small cat heads, of a good size to make into keychains, magnets, or even hair clips! There are six PDF versions available:

- US stitch names in 12 point Atkinson Hyperlegible
- US stitch names in 22 point Atkinson Hyperlegible
- US stitch names in 22 point Comic Sans

- UK stitch names in 12 point Atkinson Hyperlegible
- UK stitch names in 22 point Atkinson Hyperlegible
- UK stitch names in 22 point Comic Sans

Between those six options, that should cover most pattern accessibility needs. If you need something else, though, let me know! I'm prepared to offer a .doc or similar file on an individual basis if you need a screenreader to access crochet patterns, and have a sheet I can use to translate things to German stitch terms (though more in-depth instructions would still be in English). The pattern is worked primarily in (US) single crochet/(UK) double crochet, with the ears in (US) double crochet/(UK) treble crochet popcorn stitches, and is bundled with similar file options of a popcorn stitch tutorial PDF (no stitch names used).

"Socchan," you say, "These cats are super cute! And you said that this pattern is for charity? How does that work exactly?"

I'm glad you asked! Simply donate a minimum of $3 or close-enough local equivalent to a related charity, then take a screencap of your receipt/proof of donation. Block out any information that could doxx you; it's nice if you trust me, but it's not impossible that my email could get hacked, and I want you to be safe! Then email the altered screencap to socchan (at) protonmail (dot) com.

Once I get and check the screencap, I will email you back with a link to a MediaFire folder and the password you'll need to open the PDFs. Yes, it is a bit of a pain to need a password to open these files, but this was the simplest way I could figure out how to do things without needing to upload and send a minimum of six files to every person. Download as many of the variations as you want, keep a copy of the password somewhere safe (and don't delete the email with it), and go to town!

As a bonus, if you take your donation up to at least $5 (or close-enough local equivalent), I'll throw in an additional link and password for a very cute little flower pattern!



"That sounds pretty easy," you go on to say, "but where should I donate? There are so many options to choose from!"

No problem! Here's a couple of short lists of options that can help you narrow things down:

Palestine:
Palestine Children's Relief Fund - Focuses on medical aid to children in Palestine
Medical Aid for Palestine - "[H]elp MAP respond to the ongoing emergency in Gaza, as well as provide medical supplies, support healthcare services and deliver long term development to healthcare in the occupied Palestinian territory and Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon." MAP reportedly has a team on the ground in Gaza, providing critical medical aid.
Anera - Providing food, hygiene kits, and medical care in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem.
Palestine Red Crescent - More medical support in Palestine; the rest of the webpage is in Arabic, so be prepared if you want to click around at all. Basically the Palestinian Red Cross.
Gaza Cemetery Project - "Al-Hamdulillah, a ​​5,500 square meters’ piece of land has been secured to create a public cemetery for the city and neighbouring areas." This area still needs a fence to protect the burial plots before it can be used.

Israel:
Zaka - A group of first responders and people who identify bodies and prepare them for burial (sadly, sorely needed right now); they are in need of safety equipment, medical supplies, first aid kits, and more.
Red Magen David - The Israeli/Jewish equivalent of the Red Cross; first responder medical support and similar.
Hatzalah - Similar to Red Magen David, another first responder and emergency medical group.
The Koby Mandell Foundation - Focuses on bereavement aid in Israel for people who have lost loved ones in traumatic circumstances; they've got support hotlines and can arrange for support visits, among other things.
The Refuser Solidarity Network - Providing support for Israeli citizens who refuse government mandatory military service.

I think that's everything, aside from: Please Signal Boost! If I end up having to send out two hundred emails in the next couple of days, that still won't be too many.

Edit: Here's a Tumblr mirror, if you want to reblog over there.

Younger Brother has asked to borrow my crocheted brain slug for a costume contest early next month. I have readily agreed, and said I will make sure it is at his house within the week.

What I have not yet disclosed is my plan to make sure there are two matching brain slugs available, sized perfectly for the niblings, so I can get an absolutely adorable family photo ♥ Dunno if I'll be able to get one made for SIL on time, but getting at least three together should be a piece of cake!

Yes... It's all coming together... 😈

It's done, whee!




(This is the largest image of the batch, BTW)





I am Quite Pleased with how this turned out! I also got a fresh new pattern out of it: The octopus! I've crocheted octopuses before, but never had a set pattern for them, and honestly this one seems like a winner to me. Unlike the vast majority of my crochet patterns, which work primarily in multiples of six (or, occasionally, multiples of three), this one works in multiples of four! Which makes placing the arms/tentacles much easier on the brain, if I do say so myself.

Anyway, this particular Ocean in a Jar will be going to a fundraiser auction for a local labor-related organization. The person I submitted the photos to said that stuff for kids tends to do really well, so I'm optimistic about how much it will raise. Then again, I've had someone camp out by a crocheted griffin I submitted to a different silent auction to scare off other potential bidders, and as flattering as that was, I think I'd prefer if that didn't happen too often 😂

A project I finished on Wednesday, actually! This one has been in the works for several months now, and I only finally got around to sewing it all together. (I... may have already talked about it? But I am le tired, and cannot recall.)

( Cut for pics! Rainbow Amish puzzle ball )

Mermaid is done, yay!

( Image under the cut )

Up next: I start dedicated work on the present for my nibling! And then after that I might tweak this pattern again, see if I can come up with a single crochet version to sell or something.

Gifts purchased and wrapped for Mom, brother, sister-in-law; purchased but not delivered for Dad; in progress for niebling.

After lots of thought and a fair amount of waffling, I decided to go with an amamani dinosaru for niebling.

Me, looking at the pattern: "Okay, you can do this. You can use a pattern someone else made to crochet something. You don't have to alter it in any way."

Me, fifteen minutes later: "Oh god this is so tedious. And also looks too hexagonal. And the holes! Am I truly the only crocheter who crochets tighter in double crochet than in single crochet? How did this happen?!"

Me, five minutes after that: "...I guess I could try it with double crochet, just to see what it would look like. It wouldn't have to be that different."

Me, an hour later: "That's all the wedges done; now I just need to try the lids! This is going better than I expected..."

Me now: "Goddamn it, why can't I properly translate the leg patterns into double crochet! Ugh! I guess I'll have to use the pattern after all..."

I may yet give it another go 👀

(The plan for Chester is to make him his own amamani ball. He enjoys chasing after balls and tearing things apart, and this is a ball that's designed to be taken apart and put back together again, so we'll see how it goes. Failing that, I can probably throw some treats together.)

Hello, and welcome to "Help, I have no idea how I'm going to explain this in the crochet pattern!", part ??? in an ongoing series.

(It looks great! But I don't know how to tell people to do it! But it looks great!)



(Current character: Mitchell. Warnings for Awful Hospital, the webcomic he is part of: Gore, unsanitary, grossness, blood, injuries, eye trauma, death, temporary character death, disease, existential horror, body horror, child illness, child endangerment, and yet it's all somehow wholesome-ish??? Also, Homestuck-like in storytelling style, including a bunch of stuff that's in images and not accessible to screenreaders, and some broken Flash stuff. Most of that doesn't apply to the specific 'page' linked right there, at least, so you can safely be introduced to Mitchell, but I am being very frank in that I do not expect anyone who follows me to start reading it. I probably won't even post about it much outside of this crochet project, since there's on-site commenting and an official Discord where I can get my fan on.)

(...Anyway. Yeah.)

Yesterday, just a bit after midnight my time, alexseanchai was "kind" enough to link me to this prompt on Story A Day:

"Of the things that could go wrong while crocheting, opening a portal had seemed like a low probability."

(Prompt provided by Mary Robinette Kowal, of "A Lady Astronaut of Mars" (etc) fame.)

And god damn if that doesn't sound like a helluva lot of fun to write something with. My crochet-themed superhero OC, Ami Kurumi, is clammoring after this with two different options (one more useful, one more portal-fantasy-esque), and some sort of fairy-tale-esque thing is also knocking at the proverbial door over it. And then the sheer potential of a plain portal fantasy option with someone who doesn't already have crochet superpowers...

Hnng, gotta find the time to plot some of these out.

That feel when you've already completed the torso for a crochet project, only to look at a slightly different reference image and realize it's missing at least two colors near the very beginning, so correcting it would basically involve re-doing the whole thing anyway.

But damned if this pattern isn't going to look the best it damn well can for my auction winner!