Storm Trooper Pillow

As I discussed previously, this is one of the Christmas gifts I made for my a family member. You can see this post for more information. I have two more pillows to make, but it's going to be a couple of weeks before it's ready to share. The response I've gotten to these pillows is overwhelming and I sincerely thank each and every one of you. I've loved making all of these so much, and I really hope you all enjoy it as well.

It was originally made for my cousin, Ethan. He loves Star Wars and while there are half-a-million star wars characters, he loves to draw Storm Troopers specifically. I chose a dark blue background with hopes it would look like the night sky. This pattern is available for free at my Ravelry and Craftsy stores. If you came here through those sites, welcome! Hopefully I can give a bit more insight here. Now I'm not going to lie, and please don't shun me, but I've never actually seen Star Wars. This was the hardest pillow for me to design, mostly because I didn't really know what it was. :D For a reference, this is a storm trooper...

Not the hardest character to draw....but not the most fun either. I found that a two dimensional drawing was actually more helpful to me. This is the one I referenced during design:

There are so many ways to customize this pattern! You can change the name of course (I included an alphabet in the pattern as well as a number chart) the yarn, the backing, etc. I love the look of the textured yarn!

To learn about my inspiration, please visit this post.

This was the pattern designed for the storm trooper You begin at the bottom right of the grid and finish at the top. Now if you look too closely you'll realize my math was a bit off. The entire picture and name is off center by about eight stitches. I fixed this in the digital version of the pattern but as a result, you'll start by chaining 68, kind of a weird number, but it looks fine nonetheless.

I didn't add quite as many embellishments with this one as they weren't really necessary. The lines around the mouth (do they have mouths?) are REALLY important. It looks silly before you add those. It's simple to add with a tapestry needle, yarn and back stitching, but so important to the overall look.
I also used a silver metallic ribbon to add stars. If you download the pattern you'll realize the stars aren't on it. They weren't on my original pattern, and I didn't plan them very specifically. Basically I just threw the yarn in for one stitch here and there to dot the background. I also used white yarn and added backstitching in areas where the black and dark blue seemed to blend into one color. It really helped sharpen the lines.

The backing on this pillow is a fleece I found at Hobby Lobby. I was hoping for some officially licensed Star Wars material, but couldn't find any. I also forgot to take a photo of the back. This picture is actually one I took in the store with my phone. I needed a second opinion from mom. :) The fleece on the right is what I ultimately used because it's soft and and doesn't fray, however I also considered the cotton fabric on the left. To get the perfect size, I pinned the finished front to the fabric and cut around it. It doesn't fray, but just in case, I used pinking shears to prevent any possible fraying. If using a fabric that does, simply use your favorite method of finishing to finish the edge. Using a yarn needle and embroidery thread or tatting yarn, complete a blanket stitch around the perimeter. You'll want to insert the needle about a quarter inch from the edge (or just under your hem, if you created one) and make each stitch about a quarter inch apart.

Using the blanket stitched edge, join the front and back together, wrong sides together using a single crochet stitch. Leave a small section open along the edge and remember to stuff it before you finish closing. My favorite part about this, is probably the fact that you don't have to weave in a million ends, just stuff them in the pillow. :)
 
I'd also like to share some important "Do's" and "Don'ts" I learned using the afghan stitch:
DO: Customize this pattern, or create your own, I promise you can do it!
DO: Watch the Gege Crochet tutorials on YouTube, especially the one on color changes.
DO: Take lots of pictures of the process, I really wish I had taken more, specifically for this pillow.
DO: Stay organized when arranging the skeins, the order you use them is best.
DON'T: Try to travel with this. This is really not the project you work on in the car or at the doctor's office. Sometimes you'll have so many skeins attached at once you'll have more of a headache untying the knots than it's worth.
DON'T: Over embellish. Step away from the work OFTEN and eliminate the inclusion of truly unnecessary details that would clutter and take away from the design rather than add to it. 
DON'T: Be afraid to ask your family member for their opinion. (Unless they've also never seen Star Wars, in which case you turn to your sister's boyfriend)
DON'T: Design the pattern in one sitting. Step away from it often to get an overall perspective and clear your head after a while. This is more important than you realize. Believe it or not, this pattern, which I already admitted was the most difficult, was the ONE pattern I didn't step away from...and I realized half way through that the entire pattern was off-center.  :/

I really hope you enjoy this pattern and it inspires you to make your own! :)

~That Farm Girl Teacher

Horse Pillow

As I discussed previously, this is one of the Christmas gifts I made for my a family member. You can see this post for more information.

She is in sixth grade and loves her horse, Drawdy. This customized pillow has both her name and her horses name and image on the front. Additional details include a small key ring added to the halter, fringe for the mane and forelock, textured yarn details in the ears and heart, and a faux leather backing. This pattern is available for free at my Ravelry and Craftsy stores. If you came here through those sites, welcome! Hopefully I can give a bit more insight here.

My model

There are so many ways to customize this pattern! You can change the name (I included an alphabet and number chart in the pattern),  the name, alter the colors, pick a unique backing, etc. Please email me at thatfarmgirlteacher@gmail.com if you need assistance, or if you'd like to order a finished pillow from me.

To learn about my inspiration, please visit this post.

This was the pattern designed for the horse pillow. You begin at the bottom right of the grid and finish at the top. To me the neck is kind of skinny looking, but after the fringe is added it looks much better! :) Also, I wouldn't advise skipping the halter. I actually added it in order to create a distinction between the horses head and neck, without the halter, something is just...off.

I didn't add quite as many embellishments with this one as they weren't really necessary. The heart is made from a really pretty textured yarn I've had forever, and the inside of the ears is made from a yarn I spun myself from Alpaca fiber to add texture and shadowing. Originally this was going to be pink, but in hindsight I decided it made the horse look like a very bizarre mouse...

The backing on this pillow is a faux leather I've had lying in my stash forever. Because it's faux, it's soft and supple and can easily be punctured with a yarn needle.  To get the perfect size, I pinned the finished front to the fabric and cut around it. It doesn't fray, but just in case, I used pinking shears to prevent any possible fraying. If using a fabric that does, simply use your favorite method of finishing to finish the edge. Using a yarn needle and embroidery thread or tatting yarn, complete a blanket stitch around the perimeter. You'll want to insert the needle about a quarter inch from the edge (or just under your hem, if you created one) and make each stitch about a quarter inch apart.

Using the blanket stitched edge, join the front and back together, wrong sides together using a single crochet stitch. Leave a small section open along the edge and remember to stuff it before you finish closing. My favorite part about this, is probably the fact that you don't have to weave in a million ends, just stuff them in the pillow. :)
 
I'd also like to share some important "Do's" and "Don'ts" I learned using the afghan stitch:
DO: Customize this pattern, or create your own, I promise you can do it!
DO: Watch the Gege Crochet tutorials on YouTube, especially the one on color changes.
DO: Take lots of pictures of the process, I really wish I had taken more. 
DO: Stay organized when arranging the skeins, the order you use them is best.
DON'T: Try to travel with this. This is really not the project you work on in the car or at the doctor's office. Sometimes you'll have so many skeins attached at once you'll have more of a headache untying the knots than it's worth.
DON'T: Over embellish. Step away from the work OFTEN and eliminate the inclusion of truly unnecessary details that would clutter and take away from the design rather than add to it. 
DON'T: Be afraid to ask your family member for their opinion. My sister the horse-lover was especially helpful on this one. She was really helpful for advice on getting the correct proportions when designing the pattern, and determining which of the embellishments were unnecessary.
DON'T: Design the pattern in one sitting. Step away from it often to get an overall perspective and clear your head after a while. This is more important than you realize. Had I not stepped away from this pattern...I'd have made a bizarre looking mouse. :)

I really hope you enjoy this pattern and it inspires you to make your own! :)

~That Farm Girl Teacher

Bucket Truck Pillow

As I discussed previously, this is one of the Christmas gifts I made for my a family member. You can see this post for more information. This would also make a wonderful new baby gift, retirement gift, new hire gift, etc.

He is 7 or 8 and loves everything about his dad's job as a lineman. This customized pillow has his name on the front, his dad's bucket truck, and the back is made from one of his dad's work shirts! I actually think he had a hard time deciding which of the sides he liked better! This pattern is available for free at my Ravelry and Craftsy stores. If you came here through those sites, welcome! Hopefully I can give a bit more insight here.

They were the inspiration behind last year's present, too! :)

There are so many ways to customize this pattern! You can change the name (I included an alphabet in the pattern), or if you're making this for an adult as a retirement gift, take the name off entirely and change it to the hire year, or a nickname. (Number chart is also included) Make the logo specific to another company, or take it off entirely, alter the colors, pick a unique backing, etc. Please email me at thatfarmgirlteacher@gmail.com if you need assistance, or if you'd like to order a finished pillow from me.

I'll start with my inspiration. As I mentioned before, Gege Crochet made a really awesome Mario afghan that served as my initial muse. It began when I had an interest in why exactly one would want to learn to do the Afghan Stitch or Tunisian Crochet. Everything I'd seen so far seemed dull as it was always worked in one color and seemed easy to do the same thing with knitting or crochet. I stumbled on her YouTube videos accidentally and fell in love with the technique and the unique pattern she was creating. If this is your first time doing the Afghan stitch, or if you've never attempted doing all these crazy color changes I SERIOUSLY recommend her YouTube tutorials. It was how I learned and I found I needed little to no outside assistance as I was learning. Even if you're pretty well-versed, at least watch her video on making color changes. Doing it 'wrong' can create holes in your project, and tie your yarn into a knot the size of your head.

I dove right in, actually starting with a laptop case I started for my sister. (And still haven't finished, I know, I know, don't judge.) She wasn't really using a pattern for say, but was using pixelated pictures. The Mario game lends itself well to that as it is very 'blocky' but I was trying to create a horse, and didn't even know where to begin. Other patterns weren't specific to my task, and didn't look like my sister's horse. Finally, I pulled out some grid paper, taped four sheets together, and started making my own pattern.

The 'pattern' for Lawton's pillow.

I found that the best way to do this was to basically draw the design I wanted in pencil as if there wasn't grid paper, and then go back and match the blocks to the penciled in drawings. For example, I drew the circle of the wheel, then matched squares to my original line, keeping it symmetrical. This is really useful for curved lines because before doing this, everything with a curve basically looked...stupid. I also ran a quick crayon over it, sometimes in the actual color I wanted, more often in whatever was handy to get a better idea of the overall affect. When stitching, you'll begin in the bottom right hand corner and work up.

Gege didn't add much to the fabric after she'd stitched it, mostly because it wasn't really necessary for her design, but as soon as I finished this one I knew I had to add to it. I grabbed my yarn needle and yarn and used back stitching to add doors in the bed of the truck, a truck number, a step under the drivers door, outlining around his name, lines for the fender, the 'w' in the logo, lines along the top of the bed to add shadowing, etc. I also used cross stitches to make the head lights and tail lights (I forgot them originally) and half cross stitches to make the slope of the boom a little more gentle and not so 'stair-steppy.' I also slip sitched over the diagonals in the logo to make them pop more. I wish I'd taken photos pre and post embellishments so I can show you how remarkable the change was, but I really think this was a design where the embellishments made a huge difference in the overall look.

I had a little fun with the yarns used as well. The hubcaps aren't actually yarn, but quarter-inch silver metallic ribbon. The yarn used in the name is a beautiful hand-spun, variegated yarn I bought at a LYS in Asheville, NC that I'd been saving for the 'perfect' project. The stripes weren't originally planned. I planned on using the yellow at the bottom for the entire pillow, I knew I'd run out and bought more, but alas, when I arrived home I found it was just a shade off, the result of coming from a different dye lot. I was NOT starting over, so the stripes were a solution to this speed bump. I actually wound up liking the stripes better than I would have liked a solid yellow background.

Originally I was going to use a denim backing, but I thought a more personal touch would be to use the actual shirt used by the company. My dad also works there, but I really wanted the shirt to be specific to Lawton so through a lot of help from his mom, a friend, and my sister, they were able to get the shirt to me just in time! If you'd also like to use a shirt, I wouldn't suggest going smaller than a men's size medium. You could certainly use a smaller shirt, but know you'll probably need to do some patching in order to make it large enough. To get the perfect size, I pinned the finished front to the shirt and cut around it. You could probably use pinking shears to prevent fraying but I wanted to be double-sure this would last for many years, so I completed a double-fold machine hem, first. You could also serge the edge, or complete any hem you prefer. Using a yarn needle and embroidery thread or tatting yarn, complete a blanket stitch around the perimeter. You'll want to insert the needle about a quarter inch from the edge (or just under your hem, if you created one) and make each stitch about a quarter inch apart.

Using the blanket stitched edge, join the front and back together, wrong sides together using a single crochet stitch. If you are using a  button-up shirt like mine, you can stuff through the button, otherwise leave a small section open along the edge and remember to stuff it before you finish closing. My favorite part about this, is probably the fact that you don't have to weave in a million ends, just stuff them in the pillow. :)

To make up for stealing his shirt I also made dad a coozie. :) There's not a pattern for this, I pulled a coozie out of our kitchen drawer and stitched the sleeve around it.

 
I'd also like to share some important "Do's" and "Don'ts" I learned using the afghan stitch:
DO: Customize this pattern, or create your own, I promise you can do it!
DO: Watch the Gege Crochet tutorials on YouTube, especially the one on color changes.
DO: Take lots of pictures of the process, I really wish I had taken more. 
DO: Stay organized when arranging the skeins, the order you use them is best.
DON'T: Try to travel with this. This is really not the project you work on in the car or at the doctor's office. Sometimes you'll have so many skeins attached at once you'll have more of a headache untying the knots than it's worth.
DON'T: Over embellish. Step away from the work OFTEN and eliminate the inclusion of truly unnecessary details that would clutter and take away from the design rather than add to it. (For example, I chose not to include a line for the driver's door as it would clutter the area around the logo.
DON'T: Be afraid to ask your family member for their opinion. My dad was especially helpful on this one. He works for the company and was really helpful for advice on getting the correct proportions when designing the pattern, and determining which of the embellishments were unnecessary. (I tried this wacky single crochet thing on the boom and he let me know it looked like a hot mess. Trust me--he was right!)
DON'T: Design the pattern in one sitting. Step away from it often to get an overall perspective and clear your head after a while. This is more important than you realize. Had I not stepped away from this pattern and done some dishes, I would have made a truck with very tiny wheels. It's amazing the things you'll miss if you spend too long staring at the same thing without taking a break.

I really hope you enjoy this pattern and it inspires you to make your own! :)

~That Farm Girl Teacher

Merry Christmas

I know, I haven't made good on my promises, but I will be making up for it soon, I ..er.. promise :D Between wedding planning, work, and school, I haven't had a ton of free time, and most of what I do have goes towards actually crafting...instead of blogging about crafting. Hopefully I will work my schedule out better, but for now, let me show you what I've been working on.

From left to right. Horses: Tux, Jose, Drew Piney. Dogs: Mandy Cole. Standing people: My dad, Randy, and sister, Miranda. Sitting people: Me, my mom, Tammy. For the story of our annual family Christmas photo, click here.

By the way, I know it's past Christmas, but Santa brought the Wooten household the flu for Christmas and we're just running behind in general. :)

Every year for Christmas I give the children in my family handmade gifts. (To see last year's, click here.) This year, I decided to use some new skills I learned with the afghan crochet stitch (sometimes called Tunisian crochet) to make personalized pillows for each of them. I was really inspired by an amazing Mario afghan crocheted by the INCREDIBLE Gege over at GegeCrochet. (Link: here, seriously, go check it out, it's amazing!!!) She also has wonderful tutorials on her YouTube profile I recommend if you are new to this technique, I used her videos myself when I was learning. All of these patterns were created by me, I'll talk a little bit about the process I use to create them here, and again when I 'officially' share these patterns. I'm still working on how to transfer them from paper into a digital format, and will be putting them on Craftsy and Ravelry as soon as I'm finished.

This was the first one I made for my cousin, Tiffany. The original horse design actually came from a different pattern I made for a laptop case for my sister. The coloring is designed to actually look like her horse, Drawdy, and the pillow features a fringed forelock/mane, a metal ring for the halter, textured yarn in the heart, and hand spun yarn (by me) inside the horse's ears. The backing of the pillow is a cool faux leather fabric I've had laying around waiting on the perfect project.

 

The next pillow was designed for my cousin, Lawton. His father works as a lineman for the local electric company. He is all boy and loves everything about his dad's job. This bucket truck was designed with this in mind, featuring his dad's actual truck number and company logo. The pattern also has silver ribbon in the hubcaps, and variegated, hand spun yarn (Not by me, I purchased it about a year ago in North Carolina) for his name. The backing for this pillow is cut from one of his dad's old work shirts to add an even more personal touch. (I actually think he like this side more! haha)

To make up for cutting his shirt, I also made his dad this coozie from the sleeve. :) There's nothing special about it, basically I just dug a coozie we already had out of the drawer and sewed it into the sleeve.

Finally, this was for my cousin, Ethan. He has really been into Star Wars lately and his mom told me he draws Storm Troopers every time you turn around. This was actually the most challenging for me, mostly because I didn't have the slightest idea what a Storm Trooper actually looked like. After several Google Image searches, I arrived at this pattern and I think it's pretty close. The additional back stitching around the mouth (do they have mouths?) is what really bring it together. The pillow also has silver ribbon stitches to imitate stars and textured yarn for his name and the border. The backing of this one is a fleece fabric with realistic-looking images of the Solar System. I forgot to take a photo of the back before wrapping it though. :(

I still have two more pillows and a laptop case I'm working on that use similar techniques. When I share each of the patterns I'll talk a little more about what went into each of them. These shots are of the patterns I used to make them. As you can see, I taped grid paper together to design them and used crayons to color things in and get a better overall idea of how each would look. You may also notice that some things changed between the first design and the final product.