Well, at least on this blog anyway ;)

Here comes the sec­ond pat­tern for the 12 Days of Wood­land Crea­tures (and Their Favourite Things)! To the awe­some vis­i­tors who have com­ment­ed on my last post — thanks SO much for join­ing me in the cro­chet-along! And to every­one — it is nev­er too late to join in the fun (details here)! You can make all or a few or just one of the 12 crea­tures you like. It would be real­ly great to see what every­one has cre­at­ed at the end!

AND! I’ve cre­at­ed a Rav­el­ry group! I thought maybe it will make it eas­i­er to share pic­tures. Please feel free to join if you use Rav­el­ry! I’ve nev­er made a Rav group before, bare­ly par­tic­i­pat­ed in one and not so sure about how they run… so we’ll see how it goes! :D

So, any­hoo, the elu­sive white squir­rels are leg­endary crea­tures in Toron­to’s Trin­i­ty Bell­woods Park (though I’m very sad :’( to find out that we just lost one recent­ly). There is a street and a cof­fee shop in the neigh­bour­hood named after the white squir­rel. I have yet to encounter a real one, so I just keep mak­ing cro­cheted ones. Appar­ent­ly there are also white squir­rels in Exeter, Ontario, which are not albi­no with red eyes, like the Trin­i­ty Bell­woods squir­rels, but just have white fur instead of the more com­mon grey or black fur. So I sup­pose the white squir­rel we’re mak­ing here today can be a vari­ety of the Exeter squir­rels. Actu­al­ly, I chose to give the squir­rel the reg­u­lar black eyes because I’m mak­ing it for a baby mobile, and the thought of tiny red eyes star­ing down at the baby is just… a bit strange.

I think the white squir­rel also makes a nice tree orna­ment! :D

The con­struc­tion of this squir­rel is rather sim­ple. It’s made out of 4 pieces: 2 head pieces and 2 body pieces. Oh and a fluffy tail.

I used, as usual:

Worsted weight white yarn

3.5 mm hook

Black beads for eyes

Nee­dle and thread for sewing and embroidering

A bit of pink yarn for embroi­der­ing the nose

A bit of fluffy white yarn for tail (like Bernat Boucle or Lion Brand Home­spun)

Pat­tern:

Head (make 2) — cro­cheted in rounds

Round 1: 6 sc in mag­ic ring, sl st in first sc to join.

Round 2: ch 1 (does not count as a stitch), 2 sc in each sc around, sl st in first sc to join.

Round 3: 1 sc in each of first 3 sc, sc in next sc, ch 3 (this is an ear), sc in same sc, 1 sc in each of next 3 sc, sc in next sc, ch 3 (this is anoth­er ear), sc in same sc, 1 sc in each of next 2 sc, 2 sc in next sc, 2 dc tog over next 2 sc (this is the nose), ch 2, sc in the same st as first sc of the round, sl st in next sc, fas­ten off, weave in ends.

*When fin­ish­ing the 2nd head shape, leave a long tail for sewing.

Body (make 2) — cro­cheted in rows

ch 4

Row 1: sc in 2nd st from hook, 1 sc in each of next 2 sc, turn (3 sc).

Row 2: ch 1 (does not count as a stitch), sc in each sc across, turn (3 sc).

Row 3: repeat row 2.

Row 4: ch 1, sc in first sc, 2 sc in next sc, sc in last sc, turn (4 sc).

Row 5: ch 1, sc in each sc across, turn (4 sc).

Row 6: ch 1, sc in each of next 2 sc, 2 sc in next sc, sc in last sc, turn (5 sc).

Row 7: ch 1, sc in each of next 3 sc, 2 sc in next sc, sc in last sc, turn (6 sc).

Row 8: ch 1, 2 sc tog 3 times, fas­ten off, weave in ends.

*When fin­ish­ing the 2nd body shape, leave a long tail for sewing.

Attach­ing tail:

1. Cut 6 pieces of the fluffy white yarn, each about 5–6 inch­es long.

2. Find a gap between stitch­es in the low­er cen­tre of the squir­rel body.

3. With cro­chet hook, pull each piece of the fluffy white yarn, one by one, through the same gap, leav­ing the long tails on one side of the body piece and short ends on the oth­er side, like so… (I hope you can see it alright… white yarn is a bit dif­fi­cult to photograph…)

 

4. Tie the short ends togeth­er by pair­ing them up and tying each pair in dou­ble knots.

Assem­bling body and head:

1. With all the short ends of the tail inside, sew the 2 pieces of body together.

2. Sew eyes and embroi­der nose on one head piece (I made a giant french knot with pink yarn for the nose).

3. Posi­tion the head pieces so that they sand­wich the body, with the nose cov­er­ing the top row (neck) of the body. Sew head togeth­er, and sewing through all head and body lay­ers when you get to the neck/nose area.

(If you’re mak­ing an orna­ment, you can make a loop with a piece of rib­bon and sand­wich it between the 2 head pieces at the top of the head before sewing the head together).

Posi­tion­ing the tail:

Curl the tail up in a posi­tion that you like on the side of the body. Take one piece of yarn from the tail and pull it through a stitch on the edge of the body through the front, where the head and body meet, then take the same piece of yarn and wrap it loose­ly but secure­ly around the entire tail once, then pull it through the same stitch on the body through the front again, and tie a knot at the stitch on the back to secure.

Trim tail to the length you like.

And the squir­rel is done! :D

 

Hap­py week­end, everyone!