The World

And of course, the last piece of the birthday present was the world.  Discworld, that is.  Again, PlanetJune came to the rescue in helping me make that a reality.  I made the underworld first in all blue, reveled in the fact it was actually flat, photographed it, stuck it in Photoshop, laid a map of Discworld over it, marked stitches as different colors, printed it out and went to work on the top world.

I didn't realize until it was too late that I was pulling the yarn on the underside too tight, but it helped make the mountain 3D in the end.  I didn't cut the yarn between colors because that just seemed like too much work, just let go of the one I didn't need anymore and pulled up the one I did.

As to be expected, the pattern and what I was working on quickly departed from each other.  I don't know how, I don't know why, but I had to start changing colors on the fly and it worked out.  It's not 100 percent accurate, but who cares?  It turned out more perfect than I could have hoped, and it fit right on the backs of the elephants on the back of the great A'tuin.

There was so much back and forth making this, and for a while, I really worried that it wasn't going to turn out.  And then it all came together and it did.

Turtle!

The next part of that same birthday present was a turtle, pattern also purchased from PlanetJune.  This introduced me to the idea of shaping a 3D piece by adding or removing stitches.  Blew my mind.  Getting more and more crafty every day.

The turtle was a lot slower-going than the elephants for several reasons.  New techniques, of course.  Having to rip pieces out and start over a number of times, too.  General end-of-semester business, too.  Also a little bit of fear that it wouldn't turn out or it wouldn't be liked by its recipient.

It was worked on in the dorm, in the car, in the office, in class, at work - everyone saw it and everyone thought it was the best thing ever.  A number of people wanted one.

I managed to finish it by holding my hook different after the injury with the elephants, and got a lot of funny looks because it forced me to use my elbow for leverage rather than my wrist.  Digging and scooping and catching were all very different motions when I couldn't anchor the hook between those last two fingers.  It was a good learning experience.

As with the elephants, there were turtle parts.  There were shenanigans.  There was not a mailing issue that I heard of, which was great (unless you count the mailroom screwing up and giving me the wrong tracking number).

I really enjoyed working on the shell most.  It was so different from how I would have thought to approach the problem and really showed just how creative you can be with crochet as a form.  Building up the edges and figuring out how to make it more smooth than angular was particularly impressive.

I'll admit I'd love to have a turtle myself, but I don't know if I can devote myself to a month of work again so soon.  In the future, I will eventually have a turtle of my own to love.  This one was well-received.