Lucky the Horse

    I made my mom her own Horace Jr. doll. And managed to make it in 4 instead of 7 hours! So it was finished for her birthday.

   As you know she wanted a black one to go with her rooster. Originally I was going to give it brown eyes, but mom suggested red. I think he looks pretty cool. She named him Lucky.


                 Thank you for reading Bats Bizarre's offical blog. Have a bat-tastic day!  

      

Horce Horse Jr.

   2014 is the year of the horse. It officially starts this Friday. Mom and I will be making eggrolls.

 
    I came up with Horace Jr. because I wanted to make a horse that could be displayed like my snakes. (We'll be leaving the snakes up because we'd miss them, and having a reptile in the home supposedly brings prosperity, so it'll all work out.)

   It took me 7 hours to knit the first Horace Jr.. Hopefully I will be able to get that time down. I know I spent a bit of it stopping to check the pattern's math and my assumptions and have a tendency to knit slower when I'm working on a new pattern. So, it might be possible.

  Right now I'm working on a solid black one for my Mom. She wanted one that would match her rooster ornament. It will probably become a variation on the listing with a photo.

I finished the head and body in one hour and thirty five minutes, but I still have to knit the I-cord legs, mane, and tail and sew it all together.


   Horace Jr. is a miniature version of my Horace Horse doll. He can stand on his own four feet.
Each Horse is 4 1/4" (10.795cm) tall not counting his ears when sitting up, 4" (10.16cm) on all fours, and 1 3/4" (4.445cm) wide.
 Like all of my work, each is signed with a small 'J' on the bottom.
A hook is not included.
 The yarn is 100% acrylic. Stuffing is 100% polyester. Machine washable with low heat on gentle/delicate cycle. Made in a smoke free environment. Custom colors are available; please ask before you order.
            Horace Jr. Ships every where.

Here is a link to the listing: https://www.etsy.com/listing/176453282/horace-horse-jr-chinese-new-year-doll
   
             Thank  you for reading Bats Bizarre's offical blog. Have a bat-tastic day!

Ornaments and Chistmas Lights

          There's a cold front blowing in that's supposed to drop the temperatures here to the 40s and 30s and bring rain to boot, so Mom and I are going to spend today inside putting up the Christmas decorations. (and baking cookies)


    After many tries and several site changes I finally got a good picture of all three of my knitted roosters. It was almost impossible to get a photo that wasn't too far away and still showed their pretty tail feathers and the rest of them, at the same time.

      I ended up having to get my mom to hold a branch from or tree while I took a photo. And spreading a bunch of gauzy fabric under my window with some between the roosters and my window to make the sunlight less harsh.    

   As you can see the black rooster in the picture has green eyes. He is a Christmas present for my mom and she said she wanted it to have green eyes. Unless someone orders a custom color the black roosters will have yellow eyes.  After this I will also be gluing an extra long tail feather she found while feeding the roosters onto mom's rooster. She was born in the year of the rooster so this is a good luck charm for her, too.   

 Here's a link to the listing: https://www.etsy.com/listing/169909098/rooster-ornament?

                  Thank you for reading Bats Bizarre's offical blog. Have a bat-tastic day!

Horace Horse

   I've added a new stuffed animal to my listings. Horace the horse, named for one of the lead characters in 'The Ranger's Apprentice' series. (a great series of books by the way.) I decided to work on a pattern for a knitted horse because 2014 is the year of the horse, I couldn't find a pendent I liked, and I cannot make a horse out of polymer clay.

   It took me about fourteen hours to make Horace, most of that time was either spent holding up one of his body parts and asking my mother 'This looks like something, right?' or going back and fixing something I didn't like. I'm hoping the second one won't take as long. I'm shooting for nine hours, that's an hour more than Roxi Rabbit, but there is a lot more involved in making Horace so nine might be doable.

   I learned to make a loop stich for his mane, but I'm not very good at it, yet, that's one of the reasons Horace has the longest processing time of all my items. Hopefully I can lower that as I get better at making him. For some reason tassels, like pompoms, are hard for me to make. I don't know if there is some trick to it or if I just naturally bad at it. Not that that stops me. I sew the base of the tail to secure all the threads. Otherwise it falls a part if you pull on one of the threads.

  This horse doll is about 10 1/2" (26.67cm) when sitting up, not counting his ears, and is 8" (20.32cm) at the shoulder when on all fours. (It takes a bit of work to make him stand like that.) He is one and a half feet (31.75cm) tall if you count the ears. Horace's body is 4" (10.16cm) wide. His legs are 4 1/2" (11.43cm) long and 1 1/2" (3.81cm) wide. His luxurious, black tail is about 8" (20.32cm) long at longest point.
   Here is a link to the listing: https://www.etsy.com/listing/163016552/horace-horse
He ships everywhere. 
   Every horse is unique; yours may not look exactly as pictured. Each is signed with a brown J on the seat.
   Horace is latte brown with a black mane and tail, but custom colors are available.

  Mom thinks he looks like a buffalo on all fours, so I guess I'm half way to a buffalo toy. And 90% of the way to a unicorn or a Pegasus.  It took a bit of work to make him able to stand on all fours while still being able to move his legs, but I really wanted him to be able to. Some of my favorite stuffed animals growing up were ones that were like that.



                 
                             Thank you for reading Bats Bizarre's offical blog. Have a bat-tastic day!