April 03, 2020

A Baby Yoda for Jerry

This weather has been gorgeous in Michigan the last couple of days! It's so weird--usually we get a big snowstorm in late March or early April after thinking that the last snowstorm in March would be the end of it. I'm really starting to believe that this may be it--the real start of spring :)

When I woke up, I wanted to finish a project I was working on as a gift for Jerry. As you know, he's a total Star Wars nerd, and he has been obsessed with Baby Yoda ever since November when the Star Wars TV show came out.

When I became interested in crocheting and knitting again, I started on an afghan; then I realized that I really need to do projects that have instant gratification in order to stay interested. I enjoy them more!

So I decided that making little plush toys (amigurumi) would be a good thing to work on. On Amazon, I bought a variety bag of tiny balls of yarn in several different colors (Amazon affiliate link). Then I saw a pattern for a Baby Yoda on Ravelry and I just knew I had to make it for Jerry.

The pattern was in Spanish, and I'd never had to deal with that situation before! There were several other patterns, but I needed one that was very small (due to amount of yarn) and that was free (I didn't want to buy a pattern when there were several free ones).

Despite the fact that I am FLYING through the Spanish lessons in Duolingo (thank you all for the suggestion!), I was super confused when try to decipher the pattern. I managed to read it well enough to make the Baby Yoda, but I had to totally wing it when it came to the coat.

This morning, I finished it up and gave it to Jerry. I like how it turned out! It was my first time using "safety eyes" (they are used in amigurumi) and it was fun.


While I was working on that, my sister sent me a text asking if I could make some face masks for her and Shawn, and possibly a friend of hers (plus her friend's family). And a couple of other people asked for masks, too. Since I was going to make some for my sister, I thought I might as well make as many as I can in case other people need them.

As of today, there is a federal recommendation that everybody wear masks when going in public to grocery stores and whatnot.

I don't have a ton of fabric, and there was no way I was going to be able to make enough masks with pockets for filters (it took a very long time to make them for my family); but since most people don't have the materials for filters anyways, I just decided to do an extra layer of fabric--and for one layer, I used the fabric from a pillowcase. I read that pillowcases are better at keeping out contaminants than regular old cotton fabric.

I noticed that it's definitely harder to breathe through a pillow case than through other fabric (the ones that I cut up weren't used--they came with a fitted sheet for a futon, and we only used the sheet). I know the masks aren't perfect, but they are better than nothing!

I have only been to the grocery store once in the past couple of weeks. It's so weird! I'm always saying that we need to stop grocery store trips, because there is no reason to go--we have plenty of food at home. Now we're actually abiding by that.

Jerry wore his mask to the store today, along with a hat and sunglasses, and got some odd looks ;) But I actually saw a lot of people wearing masks when I went to the store.


Those are actually my sunglasses! Maybe that's why he got the looks. ;)

Anyways, today Eli got a baseball net/cage thing delivered from Amazon. Since he hasn't been able to play baseball, he's going stir-crazy. I love that he plays baseball instead of video games, so I wanted to encourage that--and we bought a huge net thing where he can hit balls off of a tee without them going halfway across the neighborhood.

Jerry went to the store to get some groceries for my parents, and while he was gone, Eli and I set up his net. It was the WORST designed thing I'd ever seen! Setting it up was super frustrating and took about five times longer than I thought it would. In the end, I don't know if we're even going to keep it. It was expensive, especially considering that it's not the greatest quality (something we discovered today during the set-up).

Tonight, Jerry and I had another game night with with our friends via Zoom. It was fun! And thanks to Zoom, I've now seen my old high school friends more in the last two weeks than I have in a year! We played Wits & Wagers again; I think next week, we'll play Scattergories. If any of you have ideas of games that would work well to be played online, please share! I know there are online versions of games (like Cards Against Humanity) but I like the actual physical games.

Oh! I was THRILLED to notice that Nip/Tuck (from the FX channel way back about 15 years ago) is now on Hulu. I loved that show, and I've been looking for it to stream ever since. So, if any of you were fans, just letting you know that you can watch it again on Hulu.

If you haven't heard of it, it's a great show to binge watch during this lockdown. It was considered very "edgy" back then, and it's a mature show (just FYI). I remember that Nip/Tuck and The Shield were very popular and actually they opened the door to a whole new sort of genre of shows.

Funnily enough, I remember giving birth to Noah during an episode of The Shield, hahaha. I watched it every Tuesday night at 10:00. Noah was born at 10:46 pm on a Tuesday. (No, I wasn't actually watching it while I was pushing!) The Shield also had the most memorable finale of any show I've ever watched.

This post really doesn't have a point. It was just a busy day! Tomorrow, I want to finish up the masks I started making and hopefully get them mailed out. Jerry's off this weekend, so if we have another nice day, I'd like to go for a walk at the part or something.

2 comments:

  1. I'm so impressed with your masks! I'm a total novice sewer and trying to figure out how to make masks with a borrowed sewing machine. There are tons of tutorials online, but I'm just struggling with the basics like getting the machine to work. Thankfully I have a reusable mask from a trip to China about a year ago, but I'd like to try to make more to donate to local hospitals!

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  2. LOVE Baby Yoda. Way to go winging it on the jacket, but especially for reading Spanish to follow the rest of the pattern. You are amazing! I too made masks for my son and his family (and daughter-in-law's brother) yesterday. My sewing machine was being cantankerous, but it would have been super easy had it cooperated with me. I was so frustrated, and did a lot of swearing, but in the end after finding a You-Tube video on how to make them, I ended up with four masks for them. I made a smaller one for 2-year-old Grandson River. (And I forgot to comment on your post with the pics of your blondie niece and nephew--OMG, They are SO CUTE!) I will make masks for Duane and I when I work up enough courage to face my damned sewing machine again. Was glad to read pillow cases are good material to use, because one side of the masks I made was a pillow case and the other side was an old tablecloth. They might not be perfect, but better than nothing, right? I think wearing masks should have been the CDC's recommendation from Day One. It can't hurt anything to wear a mask, and it just might help in keeping the virus from spreading. Hope you and yours are staying well!

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