"It's exactly what I wanted!"

Caleb has been feeling left out of the "pillow pals" scene lately. Norah and Will both have these cozy pillows that transform into a stuffy and to add to the insult, Will's bear even shines stars in alternating colours onto the ceiling.

"Mom will you crochet me a dog? One of those pillow dogs? It could look like Chaz, with one ear up and one down, one leg a different colour, and it could be blue....or lots of different blues. Oh and his mouth could be doing this (cue dog face impersonation). And then, you could put a couple different patches of colour on his body and I could name him Patches.  "

Wow. He'd obviously had this all planned out for a while, so I sent him to my yarn box to pick out some colours that he liked. I've never made a stuffy before, but why not, I'll try. He came busting in the door after school a couple days later... "Mom, did you finish my dog?" My response?

"Wellll, how do you feel about turtles?" 

Worst.Dog.Ever. 

I sure do love that boy of mine. Even with only the head and body attached, it was clear that this stuffy was never going to look like a dog. "That's ok, Mom. It doesn't have to look EXACTLY like a dog. In fact, this is how I wanted it! Half dog, half turtle!! You're not as terrible at making stuffies as you think you are. "

I added legs and a poorly shaped tail that made the turtle look like a fat tailed gecko and almost chucked the whole thing out the front door. Did I mention I don't fail well?

Things I learned from this blasted dog:

1. If the shape is off early on...for the love - rip it out and start over;
2. Proportion, proportion, proportion;
3. If you decide to proceed with the tiny head, it will always look like a turtle. There is no return from turtle;
4. Stuffing does not fix shaping problems (see the aforementioned gecko-dog).

Caleb still loved his "dog" and he wasn't ready to give up on it, so I decided to take a second stab at the head.  For some reason, the math of how I wanted the head to look just made sense this time. The ears came out just as Caleb ordered and I love how cute the face is. I stuffed the turtle head inside the new one, filled in the space with stuffing and sewed the whole thing together. The journey to "dog" was long, but I am so happy with the result!

Now Glen is feeling left out. I can't win. "You still haven't made me anything. Will you make me a Yoda? With a walking stick, no - a lightsaber!" 

Stay tuned.